Anitha Jayaraman

Peas-Broccoli Biriyani, boiled egg, fried Tofu-Cauli-Potato Kurma, Carrot-GreenMango grated raitha

Followed the instructions from Anubhavati-Tastes from my Kitchen

I learned to make this from a friend. We know Avocado is a healthy fruit. Mexican restaurants and fast foods serve these in abundance.

Required Items – Avocado(ripe), Onion, Black pepper powder, Lemon syrup & Tomato(optional).

1. Cut the onion and tomato into very small pieces.
2. Add required black pepper to it.
3. Add the lemon syrup and let it soak for 15mins.
4. Meanwhile open the Avocado and peel all the ripened flesh using a spoon/fork.
5. Add it to the mixture and mix it well with a fork.
6. Its all ready to serve with tortilla/corn chips.

Mom makes this occassionally. People who would like a bitter mixed taste will like this as well.

Required Items – Indian/Asian Raddish root stem/leaves & other sauting items.

1. Cut the greens into very small pieces.
2. Saute them with oil, mustard seeds and Urad dhal.
3. Add required salt. Start with a less amount of salt as raddish is of the salty variety.
4. Cook them to the required level until it gets tasty.

I learned to make this recently. It is so easy that you make it with Idly batter when its really thick. You can easily serve this for breakfast or dinner. You need the Appakaaral to make it.

Required Items – Oil, Idly batter, Onions, Green chillies, Coriander leaves.

1. Cut the onions and green chillies.
2. Saute them a little.
3. Add them to the batter.
4. Garnish with Coriander leaves too.
5. Heat the Appakaaral vessel with oil poured in each dip.
6. Pour the mixture into the dips.
7. Let it cook for a while and use a fork to turn the appams upside down.
8. You can remove them with the fork once its completely cooked.

I made this for Diwali. This time I finally followed the right proportion and did not use hot spices.

Required Items- 2 cups of Rice flour, 1 cup of Moong Dhal(Passi Parupu) + Chenna Dhal, Cumin seeds, Butter, Salt

• Fry both the dhal using a pan. Once its start changing color, remove them from heat and allow them to cool.
• Grind them using a mixie to powder.
• Take a small stick of butter and melt it.
• Mix 2 cups of rice flour, 1 cup of dhal flour, butter, salt and cumin seeds.
• Add a pinch of asafoetedia too.
• Add appropriate quantity of water.
• Start making the shapes on a plastic sheet or ziploc.
• Start frying them in hot oil

Not sure whether you want to call it this way or Puliyogare / Puliyodare / Pulisaadham. My mom calls it with the last one. However I make it, the Iyengar style will top the rank. But I cannot give up my mom’s old style of making it. When its a school picnic or family outing/travel, this will be made without fail. I did Thaligai for Perumal so I got a chance to do it this time.

Required Items – 1 cup of tamarind, peanuts, 6-7 red chillies, curry leaves, chenna dhal and other seasoning items

• Soak the tamarind in 4-5 cups of water. Add little salt and turmeric to it. Let it soak with it.
• Once it has soaked really well and you can get a concentrate out of it, start the process.
• In a vessel, season the mustard seeds, chenna dhal using gingelly oil(sesame oil)
• Add curry leaves and peanuts to it and fry for a while.
• Add 5 red chillies and fry them too.
• Add the tamarind concentrate and appropriate quantity of salt.
• Let it boil for ever. You need to wait until you get the required concentrate of it.
• While boiling, I added powdered Chenna dhall + red chillie powder. This is optional.

Oh yes, it a Kerala item, I thought I will give it a shot. I did not try it from scratch, instead I used the readymade puttu maavu(flour) from the shop. You need the Puttu kozha for cooking.

Puttu rolls

Required items – Puttu flour, Salt, Grated coconut and water

• To the flour, add little water and allow it to soak for 5 mins. Add a pinch of salt.
• After which use your hand to press & break the flour into tiny pieces.
• Put a pressure cooker on stove with water and let it boil.
• Wait until you see the vapor passing our of the cooker’s needle on top.
• Take the puttu Kozha and add the flour and grated coconut alternately.
• Close it and fix it on the cooker’s needle.
• Let it cook for 10mins, now remove the puttu kozha and use its rod to push the puttu from backside.

Kadalaicurry

Required Items – Garbonza beans(Chenna), Onions, tomatoes, Coconut milk, Chillie powder, salt, Coriander powder

• Pressure cook the beans for one whistle.
• Fry the cut onions and then tomatoes in oil
• To this add the chillie powder and salt and fry for a while.
• Add water to make it a gravy.
• To this add the boiled beans and mix them thoroughly with the gravy.
• Let it cook for a while. Add coconut milk to suppress the spice.

I made this for Satyanrayana Pooja. I would classify Kesari as one of the items that can be bravely attempted inspite of not being allowed to taste before pooja. Its a matter of ’sweet content’ and the appearance of the cooked food will guarantee the other aspect which is ‘properly cooked’.

Required Items - 2 cups of Rava(Sooji), sugar 2.5 cups, 1 cup ghee and other flavoring items.

• Fry the rava in a spoon of ghee until it turns light brown.
• Add 3-4 cups of water to the fried rava and allow it to boil and cook well.
• Once its cooked, slowly add the sugar. Keep stirring.
• Sugar will melt and bind the cooked rava.
• Add the remaining ghee while stirring. Also add Kesari powder.
• Once its cooked, add ghee fried cashews & raisins
• To this add cardamom powder and Pachai karpooram(camphor used for flavoring)

When I was small, I used to stay away from Kurma but now I think I am OK. The reason being I do not prefer the masala flavor all times, I know I am a specimen -:)

Anyway I made this as a side dish for the Vegetable Biryani. I used only white peas.

Required Items – 1/2 onion, 1 big tomato, ginger, garlic, green chillies, red chillies(optional), 1 cup grated coconut, seasoning masala items(bay leaf, cinnamon, cardamom, cloves fennel seeds, etc) & some kind of peas(bean) and/or vegetables(cauliflower, potatoes)

• Boil the peas and/or vegetables using a pressure cooker and keep it aside. Add salt while boiling.
• Cut onions, tomatoes, garlic, ginger, green chillies into pieces. Not required to be tiny pieces as we are anyways going to grind them.
• Fry them in oil for sometime until they start shrinking to get rid of their raw taste.
• Cool the mixture and grind them using a mixie. While grinding add grated coconut.
• Grind it to a paste. Not required to be really thick.
• Now add some oil to a pan and fry the seasoning items.
• To this add the paste and stir for sometime. Add water to make it like a concentrated soup.
• Now add the peas and/or vegetables.
• Add required salt and let it cook until the peas gets the flavor.

I am still counting the uppama varieties. I feel its a nice and light breakfast or dinner item. You dont want to eat too spicy early in the morning and you definitely dont want to eat more when you go to sleep.

Required items – Jowarisi(Sabudana) & seasoning items

• For best results, soak the jowarisis hours before. May be soaking at night should help but I did in the morning & it was little chewy.
• In a pan, get the seasoning items fried. Mustard seeds, Urad dhal, Chenna dhal, Peanuts, Curry leaves fried in oil.
• Add a little of turmeric powder. Add the soaked jowarisi to the pan and mix well.
• Add salt accordingly
• You can also add cut onions while frying the seasoned items.
• Garnish with coriander leaves when done.

Mom makes this wonderful combination of food together wiht Pudhina Chutney. I am a strict follower of my mom trying to match food accordingly.

More Kuzhambu

Required Items – 2 cups of curd, salt, 4 green chillies,  1/4 tsp cumin seeds,  1/2 tsp toor dhal,  1/2 tsp chenna dhal, 1/2 tsp rice, 1/4 cup grated coconut, curry leaves and some suitable vegetable.

• Soak all of the dhal & rice for 15mins.
• Grind the soaked items together with green chillies, cumin, coconut and curry leaves using a mixie.
• Dilute the curd and whip it to change to butter milk.
• Mix the buttermilk with the mixture and also salt. Start cooking this on the stove.
• After it boils, season with mustard seeds, red chillies, curry leaves. Add coriander leaves at the end.
• With this you can also add a vegetable. I boiled few potatoes and added to it while cooking. If you prefer to add eggplant(brinjal) or okra(ladies-finger), fry them in oil and then add to boil.

Potato curry

Required Items – potatoes, onions, tomatoes, seasoning items, chillie powder and salt

• Cut onions and tomoatoes to tiny slices
• Season the oil with mustard seeds.
• Add the cut onions and fry them until its light brown.
• Add the cut tomatoes and fry them to a gravy
• Add chillie powder & salt. Fry them without adding water first.
• Now add water little by little and make a gravy mixture.
• Add the boiled cut potatoes to this and mix them thoroughly with the gravy.

Hmm..the festival season is keeping me busy!! Kutty Krishnan loves sweets and savouries. I was also born on the same birth star as Lord Sri Krishna. Anyway this is the first time I decided to make sweets and savouries upfront for Krishna Jayanthi/Gokulashtami. I tried a few varieties with friends and they came out really well for a first timer.

1.Coconut burfi

Required items - Equal cups of Grated coconut, Sugar & Water. Ghee, nuts of your choice. I took 8 cups of grated coconut.

• Melt the sugar to a syrup using equal cups of water. Wait for the consistency until you get strands.
• To this add the grated coconut and keep stirring on low flame
• Wait until the mixture turns out semi solid and ready to freeze from free-flowing.
• Keep a tray ready. Apply ghee on it.
• Drop the mixture on this tray and flaten it to get regular shapes.
• Make squares immediately before it gets hard
• Similarly keep the ghee-fried-nuts ready. Affix them quickly on the squares.

2. Rava laddu

When I think of this, all comes to my mind is my 10th class teacher distributing this sweet on her bday to all the whole class team. I think her’s was more powdered rava, not sure though!

Required items – Equal cups of rava & Sugar – lets say 2 +2. Ghee – 1/2 cup, Cashews, Raisins, Cardamom powder and milk.

• Fry the rava in a spoon of ghee until it turns light golden colour.
• In a large vessel, add this rava, sugar and the cardamom powder. Keep it aside after mixing them thoroughly.
• Break the cashews & fry them along with raisins in the ghee. Add it to the mixture.
• Start molding the laddus into small balls with your hand. While doing it add milk little by little to the mixture to get the required consistency.
• Refrigerate if you plan to eat it later.

3. Thattai

I learnt this from my friend here & I am sure the ingredients vary from the traditional making.

Required items – 5 cups of Rice Flour, 1 cup of Urad Flour, Chillie powder, Salt, 1 stick butter, 1/2 cup Chenna dhal.

• Soak the chenna dhal in water 1-2 hours before.
• Melt the butter to liquid state.
• Mix the rice flour, urad flour, chillie powder, salt, butter, and chennai dhal in a vessel.
• Add appropriate quantity of water so that the mixture is made to a dough.
• The dough should be good enough to make the thin round shapes of thatai.
• Use oil to make shapes on a plastic sheet(use a big ziploc cover).
• You can start frying them in a oil pan.
• Look out for color change and it would rise to the top in oil once its cooked.

4. Seedai

Refer to Asha’s website

We did not really succeed in making this, it started bursting out like anything. We got panic and we dropped the plan making just these.

5. Karasev

Required items -2.5 cups of Besan flour, 1 cup of Rice flour, chillie powder, pepper powder, salt, ghee

• Mix the above adding 3 tbsp of ghee.
• Add water to get the required consistency.
• The consistency should be good enough for it fall from the ladle that has holes in it(Jalli Karandi)
• To make it fall onto the frying oil, you need to rub the dough on the ladle.
• Once it gets fried crispy with a color change, you can drain them from oil.

For the best pictures of the process, follow this link MenuToday

6. Boondi

This is my best try this time. It came out well and realized it 2 days later -:) But the shapes were little irregular.

Required items -2 cups of Besan flour, 1 cup of Sugar, cardamom powder, cashews, raisins, ghee

• Prepare the sugar syrup using water and let it become thick. We will use this for soaking the boondi.
• Mix the flour, water(1 cup) with a pinch of cardamom powder.
• Take care of consistency. It should be watery and fall off the ladle.
• It falls off as you pour the batter through the ladle.
• Let it fry in the oil until it bulges out.
• Drain them and drop them in the sugar syrup.
• By the time you drop the next set of boondi in sugar syrup, move the previous set to a tray.
• Finally add ghee fried cashews and raisins to it.

One should appreciate their traditions & customs for giving us a wide range of festivals with one thousand reasons! V.V is celebrated on the first friday before Pournami in the Avani month. This is for the goddess Lakshmi in the name of Varalakshmi Amman. I followed a book and also my MIL’s words -:) to prepare dishes for this pooja. The below are the required ones for Pooja.

1) Kuzhi-Appam

Required items – Raw Rice, Jaggery, Half banana, Cardamom powder for preparation of the batter.  AppaKaral (special pan with molds), Oil, Appa Kuchi(optional) for cooking.

• Soak the raw rice in water for 1 – 2 hours.
• Powder equal amount of Jaggery stones.
• Using a mixie, grind the rice, Jaggery and a half banana. Also add little cardamom powder to it.
• Add water until you get a watery consistency like thin dosa batter.
• Pour oil in each of the molds of the Appakaral. Heat the pan.
• Once heated well, you can start pouring the batter in each mold.
• Once the batter turns to an appam, use a fork or Appa kuchi to turn the appam upside down
• Once cooked again, you can remove the appams
• Continue the process for the remaining batter

2) Kozhukattai (sweet, salt)

Rice flour is required. It is better to prepare the pooranams first.

Required items for sweet pooranam – Equal amounts of Jaggery & Grated coconut, Cardamom powder.

• Melt the Jaggery in a pan on the stove. To this add the grated coconut and cardamom powder.
• Fry them until they reach a sticky consistency for stuffing.

Required items for salt pooranam – I cup Urad, green chillies, seasoning items.

• Soak a cup of Urad dhal for an hour or so. Grind them with few green chillies.
• Steam the Urad dhal mixture using an idly vessel.
• Break the steamed mixture to pieces. Fry them with seasoned mustard seeds.

Kozhukattai

• Fry(warm up) the rice flour using a pan.
• Heat water in a vessel. The quantity of water should be the same as that of the rice flour you will be using.
• When it is boiling hot, add the rice flour slowly and stir strongly.
• Add a pinch of salt to this mixture.
• Once its ready as a dough, remove from stove and cool it for a while.
• Make shapes out of it to stuff the pooranam.
• Steam the stuffed items using an idly vessel. Your kozhukatai is ready.

3) Sweet Pongal (Chakarai Pongal)

This is an easy dish that I would prepare for any occasion but anyway to this festival it is a must.

Required items - 2 cups rice, 1 cup moong dhal, 3 cups jaggery, cashew, raisins, cardamom, ghee

• Wash the rice and dhal. Fry the dhal using little ghee.
• Using a pressure cooker, cook the rice and dhal. Add double the amounts of water.
• In this case 6 cups of water is required. I minus a cup of water and substitute with a cup of milk.
• Cook for 3-4 whistles depending on the power of the cooker. It has to be cooked really well and cannot look dry.
• On the other burner, take a non-stick vessel and melt the jaggery to liquid by adding little quantity of water.
• To this add the cooked rice and dhal. Keep stirring until they mix up well.
• Add little ghee while stirring in order to bind.
• Finally add the ghee-fried cashew, raisins, cardamom.

4) Parupu Payasam

This is kinda same as Chakkarai pongal. Oops I forgot the instructions, will check at home and will be back to write it out.

Required items - 2 cups of moong dhal, 1/2 cup of chenna dhal, 2.5 cups of jaggery, thinly cut coconut pieces, milk, cashews, cardamom.

• Fry the dhals again in low flame using little ghee.
• Pressure cook them adding double the quantities of water. Substitute 1-2 cups of water with milk.
• Melt the jaggery using little water.
• Mix the cooked dhal with this. It has to be little watery being Payasam(supposed to drink!!)
• Fry cashews, cardamom and cocconut pieces in ghee. Add it to the payasam.

5) Medhu Vada

I am hoping Aliya can refer back to this section as she pointed me out to write it down instead of recommending the readymade pack which I did for a quick dinner special -:)

Required items -2 cups of Urad dhal, 2 Green chillies, Pepper, Asafoetedia, Salt, Oil, Corinader leaves, Curry leaves, Ginger.

• Soak Urad dhal in water for  4-5 hours atleast.
• Grind it using a grinder or mixie without adding water. Its difficult to grind it hence suggesting a grinder. Sprinkle little water whenever it annoys you while grinding.
• Using a mixie, grind the chillies, pepper, curry  leaves, corinader leaves.
• Mix this with the batter. Add salt, asafoetedia.
• Take a small banana leaf or a thick plastic cover. Apply oil to your hand and the leaf.
• Make shapes of the vada on the leaf and start frying them in oil.
• Wet your hand everytime in water so that the batter doesnt stick onto your hand.
• Fry themuntil the oil stops bubbling and the vada changing to brown color.

6) Raw rice Idly

Idly is not a big deal but this is the first time I am making Idly with Raw rice and without boiled rice. Ladies(wives) are not supposed to eat boiled rice on this day and hence this gets useful for lunch and dinner.

Required items - 2 cups of raw rice, 1 cup of Urad dhal and salt.

• Soak rice and urad dhal separately for 3-4 hours.
• Grind them separately adding required quantity of water. I used a mixie being less quantity.
• Mix them and ferment it overnight.
• The next day, Idly is sure to come within shape and not sticky.

To complete the cooking on this special day, I made aracha vita Pudalangai(Snake Gourd) Sambar, Potato-Methi fry, Parupu rasam and applam.

I had invited people for dinner on this special day.

I know its a wierd combination. Dont worry, I reused the Bhaji to stuff inside the sandwich.

What do you need – Sandwich buns, butter, cut onions, cut tomatoes, ginger-garlic paste, Pav Bhaji masala powder, Chilli powder, fresh vegetables and/or soaked beans.

• To make the Pav, I used the regular sandwich buns that you get at the stores. Toasted them traditionally on a flat pan using butter.
• For bhaji, you can use any vegetable of your choice. I used soaked black eye peas(Karamani), potatoes, carrots and also some eggplants.
• Pressure cook these to 3-4 whistles so that they get mashed completely.
• Start cooking the mashed mixture. Add salt, Pav Bhaji masala powder and a little bit of Chilli powder.
• You can vary the proportion of these powders accordingly to your spice taste.
• On the other stove, take a small plan and fry the cut onions in butter. Add it to the cooking mixture.
• Now fry the cut tomatoes in the same pan and add it to the cooking mixture.
• Again, fry ginger-garlic paste and add it to the mixture.
• Your Pav Bhaji is now ready to eat. You can add cut onions and lemon syrup to flavor the food.

Sandwich

• Take 2 slices of bread and apply butter to its outer sides.
• I stuffed the Bhaji inside and pressed them on a sandwich maker.

While Aadi Velli, Peruku, Pooram are the busy festivals during this special month. Most of the familes do not forget to make the Raagi (Kaezhvaragu) Koozh on atleast one of the sundays during this month. My elder sister follows this custom and I got so attached to the Koozh because of her. Non-vegetarians have their suitable side dishes but I made my yummy counterpart last sunday. My sister did her ritual in India on the same day and I wanted to be a copy-cat.

Koozh-

• Its a 2 day process. Soak the raagi flour the previous day morning in suitable quantity of water. Maintain the consistency in equal to the Idly batter.
• In the night, cook 3-4 cups of rice using the traditional method. While it gets to over-cook, add this raagi batter and start stirring.
• Stir to boil and then leave it aside.
• The next day morning, add a cup of curd and salt and mix it again. To this add finely cut onion pieces.

Bean curry

• I used the motchaikottai dried bean. Soak it in water the previous day night.
• The next day pressure cook it to 1-2 whistles.
• You can choose any vegetable to go along with it. I chose eggplant(brinjal). Cut the vegatble into small pieces.
• In a pan, after seasoning add finely cut onions and tomatoes and deep fry them.
• To this add little water and add chilli powder and salt. Let it boil to a precipitate.
• To this add the cut vegetables and boiled beans. Let it cook for a while to bind to the precipitate.