Matar Paneer ( green peas with Roasted cottage cheese)

Presenting here my verison(= jhatpat , quick ot make ,easy to cook :)) ) of "Matar Paneer" . I have always been a great fan of this dish , and i used to make it from the ready to cook masala when i was in India , just as i made it here . This is first time I made it from scratch at home,and to my surprise it turned out to be exactly as I expected it to be. Not only taste but the color of home made also matches perfectly with the one made using readymade masala for Matar Paneer

Ingredients:
1 medium sized tomato, roughly chopped
2 medium sized onion, peeled and chopped
1 inch cube of fresh ginger, peeled and chopped
1 cups shelled fresh or defrosted frozen peas
250 gms Paneer (Cottage cheese)
1/2 tsp Red chilli powder
1 tbsp. coriander seeds
2-3 Green chillies
1/4 tsp turmeric Powder,
½ tsp asofoetida ( Hing) ,
1/2 tsp of garam Masala,
Salt to taste
1-2 tbl olive oil

Method:

Peel Onions and ginger. Put the chopped Onion, Tomato, Coriander seeds, Green chillies and ginger into a blender or food processor along with 1/3 cup water and blend until you have a smooth paste. Leave paste in the blender container.

Place Paneer cubes on hot tawa(flat pan ) and roast it from all the sides carefully until brown. ( this is my slight variation from frying Paneer, which makes this dish even less oily and more healthy )

Heat oil in a Pan, when little hot add hing to it and then put in the contents of the blender it carefully. Stirring constantly, for about 5-6 minutes, or until paste turns a golden color. Add the turmeric powder and stir til it mix well with the material, cook this until it turn thick gravy like and add grean peas to it . Add red chilli powder, garam masala & salt, mix well .

Then add roasted paneer cubes and mix it well with gravy , on low flame , cover it and let it cook for 3-4 minutes or until peas are cooked, stirring occasionally . Delicious matar paneer is ready to serve.

As i havent been much on blogs these days , i am not aware of the events going on , will soon take a peek on all your blog and see if i can participate in any of the events soon.

As Asha asked, my exprience of migrating to here from India , is something for which I think ,I can write a big book , though somtimes I feel not much
difference at all, funny me , ha ha ha !!!
soon(!) , i will collect it to present something nicely here about that , atleast i believe that experience is worth sharing here with all my blog buddies.. :)
so stay tuned and i will be back with some recipes too .... ! :D

Happy Independence day...

Wishing all our friends and bloggers here a very Happy Independence Day... !

With a tight salute for all the heroes who fought for our freedom . Let's try keeping them alive in our memories and pass it on to next generations so that they can value the price of freedom for our nation- Matrubhumi.

I have something very musical to share with you all... ,was so pleased when i found this, feels like making my soul relaxed in the eternal voice of soothing music and music master playing in their own masti. i think it is the right time to share this will you all music lovers... :)
Many Thanks to all our Sangeet Ustad and A R Rehman for composing them together in a great way.



By any chance if you forgot the real meaning of this great poem by Rabindranath Tagore ( Nobel prize winner for Literature) here it is .

well, I will be back on blog this week with my recipes, so till then stay tuned and enjoy :) .

My entry to Spring Fling 2007.

Before I forget miss the last date to publish this, I think now is the time for this post :)


Hubby dear reminded me of Trupti's event and told me that he will make something before we left Pune( Perhaps he too loved our kitchen there and wanted to have some memories to carry along with :D ). Though it was not the first time when he entered kitchen, but yes, it was the first time when he entered Kitchen to be a part of Blogging event :).


Thought by himself what he is going to make and then did the preparations for Trupti's Event- Spring Fling :) , thinking for sometime finally he decided on making Dhokla for us. I just told him once about the event of Trupti, and he remembered it so well :) . He made some variations himself and took a trial before he allowed me to take these snaps. It was the second round of preparing Dhokla for him :D.


The variation is that he prepared it using idli stand, I remember , once while making idli , I told him the same way dhokla can be made, just the shape of it will be just like idlis :D , if we gonna use the same stand then ,and he remembered it perfectly , thus while he decided to make dhokla he choose this way :) .


Hence i think the name for this should be JhatPat Dhokla :D .
well, he has not used instant flour mix to prepare it , just the way it is cooked in idli steamer is really fast , it was a peaceful evening, i don't have to enter kitchen even, actually was busy packign all the stuffs there and wonderful Dhokla was ready for me, what else one want from life ? :)).

let us have quick look at how he prepared it .


Ingredients :

3/4 cup of rice +1/4 cup of chana dal (bengal gram ) - grind into semi coarse powder ( I normally keep it ready with me , so i can make dhokla anytime I feel like making it, this time it helped hubby :) )
3/4 cup of sour yogurt
Salt to taste
2 tsp garlic red chilli & garlic paste



½ tsp of soda bi-carbonate (baking soda)
1 tbsp of red chilli powder
seasame seeds and coriander leaves to garnish


Method:


Take dhokla flour in a large bowl, Put the powder in a bowl. Add yoghurt and little of warm water into the bowl. Mix thoroughly so that no lumps are formed and the batter is of pouring consistency not too thin, keep it thick, as in picture.
Llet it ferment for eight to ten hours- in hot days it takes lessto ferment, so keep it on look while u put it to ferment , if there is proper sunlight available , its recommended to put it in the sunlight that will greatly help it to ferment very well and quickly too , I used to do it as there is ample of sunlight always available in India, watching me alwasy to ferment dhokla flour this way , hubby too placed it in sunlighted area and kept a watch on it :D.


while making, prepare a paste of Red chilli and garlic. Once fermented, mix this paste with the batter, add pinch of baking soda to it and salt to taste. Hubby dear ,Greased the idli stand well and then pured the batter in it.and i was completely flattered to see him doing so, coz I thought he might forget this step , but he didn't :) . he filled it properly with batter and

next he boiled water in the idli steamer, and placed the stand in it, covered it and kept it in the steamer to steam for 5 to 7 minutes.
finally while it is done i asked him to check it with a knife. If the knife comes out clean, it is cooked, and he did it .
Serve hot with green chutney or anything you like( I once in a while like it with sweet yougurt chutney... the sour taste of dhokla goes well with sweet and sour chutney . will share it s recipe some other time here :D .)

It was a great experience to know that my hubby can do so well without any help of mine in kitchen that too with a pure gujarati dish. He made slight variation to this dish by adding a pinch of turmeric powder to it.



Thank you Trupti for this Event- "Spring Fling 2007-with Family and Friends in the Kitchen." , it was really fun participating in it .


Hubby is far away right now, and this too is a good memory of our staying of pune. Trupti, you added this to our one of the golden memories :), hugs to you.



Thank you Deepak, you make this post possible, I know it was much busy for you and me in our last days of staying at Pune , still you did it and added even more smiles to my life :D.

just a littel different angle and the whole picture is different- compare it with the picture in the starting of this post , needless to say this final pictures of Dhokla is taken by Deepak himself :) .

Answer to the guessing game :

there is actully total 13 (10 bird + 3 squrrels ) in the picture , check the picture below , the one rounded with yellow color is the mostly missed birds in the guessing I think :) . check out for it in a large view by clicking on it .

check out some of the famous recipe from this blog :

Tomato Paratha(Indian flat bread flavore with tomato)

Cumin Paratha( Indian flat bread with cumin seeds)

Aloo Paratha(stuffed potato Paratha) with Spicy tomato chutney

Yam and Tomato Salad

Methi (fenugreek)Triangels- a healthy snack








Okra with Green Mango and lentils






Boondi Raita

Not only recipes , check my henna designing too ! :) ....

Part-1

Some more

More henna designing , some more yet to come soon....

So stay tuned to here and happy blogging ! :D

Have fun, keep enjoying whatever comes your way and spend the days such that they will be a good memory for you to cherish :D.

Some pleasant momories of my trip to Junagadh

Junagadh- is a historical place, though I have been to there as a child, I remember it as quite an interesting place im ny memories.This time running with shortage of time even, we thought to visit Junagadh , before hubby fly to USA, and a great experience it was. More on Jungadh see here and here.

This pleasant view we got to see while entering the Jungle , Tree of "Kesudo"(Butea monosperma L.) , was ready to welcome us :D, showering its flower on earth to make the perfect red carpet welcome :) .

Near the stream in the Jungle- they told us to do not move out of car near stream, coz it has the most probability to have lions around there ,visiting to drink water. Still we dared to move out :D.

Inside Jungle - Moglee and Radha....:)) .I loved watching "Jungle book" series as a kid... no still i love to watch it :D, and so does hubby :) . sharing our pics for the first time here on blog .

this is "Shilalekh" at the foot of Girnar entrance. King Ashoka is famous with this. it is an edict of Emperor Ashok inscribed on a rock dating from the 3rd century BC. The edicts impart moral instructions on dharma, harmony, tolerance, and peace. i have got its translations in to english captured in pics with me, if intrested in readin/knowing it, tel me , may be i will send that to intrested people. its too much to post around here.
The fact behind "Shilalekh- documents written on rock". click to view it in larger size.

Mount Girnar- they says viewing from side it creates a shape of face of a man. its as whole body , rest of the body is inside earth ...

now Next are some "Jadibuti"- aryuvedic medicines(aushadhi) , from the the Jungle of Junagadh. we got very few of them , as we visited here in fall, raining season is the right time to get most of them in jungle. (it was agood chace to try my hand on photography too :D. )

Maalan

Chanothi and above this pic is tree of chanothi

something used for detnal problems...

Shemdo

At place called -Ooperkot. behind ours is mount girnar , visible clear and so peaceful...

See , how I am going with photography..... :) .

Its too hard to capture bird in camera, as far as it concerns to peacock its almost impossible as i see that they are very sensitive to other voices and soon hide themsleves in some safe area, if we pass from near by... still i got to click some pic of it.
this lovely pair of parrot, i cant resist capturing in my cam ,and sharing here with you all. aren't they lovely?

Now , a Guessing game... see the pic below carefully, and guess how many creatures / birds are there in pic. look carfully, even I missed some of them in first look. :)) . put sharpen your mind& vision and keep guessing.... (click on image to view it in larger size).

Indian Kitchen-traditional way to select and store wheat for the whole year.

Something nice to share with you all.

I still remember those days when I was a child I used to see this whole process, by sitting at a side :) .

Mostly in the month of April every year , at my mom's place,Mom used to order good brand of wheat delivered at home.
To select good brand of wheat from stores , then order it, and afterwards get it plucked and finally make provision of storing it in such a way so that no way it get spoiled throughout the year.

Other major aspect of this tradition is to store it in a big, airtight containers.
I always find it much time taking and also after I get married I never did this kind of things.
But I always admire this system. This is the tradition due to which our parents and grand parents have spent and are spending a healthy life. This is the reason behind our healthy childhood and normal
day to day life.

Sometimes somethings become so common in our life that we rarely value them until it disappeares from our life.
The same life much of us around here on blogs spending now, right?
Just to get packed flours and cook it acoordingly. I also do the same at my home after my marriage. Fast life, fast cooking and fast weight increasing too ! :))
Fortunately, this time being at mom's place I got to click Mom's hands on these lovely moments and was gladly a part of all of this. I never even before my marriage even I was a part of such process, as always I was busy studying while I was at home, then I went to hostel for engineering , afterwards was doing job outside my home town, so this was something I knew uptil now,not something I did.
This is a first chance when Iwas an active part of the whole traditional process of plucking carefully stones and other items from Wheat.Then finally get it oiled well,mixing and storing it.
It really reminds me of secret of healthy life our my parents, grand ma-grand pa and great grand parents.

May be some day we will show this to our fast food lover niece-nephew or children and they might get a chance to see the tradition of India. Thought to blog about this to save this tradition of us with great pride and hight respects for those who did so much just to bring up their child with high nutritions and right food. :) Hats off to them !

( P.S-Forests of Junagadh soon to appear in next post here. Stay tuned and have happy days ahead. :) )

Mahabaleshwar- Mini Heaven in Maharashtra :)

Just before we left our beloved Pune to march over to USA , me and hubby visited famous hill station Mahabaleshwar, and it was a pleasant experience in all the way.

Mahabaleshwar is a very popular hill station in Maharashtra because of its places lakes, verdant hills and cascading waterfalls. thought it was not raining season here when we visited , we didnt get to see streams like waterfalls here ,but he other beauties of it were companasating this. It is not only famous for its scenic beauty but also for its various temples, spectacular viewpoints and historically significant places too.
During our trip I tried my hand on photography, and had a great time along with that too ! :)

Here are some pics of strawberry plants to share with all of you. It was really a great to visit real strawberry farms in Mahabaleshwar. Basically Mahabaleshwar is famous for that very much around here. And the market around there is full with strawberries from the starting of winter season to march . That too very fresh , big one and too yummy ! Luckily we hada guide who lead us to one of hid relative's strawberry farm there and we got to eat farms fresh strawberries there, OMG that taste still makes my mout hwater... :P

Picture 1

I had my part already there, until my stomach refused to take any more of it. :D

The fruit of strawberry starts developing from the center part of small white colored flower on the plant (pic 1 below). later on it goes on growing up in size and till much larger size of it , it remains in the color green (pic 2 below). when fully grown up it turns into perfect red color like the one shown below in pic 3.

Picture 2

Picture 3
Below are some pictures of the real beauty of Mahabaleshwar. There are more than 30 points to visit. most of them are at the hill place, situated near by and worth visiting. some other point like lake and temples are in the city and situated in the center of Mahableshwar.

Check out the picture below, here the middle of hill is in the shape of dinosaur, which I found resembling a huge lizard……… I hate lizards…. But this is looking nice, coz it is naturally turned into shapes like this. There are so many others like needle point, elephant head, the 3 monkeys of Gandhiji(Gandhiji ke teen Bandar)etc….
It was nice time when we planned visiting there, though the real season of visiting Mahabaleshwar is considered from mid- March to July. I succeed to capture a picture of monkey family on one of hill point needle point over there, I just went 'Fida' over the cute looking so young baby monkey ... :)).
Near by Mahabaleshwar is Pratapgadh – famous for its story of victory of Shivaji Maharaja over Afzal Khan. It’s a real historical place worth while visiting. It’s the one I have ever seen constructed with so much intelligence to protect it from enemies. It is really worth appreciating for each detail it is built up with. It has the entrance just of size that only one person at a time can enter. So that even if there is any attack from outsiders irrespective of the size of the army of enemy only little people at a time can be entered and that can be easily faced by the not so big army of Shivaji. Watch point 1 in red circled area
At the entrance there is a hidden cave in which 40 people can be hidden, to strike the enemy army. The next intelligence was their watch points.
As the fort is built at much height, there are 4 watch points situated at four different directions, which can easily monitor people moving in the area around and below, and before the enemy could reach the real fort mostly they can be sent to death, mostly by bombarding. There is much more to write about that , but may be some other time. Just a note that if anyone is visiting there then dont forget to get a guide along with , as without guide one can easily miss some very important points in the fort there, also to enjoy it fully guide will help you explaining each details of the constructon of fort vey well. just the point is you should not miss so many nice points worth while visiting and knowing.

This one is the complete picture of Pratap gadh taken from watch point 1. (shown in picture above)

Comiong up in next post some pictures of our trip to forests of Girnar, Junagadh - a historical city, and our trip to Farms of my uncle. so stay tuned to keep enjoyin the real pics of birds and animals enjoying in the forests, and the fresh products of farms... and yet there is so much to share with you all. So be in touch and keep enjoying your days ahead .

This is the 100th Post of this beloved Blog of mine.hope you enjoyed journey of my blog world till now, many more to share with you yet... :)

Soon posting Lauki-chanadal (bottle gourd- begal gram curry) for 'L' to Nupur for A-Z of vegetables on