Tawa Vegetables, clicking Beans n lentils & Mango Manthram :D

I loved "Tawa vegetables" in restaurants , and we had enough of that in Pune at a restaurant names"Atithya"( which literally mean the warm way to welcome guests). I loved the name ,service, cleanliness and food of that restaurant. Now ever since I moved out of NJ , I try those restaurant styled curries at home mainly. It is not easy to rush to nearest Indian restaurant now, as the nearest one is also not so near :)). But I must accept that it prompts me to try many innovative thing in my kitchen now. And over all my mind is working much on how to make such curries... and likely thoughts... to make it perfect with colors and tastes too. Here is something which I tried recently.
Tawa vegetable means vegetables cooked on flat styled pan (Tawa) adding some spices to it. They normally fry (shallow/deep ) each veggies and paneer.Then together cook it for a while adding all the spices and paneer cubes for a while. Tastes always too good, and who count the amount of fat you deposit when you eat out :)).

MEC-Gravies,Henna designing -4, and Blog List Updates...

Ingredients:

Parval - 250 gms ,
Cumin seeds, Jeera 1 tsp
Oil 1 tsp ,
1/2 tsp turmeric powder,
1 small tomato ,
pinch of asafoetida powder(hing),
minced garlic - 1/2 tsp .

Recipe :

Thoroughly wash parval and then cut them lengthwise.
Take 1 tsp oil in a Microwavable bowl, and cumin seeds to it, put it inside microwave for half minute. This way the cumin seeds will not pop up but as it is cooked it will give great flavor, take the bowl out add hing , and turmeric powder to it and mix it to oil, next add minced garlic and then parval to it. I small amount of garlic to veggies like Parval and Tindora (which are basically flavorless), to give it a good mild flavor and taste.

Next put bowl in microwave oven, turn it on , it takes almost 5-6 minutes to cook parval thoroughly, remove it fro microwave over and mix it nicely after every 2 mines, that will help to cook each portion of it perfectly.Consider it cooked when it is soft enough , that you can cut it easily into half using spoon.
While parval is almost cooked add tomato , cut into small cubes, and salt to it, mix it well and cook it for another 2 mins.

Garlic and tomato flavored Parval is ready to serve, just hot out of microwave oven :). Unlike other main course dishes I like it to make without using chili powder , this mild and easy to digest veggie tastes better this way , and perfect when served along with spicy sambhar ,rasam and rice.

This same dish I cook the normal way on stove, the only difference i find with this one is it takes much less oil to cook ,also for vegetables like this , it takes more time to cook on stove , also with microwave oven you don't need to worry about this getting burned from somewhere , just occasional stirring is fine with that, and it feels great when it take much less effort to cook the same dish, right?

If you are new to this nice vegetable "Parval", here are some tips for you.

Choose parval with green skin among others, it should be not too soft.
Choose little firm and medium in shape. The bigger one have more possibilities to have it seeds much hard than normal in such case you should avoid those seeds from it, as it doesn't cook well.
If you have chosen it as those shown in the first picture here, then you can cook it altogether without removing any seeds, it tastes good too.

Now here it goes straight to srivalli for her theme this month MEC-Gravies. I do ample of microwave cooking , and I really like it too. Had I known it earlier I might have been able to post many entries for this month, now at the last moment while already fixed with vacation plans, I thought better to post if not all of those I have then at least one :) . Thanks Srivalli for this event.

Henna designing -4

Here are some more Mahendi designs I did. If you are a henna design lover like me , you can check more of my own made designs by going to sidebar in left and find link to the past posts of my henna designing in drop down menu.

And hey you all buddies there, Be ready to see me more on blog now, well , of course after vacation :)) . Starting from New year this blog is going to rock again , something new is about to happen , so stay tuned to here, and keep leaving your views in comment.



(P.S. - As I see many of emerging bloggers around here now more often ,i have just updated my blog buddies list , just check it out and if you are a regular visitor of this blog , and not a part of list just send me you URL and mane in comment, i will be glad to update it with your name and link. )

Enjoy holidays, celebrate the new year with great spirit I hope new year
will bring you all success ,happiness and the strength to fulfill all your
dreams....

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.

My henna designing -part 3 and Photography :D

I have been not blogging this week , and know what? I have gathered so many things to share with all of you about this week only:) . Oh God, when this girl is going to stop ? If you are thinking so , then the answer is -Never . I really can't be quiet :)) .
Since I know that many of my blog buddies love henna designing , here is some treat for their eyes and for all of you tooo....

Just made this designs 3 days ago, grabed sister's hand and started designing. have fun with these. :D.
You know something ? When you love to do something you will get time for that ! doent matter how busy you are are what else is goin on in the life around :) . So never say that you don't have time for soing something. Just the fact is you haven't yet put that 'something' in your priority of using your time. :) . No no , I am not that much wise to learn this wisdom , My Mom told me everytime I used to say I dont have time for this and that. :P .


And here is the final result of my hard working :D.

Can't get the answer- what is most beautiful , my designing or sister's hand? if you get the answer to share it with me :) . I remember something like- Beauty lies in the eyes of beholder :) .

Remember,In Meme of 3 things I wrote photography as one of the things I love to do. May be I am very immature photographer yet :)), but I love to do that. "Practice makes a man perfect". (another slogan from Mom, oh so many wise things I learnt from her, and still learning :) ) , so I keep on practicing with that :P .

2 days ago I saw this , and immediately grabed my cam to capture this.

There were 2 rockets in the sky actually. And the view of sky is so clear that I just fell in love with this scene. Then at the middle the white fuel sign of the one rocket disappeared, I don't know why, it was still fying....just see the pic below to believe that.

And finally there was sign of only one in the sky .

I believe those who loves Photography would like it :)

My Own Made Henna designs -2

Being in India is Just great sometimes. To attend functions, meet nice people and celebrate each joy of us with the people we like to be with . Well, I think there is much more can be written about that , but today I am here to share the Mehandi designs I made recently.
I made these designs just 2 days ago . I am so much fond of making henna designs that sometimes I Catch anyone from around , and start filling her hand with my new ideas of mehandi Designing :)
Recently I had to attend a function and what can be better than to get a chance to make henna design on my own hand. I did it on my left hand (both sides) . Since many of my blog buddies are also intresten in this art, I am presenting here the designs I made . :) This is what I made on the back side of my hand . It Happened so that when I fineshed designing on the front side, the henna cone has started creating some problems with its smooth flow :( , but I was not the one to gave up so easily, so I also kept trying with care, and the a battle between my tries and flow of cone was continued till the ends :) .Finally I came to finish it :D. well, I hope if cone might have been smooth with its flow then I could have made better design. :)

This is what i made to my Sister's hand few days back. She is so nice to allow me to do so anytime I wish to do :) .

This is specially for all those buddies who had shown interest in this art of henna making. Hope you will enjoy this. See you all tomorrow with Okra - Vegetable of the Week . :) Stay tuned ...

(P.S. Some of my blog buddies have requested to show the process of making cone. As cone of good quality is noramlly easily available here these days , I don't prepare it at home. But for you Some other time I will try to show that process step by step to you, though I have never gone to any classes for learning this art of art of making cones or henna designing, but I know how to make it. )

My Own Made Design

let me share this first one with u. which I designed on both sides of a hand....