Pesarattu - Moong dal dosa

Pesarattu with coconut chutney.
2 cups Whole Green Moong dal - Pesallu
Hand full Raw Rice
4 Green Chilies
1" Ginger
1 tsp jeera
1 Onion - Optional

Mix and soak dal and rice over night. Grind along with chilies, ginger and jeera to a nice batter using water as required and add salt.

This batter does not need fermenting and is ready to be made into pesarattu after grinding.

Grease a dosa pan with oil and pour the batter in circles spreading evenly with the ladle. Chopped onions, coriander can be spread on the batter at this time.

Add a tsp of oil so that it can be removed easily from the pan. Turn it the other side and let roast.

Upma compliments pesarattu. It can be eaten with rice also.

Plain Upma can be made before hand and while the pesarattu is still on the skillet turn to the inside part, spread upma on one half of it and fold it. Press on it so it will be evenly spread.

Pesarattu with upma is a favorite Telugu combination. It is called as "MLA Pesarattu" fondly in Vizag eateries. A very filling and nutritious item.

Whole Moong Dal Sprouts Salad

My mom used to make all sorts of things with sprouts as snack, after we came back from school. It also doubled as an healthy snack for my dad, who has been Diabetic for long time. She used to make variations by serving raw, sometimes cooking, sauteing etc. This is one of my favorite. But, we cannot just decide and eat. It needs sprouting time. Can be made in abundance and stored in an airtight box in the refrigerator for future use.

Green moong dal sprouts in a muslin cloth.

1 cup raw Whole Green Moong Dal - Green Pesallu
Few Raw Green Mango pieces
Few Carrot pieces
1 Green chili - Optional
Red Chili flakes
Coriander
Lemon juice


Soak moong dal over night. Drain the water and tie them in a dry muslin cloth and place in a warm place (or in the oven) for 2 - 3 days without opening the cloth. In 2 -3 days small shoots come out and good sprouts are ready.

Sprouted dals are very good nutritionally than the same soaked dal.

Peel mango, carrot and cut into small pieces. Chop green chili and coriander. In a bowl, mix the sprouts, mango pieces, green chili, coriander, salt and red chili flakes. Fresh cucumber can also be used. Add lemon juice and mix well. Adjust taste according to personal likes.

A refreshing, guilt free snack or salad. Eat as is on a rainy day (like it is here today) for an evening snack.

Chopped onions and roasted peanuts can also be added to the salad.

Corn Bread

Corn bread warm and fresh from the oven.

A friend in my son's class, brings and enjoys his "yellow bread block" daily for lunch and he's been asking me to make what ever that is, for him since a long time. After a friendly enquiry, we figured it is corn bread. This recipe is from the friend's mom. A family recipe passed on from her Grandma (who bakes at family get-together's even now). Glad I found out, the end product is rewarding.

Assemble the ingredients and wait while it bakes!

1 cup all-purpose Flour
1 cup yellow Cornmeal
1/3 cup white sugar or brown sugar
1 tsp Salt
2 tsp Baking Powder
1 Egg
3/4 cup Milk
1/2 cup Oil
1 cup Fresh or frozen corn kernels

If using frozen corn defrost and squeeze water gently pressing with fingers and air drying on a dry tissue till all moisture is absorbed.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Use an 8" bowl. Spray PAM lightly.

In a large bowl, beat egg till foamy, then add salt, sugar, baking powder, milk and oil in that order. Then combine the flour and corn meal and mix thoroughly, making sure no flour lumps are left out. Finally add corn kernels, mix gently.

Pour batter into prepared pan. Bake in preheated oven for 30 to 35 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center of the loaf comes out clean.

If you don't like your bread sweet, avoid sugar altogether and add 3/4 cup of buttermilk instead of milk. By reducing the amount of oil in the batter, the bread becomes more crumbly.

Enjoy warm corn bread with soup and roasted or grilled vegetables.

So, finally I baked something from scratch and I have to say came out pretty good. Right amount of moisture and enough binding to keep the bread together. My son is very glad, and wants to take a piece to school tomorrow for lunch!

4000th blog to join The Foodie Blogroll!

This piece is from http://www.foodieblogroll.com/

The Foodie Blogroll Reached 4000 Blogs in May!
May 30, 2009

We are pleased to announce that the Foodie Blogroll membership reached a major milestone in May: 4000 blogs!

The 4000th blog to be accepted and verified into our directory is: My Home Cooking - Homemade recipes and Tidbits. We hope you will visit her blog and say Hi :)

http://www.fromthefarm.com/ has gladly offered to provide a $50 gift voucher to our 4000th blog winner! Our blogger will be able to choose any of their wonderful products up to a value of $50. FromTheFarm.com offers great products directly from farmers to your home, including artisan honey, citrus trees and all the vegetables and fruits you could want.

Thank you all for being part of the Foodie Blogroll
*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*

I am very honored to be a part of the Foodieblogroll listing. Thanks to the Blogroll team and FromTheFarm.com for the $50 gift voucher as a prize for being the 4000th blog. I am wondering as to place an online order for dried fruit/nuts or a Lemon dwarf tree. Christy of FromTheFarm.com has been very helpful with all the information I needed on "can I raise it indoors in winter" question. Will update..

Egg plant - Roasted vankaye pachi pulusu

1 Large Eggplant
2 Onions
4 – 5 Green Chilies
Small lemon sized Tamarind
Few Curry Leaves
Coriander
1 tsp Sesame Powder
½ tsp Jaggery: Optional

Wash and dry eggplant. Spray PAM all over the egg plant and evenly spread using fingers. Place Aluminium foil in the burner slot so, clean up will be easier. The water in the eggplant will cook and drip down. Roast on medium/low flame, turning on all sides. Remove let cool and peel the skin and discard. Transfer the soft flesh into a bowl.

Pick long, thin green chilies from what you have and coat them with oil using the tips your finger. Roast them on low/medium flame, turning them on all sides using the stem of the chilies or tongs. Remove, let cool and mash them with your hands (remove seeds if you don’t like it spicy). Suite you taste accordingly.

Chop onions into small pieces. Make tamarind juice with the tamarind.
Dry fry sesame seeds and make powder. This is sesame powder.

Take 3 tsp of oil in a small skillet and make tadka with ½ tsp jeera, ½ tsp mustard seeds, few fenugreek seeds, hing, and red chili and curry leaves. Once it is done, add chopped onions and fry till the onion turns translucent. Then add a tsp of sesame powder and fry for a few minutes.

To the vessel with the egg plant flesh add tamarind juice (raw, the above tadka, smashed green chilies, salt, turmeric, jaggery and chopped coriander (liberally). Mix well, preferably using hands and squeezing, so, the taste of all the items evenly spreads into the tamarind juice.

The roasted egg plant, chilies, tamarind juice, soft flavor of sesame powder, sweet of jaggery all combine to form an excellent taste.

This is an excellent side dish with rice and appadam, specially rice and kandi podi (from my previous blog in Podis/Powders) and oil.

Red Chili Pachadi - Mirapalla Pachadi - Korivikaram

I was strolling in the farmer's market and noticed these red chilies at a corner in a basket. Never seen this variety before, so enquired how hot or mild they can be. Lady at the counter said "if it was me, I would leave them alone". But, I could not take her advice, Sorry. So, I came home and googled the name for my red chilies. These are cherry hot peppers, quite hot.

Any one interested like me to find the name of the red chilies they are using, please check this website:

http://www.tradewindsfruit.com/hot_peppers.htm

Like to try a spicy pachadi/pickle with rice? Here you go... a treat to the mouth for spicy/karam lovers!

These chilies looked so small and cute but were super hot/karam.

10 Red Cherry Hot Peppers - Any hot variety of Red Chilies can be used
2 tsp Jaggery
Few Curry Leaves
Small Lemon sized Tamarind

For Menthe powder:
1 ½ tsp Fenugreek seeds
2 tsp Mustard seeds
Hing

Take 1 tsp of oil in a skillet and fry fenugreek seeds till they are nicely roasted then add mustard seeds when they splutter remove from flame. The mixture emits a toasty aroma when they are nicely roasted. Let cool. Grind to a powder in a spice mill or blender, this is called menthe powder.

Use immediately or store in a Ziploc bag in the freezer to retain its freshness and aroma for future use.

Cut the red chilies and remove seeds. Rough grind the pieces with salt and tamarind. Keep aside.

Take 1 scoop (about 10 tsps) of oil in a skillet, when oil is hot add a tsp of mustard seeds, curry leaves and hing. Then add ground red chili paste, jaggery and turmeric. Let cook till their natural water is evaporated. When oil starts to float, add 4 – 5 tsp of the previously made menthe powder. Stir well, check for salt and seasonings and add accordingly. Remove from flame and let cool.

This pickle has a good shelf life, store in an air tight container. Do not touch with wet hands.

Any variety red chilies can be used to prepare this pickle. This is Guntur Special "Korivikaram", very hot/karam pickle recipe that used on these cherry red peppers. The karam/hot of the pickle will subside in a week after preparation, it will become milder. Use enough tamarind and jaggery to compensate the karam/hot of the peppers.

Serve it with rice and oil. Enjoy!!

This is prepared using red peppers, brighter color and milder in taste.

For JFI - Chilli at Vysh's Cardamom at:

http://queenspice.blogspot.com/2009/06/announcing-jfi-chilli.html

Dosa - Attu

These are the attu's made during "Attla thadiya". Eating onion pulusu with nuvupodi by dawn and fasting all day and breaking the fast at dusk with these attulu's was a wonderful thing from the past. All of us cousins would get together in my Aunt's place by evening on that day. I wondered how they would keep up with a bunch of hungry kids. They had a couple of pans on stoves and 3 or 4 aunts would take care of making the attu's. Spicy coconut with peanuts pachadi by the side and a white sweet dipping dish called "Thimanam" for those sweet lovers. These attu's can also be dipped in thimanam and eaten.

1 cup Urad dal
2 cups Raw Rice
1 tsp Fenugreek seeds

Add fenugreek to the urad dal and raw rice. Soak them over night.

Grind the mix to a smooth batter add salt and mix well and set aside to ferment for 6 - 8 hrs. Yeast or cooking soda can be added for fermentation. Keep in a warm place or in the oven.

Water can be added to the batter later, as required to make dosa.

Heat a dosa pan, wipe with a wet tissue and pour the batter with a ladle and spread evenly. Add a tsp of oil so that dosa can be removed easily. Turn the other side and let roast.

These are very quick to make dosa, will remove without difficulty. Serve it hot with chutney.

Strawberry Picking

Kick started the picking season with Strawberries. We were the first ones on the farm, this Sunday morning, and got hold of the very best! My kids were very excited about picking, they both love Strawberries and both looked for the Perfect Strawberry, color and shape wise!

We picked all the fruit we laid hands on brought home a good 13 pounds of Strawberries. It is quite a lot of fruit, with such less shelf life, but could not part with any after hand picking each one of them.

We went to Melicks farm on Old Wick Road, Old Wick, NJ.
http://www.melickstownfarm.com/melicks-farm-market-pyo-strawberries.htm

Long lines of strawberry plants, they are runners.



In the farm market I found "Marovam", the sweet scented herb which we used while making flower mala with jaji and kanakambaram flowers. I hope it grows well on my deck in a pot.