Makki di Roti te Sarson da Saag

Makki di Roti te Sarson da Saag: Punjabiyan di shaan!! (The pride of Punjabis)

Well, this is the first food which comes in mind when we talk together of winters and Punjab!
Oh yes, and as of almost all the Sikh households, this is the pride food of our home as well. As the winters begin to set in in India, we see lush bright mustard greens in the vegetable markets and the preparations begin to prepare this awesome Sarson ka Saag which undoubtedly goes with flavorful makki ki roti.

Unfortunately we don't get mustard leaves where we live so I prepared Palak ka saag instead. It tasted yummy and a wonderful alternative where mustard greens are not so easily available. In this post I'm sharing the recipe of both Palak ka saag (how I prepared it) and Sarson ka saag (recipe by my Nani ji) and also how to prepare the perfect Makki ki roti..

Palak ka saag recipe:

Ingredients:

Spinach leaves: 500 gm
Onion (chopped): 1 large
Tomatoes (chopped): 2
Ginger (chopped): 1 inch
Garlic (chopped): 3 cloves
Green chilli (chopped): 1
Cooking oil: 1 tsp.
Makki flour: 3 tsp.
Salt to taste
Red chilli powder: 1 tsp.
Ghee: 2 tsp.
Cumin seeds: 1 tsp.
Onion (finely chopped): 1

1. Wash and chop the spinach leaves. Assemble all the other chopped vegetables: onion, tomatoes, ginger, garlic and green chilli. 
   
2. Add about 3 cups of water in a deep vessel or a pressure cooker and add all the chopped vegetables to it. Bring to a rolling boil in open flame.  
   
3. Turn off the flame and remove all the vegetables and let them cool. 
   
4. When cooled, grind them all to a smooth puree like mixture. Keep aside. 
   
5. Heat oil on medium flame and add the spinach paste to the pan. Stir well and let cook. Do not cover. 
   
6. Keep stirring and cooking. Add some water which was boiled with the veggies to the saag and keep stirring and cooking. Water is added because the saag will soon become dry in the process of cooking but will not be cooked properly. So adding water and stirring will give more time for saag to cook. This whole process will take about 15 minutes. 
   
7. Now add the makki flour to the saag. It will start getting thicker in consistency. Add the salt and the red chilli powder. 
   
8. Keep stirring and after few minutes the water will evaporate and it will become the saag consistency. Turn off the flame. 
   
9. Now prepare the tempering for the saag: Heat the ghee on medium flame and crackle the cumin seeds. Add the onions and fry until they start getting brown. Turn off the flame and add the tadka to the saag. Mix well and cover. 
   
10. You can remove cover and serve after 10 minutes. Saag is ready. Serve hot with a dollop of butter, makki ki roti, gud and achaar. 
    
    
    
    

Makki ki roti recipe:

Ingredients:

Makki flour: 2 cups
Warm water to knead the flour
Salt to taste
Carom seeds
Ghee: to top the makki roti

1. Take the makki flour in a kneading bowl and add in salt and carom seeds. Mix well. 
2. Begin by adding very little warm water to the flour and then mixing it with fingers. Keep adding little water and mixing the flour until it reaches a crumbling consistency. 
3. After that try and bind little flour together. Start keeping the little bits of binded flour to the side and again adding very little water and try to bind more bits of the flour. Continue keeping the binded flour to the side and try to make one big lump of the binded flour. 
4. Makki aata will not require a lot of water so be careful about adding water. Bind the whole flour into a big lump of dough and roll it between your palms to give it a round-like shape. the final product must not be sticky.  
   
5. Now will begin to make roti of this dough. Pinch a small ball of the flour and make it as round as possible by rolling between your palms. 
   
6. Lay it on the flat surface and press the ball lightly with your fingers. Don't apply a lot of pressure of it will disintegrate. 
7. Flatten it a little more with your fingers and then try to lift it up carefully with a flat spatula. Sprinkle some dry makki flour at the bottom if required. 
   
8. Now lightly begin to roll it with the help of a rolling pin. Apply very light pressure, keep checking if you can lift it with the spatula. The roti might have little rough edges on the side, it's normal. Take care not to make too big roti otherwise you won't be able to lift it up with the spatula. 
   
    
9. When it's done, lift up the roti with spatula and put it on the tawa on medium-high flame.
10. Flip the side and press with a kitchen cloth. 
    
11. Flip again and keep cooking till the roti is done: light brown spots will appear on the roti. Prepare rotis from all of the dough in this way. 
    
12. Serve hot hot with Sarson ka saag or Palak ka saag. 
     
    

Sarson ka saag recipe (Recipe courtesy my Nani ji)

Mustard greens: 500 gm
Spinach leaves: 150 gm
Makki flour: 50 gm
Dried red chili: 2
Ginger (grated): 1 inch
Green chili (chopped): 2
Onion (chopped): 1
Garam masala: 1 tsp.
Garlic: 2 cloves
Lemon juice: 1 tbsp.
Salt to taste
Red chilli powder: 1 tsp.
Cumin seeds: 1 tsp.
Cream: 1/2 cup
Ghee: 3 tbsp.

(This quantity of saag will serve 4 to 6 people; you can adjust the ingredients according to requirement).

1. Wash and chop finely the mustard greens and spinach leaves. 
2.  Pressure cook for 3 whistles with two cups of water. 
3. While the greens are getting pressure cooked, add the salt, red chili powder, garam masala, ginger and cream to the makki flour. Mix well. 
4. Heat 1 tbp. ghee and fry the flour mixture on medium flame until it starts getting golden brown. Turn off the flame and keep aside. 
5. By this time, the mustard and spinach would be boiled. Let cool and grind to a smooth paste in the grinder. Keep aside. 
6. Heat the remaining 2 tbsp. ghee and crackle the cumin seeds. Add the dried red chillis and onion. Fry until it starts getting brown. 
7. Add the garlic and green chilli and mix well. Let cook for a minute. 
8. Add the cooked flour mixture; mix well and let everything cook for 2-3 minutes. 
9. Now add the ground mustard and spinach paste. Mix well and turn the heat to medium-high. Let cook for 3-4 minutes. Do not cover. 
10. Turn the flame to medium-low and let cook for another 10 minutes. Turn off the flame, add a dollop of ghee and serve hot with Makki ki roti (procedure explained above), gud, papad and achaar. Enjoy !!!

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Instant Methi dhokla

Hello again everyone and a very Happy New year to all of you. I believe wishes are never late and I'm back to blogging after almost a month as I had taken a break and had traveled to India for vacations with my parents. Being with parents gives everyone an immense pleasure, no matter how old we are. It was very special for me and I enjoyed my trip to the fullest. It was so amazing to leave behind the cold, snowy weather to bask in the sunshine. My stay was full of shopping, sunshine, family love and food. Food, yes food is one of the most special part whenever I visit India: there are so many things I crave to eat all year long and I get overwhelmed by the choices I get to eat in my beautiful country. From roadside chaats, pani puri, samosas and kachoris, stuffed parathas and all types of curries and the typical sweets; you name it and you get it.

While it gives immense pleasure to sit and eat in the sunshine, it gives more pleasure to cook something for your parents and family. So I did prepare Whole wheat Samosas , Stuffed karela and Dal-Pakwaan at home for my family. Everyone also wanted me to prepare the instant dhoklas they have been looking at my blog and wanting to try at home since long.

Winters in India are beautiful: it's little cold with plenty of sunshine on most of the days, and you get the abundance of vegetables in the season. It was almost raining green leafy vegetables: mint, coriander, mustard, methi, spinach, bathua and what not.. So I decided to experiment a bit and filled in my dhoklas with abundant methi leaves. Also my mother doesn't use a microwave so I had prepared these on the regular stove top in idli molds. It took a total of 5 minutes for each batch. I had prepared a lot of batter and steamed them in 3 batches for my whole family.

Here's the recipe:

Ingredients:

Chickpea flour (besan): 5 cups
Semolina (sooji): 2 cups
Methi leaves: 2 big bunches
Salt to taste
Sugar: 4 tsp.
Lemon juice of two lemons
Eno fruit salt: 3 tsp. (replace eno with a 50:50 mix of baking soda and baking powder)
Slit green chillis: 4
Green chilli (finely chopped): 1
Ginger (grated): 1 inch
Mustard seeds: 2 tsp.
Oil for greasing the molds
Oil: 2 tsp. for tempering
Coriander leaves for garnish

1. First we begin by making the batter. Take a big size bowl and and the chickpea flour and semolina. Add salt, 3 tsp. sugar and lemon juice. 
2. Wash and chop the methi leaves very finely. Add to the bowl. 
3. Mix all the contents of the bowl lightly. Begin adding little water and mixing the flour to make a batter so that no lumps remain. Keep adding water slowly until the batter reaches the consistency where it's not too thick and it shouldn't be too liquid. 
4. Add the ginger and green chilli and mix everything well. Cover and leave for about 30 minutes. 
5. Add the Eno fruit salt after 30 minutes and sprinkle little water over the fruit salt. It will begin to bubble up and that's when mix it nicely with the whole of the batter. Do not mix vigorously. 
6. Now the batter is ready to be filled in molds and steamed. Add water in the idli cooker and begin to boil the water on high flame. Cover it without the pressure. 
7. Grease the idli mold (or the dhokla molds) and fill in the batter.By this time, the water will be boiled. Remove the cover and keep the mold inside the cooker and cover again (without pressure). 
8. Turn off the flame after 5 minutes, remove the mold and check if done with a toothpick. Gently remove all the molds from the cooker and keep aside. 
9. After 5 minutes, slowly remove the dhoklas from the molds in a big tray or plate. Steam all the dhoklas in this manner. 
   
10. Now we begin to prepare the tempering. Heat the oil and crackle the mustard seeds. Add the slit green chillis and fry on medium flame till they start turning white. Add 2 cups of water and mix well. Add the sugar, mix and bring it to a rolling boil. 
11. Turn off the flame and spread all the tempering over the steamed dhoklas. Let sit for a minute so the dhoklas soak in the water. 
12. Now remove dhoklas one by one and arrange on another tray or plate because dhoklas will absorb water in a minute and the excess water would be left behind. 
13. Garnish with coriander leaves and serve with mint-coriander chutney. They taste awesome if refrigerated for about an hour before serving.  
14. These dhoklas can also be prepared in the microwave in 3 minutes by following the same recipe: instead of steaming on stove top, just microwave for 3 minutes on the highest power. 

Do check out other versions of instant dhoklas from the blog:

3-minute Microwave dhokla recipe
Dhokla in idli stand recipe
Beetroot dhokla recipe
Instant khatta dhokla recipe
Instant poha dhokla recipe
Rawa dhokla recipe

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Christmas wishes: Making Santa with kids

Christmas is just around the corner and everywhere it's cold and beautiful. There are beautiful Christmas lights on the roads and Christmas starts in every window and the lovely red and white Christmas decorations in the whole market, and even in grocery shops. Basically it's Christmas and festivities in the air.. So how would the kids left behind? Apart from eating gingerbread cookies and amazing Christmas cakes, here's a lovely and easy Christmas Santa kids can make which can be hanged on your Christmas tree. Sounds lovely, isn't it? This is so easy I did it with 4-5 year old kids and it was lovely and beautiful for kids to have their own Santa!

Things you require:

White paper
Pencil to draw
Red color paper
Scissors
Fevistick or liquid sticking gum
Cotton

1. Begin by the kid tracing out his/her hand on the bottom of the paper with the pencil on the white paper. 
   
2. Rotate the paper and draw a line from the thumb across the hand as shown in the picture. 
   
3. Draw the eyes and the mouth. 
   
4. Cut little bits of the red paper and begin sticking them over the top portion as shown in the picture. This will become Santa's hat. Kids can stick small or big bits as they want. 
   
5. Now, as shown in the picture, begin applying the sticking gum over the fingers and take out small cotton balls to stick on the fingers to make Santa's white beard. Apply a little gum over the thumb tip as well and stick a little cotton (at the tip of Santa's hat). 
   
6. The kids can cut small squares (or any other shapes) and stick on the bottom of the Santa as presents from Santa. 
7. Done! Kids can add their own creativity and add sparkles, stars or decorations over the presents or on the sides. 
8. Punch holes on the top and hang on your Christmas tree with the help of a thread. 

Here are the awesome gingerbread cookies we made with the kids.

Gingerbread cookies recipe: 

Ingredients: All purpose flour, unsalted butter, ground spices: ginger, cinnamon, green cardamom and cloves, molasses, dark brown sugar, baking powder, salt and warm water. Mix everything and make a firm dough. Cling wrap and refrigerate for an hour. Take out and make small balls in palms and roll with a rolling pin about 2-3 mm thick. Cut in desired shapes using cookie cutters. Line a baking paper in a baking tray and bake the cookies for 6 minutes at 200 C. The cookies will become slightly dark brown. Remove and store in air tight containers. Enjoy!

Wishing everyone a great Christmas and a very Happy New Year 2016.

Biryani Masala

It's been a long while I have been experimenting with various types of biryanis: both vegetarian and non-vegetarian. Most of the times I just add garam masala for the taste and earlier I used to add the store bought garam masala but was never satisfied with the taste of either. Recently I asked my Nani if she knows to prepare biryani masala at home. I was not sure because I have never known her making biryani of any kind but she did have a recipe for the masala! Lucky me, right? I instantly penned down her recipe for the masala and recently made this flavorful spice powder. My house was filled with the aromatic essence of spices and the final spice powder is dark brown in color, and smells so awesome I can't describe in words; you just have to prepare it to experience the heavenly aroma.

When I had this spice powder, immediately the next day I prepared a Hyderabadi Fish Biryani using this biryani powder, and trust me, it tasted so wonderfully awesome with a taste I have never had before. I'm never going back to adding simply garam masala or using store bought ones for my biryani recipes.

Ingredients:

Cumin seeds: 2 tsp.
Caraway seeds (Shahi jeera): 2 tsp.
Coriander seeds: 2 tsp.
Black peppercorns: 1 tsp.
Black cardamom: 1
Green cardamom: 2 (with cover)
Nutmeg powder: 2 heaped pinches
Mace: 1
Dried red chilli: 3
Dry fenugreek leaves (kasoori methi): 1 tsp.
Turmeric powder: 1 tsp.
Cloves: 4
Dagad phool: 2 (if available; I did not have it so did not add it)
Cinnamon stick: 1 inch

1. Dry roast the following one by one on a medium-low flame: cumin seeds, caraway seeds, coriander seeds, peppercorns, dried red chili, cinnamon and cloves. 
2. Let cool and mix all the ingredients (dry roasted and others) and grind to a fine powder. I used my coffee jar for grinding. 
3. Sieve through a muslin cloth and store in a dry and air-tight container. It stays good for very long time. No need to refrigerate. 

I know for sure after you have made this biryani spice powder, you will totally be craving to prepare a biryani asap.. so here are the 13 biryani recipes I have blogged till date. There are many more I have tried but have not been able to write the recipes, will keep on updating this post as I share more biryani recipes. 

Vegetarian:

Hyderabadi Vegetable Dum Biryani

Malabar vegetable dum biryani

Qubooli Biryani

Spicy Vegetable biryani

Non-vegetarian:

Ambur Chicken Biryani

Dindigul Chicken Biryani

Hariyali fish biryani

Hyderabadi chicken biryani

Malabar Dum chicken biryani

Malabar Fish Biryani

Mughlai Chicken biryani

Simple chicken biryani

Zafrani Chicken biryani

How to use the biryani masala: Just add one heaped teaspoon every cup of rice in any biryani recipe. Just add a little more powder if you like more strong flavor. Add half a teaspoon of this powder to any rice preparation and feel the difference! 

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Please leave a comment and/or feedback in the comments section. 

Tabota par Eda - Eggs on tomato

Eggs are a forever favorite in our home and that's why I constantly try to find out new ways to cook eggs to make boredom at bay. That is why, after I had made a special post about How to make the perfect hard boiled eggs which helped many, I posted an array of Egg recipes; specially egg curries.  

Punjabi style quick bhurji was always an instant option in our home. But when I tried this recipe for the first time about an year ago, I have literally stopped preparing our basic bhurji as this recipe gave me a different style and gave a total wonderful transformation to the fried eggs. 

This is a Parsi recipe which is a little spicy balanced with a dash of sugar and the use of Parsi Dhansak Masala. 

I found this wonderful recipe on a website and this is the original recipe link: http://kenzyskitchenkorner.blogspot.se/2014/05/tabota-par-eda-eggs-on-tomato.html

I have not covered and cooked  like in the recipe but did it a little my way and I've lost count how many times I've tried this recipe now. I had even prepared this for my non-Indian guest and she simply loved it ! 

Here's the simple recipe:

Ingredients:

Eggs: 4

Cooking oil: 3 tsp.

Onion (finely chopped): 1

Green chilli (finely chopped): 1

Cinnamon stick: 1 inch

Ginger-garlic paste: 3 tsp. (I use grated ginger and garlic)

Turmeric powder: 1/4 tsp.

Red chilli powder: 1/2 tsp.

Cumin powder: 1/4 tsp.

Coriander powder: 1/4 tsp. 

Salt to taste

Parsi Dhansak Masala: 1 tsp. 

Tomato (chopped): 1 big

Coriander leaves: a handful

Sugar: 2 tsp.

1. Heat oil and add the cinnamon stick and immediately add the green chili. Let fry for a bit and add the onions. Let them fry until they are slightly brown. 
2. Add the ginger-garlic paste and mix well. Let cook until the raw smell goes away. 
3. Add the dry spices at this point: red chili powder, turmeric powder, cumin powder, coriander powder and Dhansak masala. 
4. Mix well and add the chopped tomato. Sprinkle salt and mix well. Let cook until the tomatoes are almost soft and mushy. 
5. Add the chopped coriander leaves and the sugar. Mix everything well and let cook for another 2 minutes. 
6. Break the eggs and add the this masala. Mix well and let cook. Turn off the flame and serve hot with chappati and raita for a complete easy and quick meal. 

And here are the pictures from the lunch I prepared for my non-Indian guest in April this year where I had prepared this with Butter Chicken, plain rice, salad, mint-coriander chutney and chappati: