Panneer Potato Cutlets

Living in a developed country means "HUGE". Almost nothing is under a kilogram at most supermarkets. Further, this is how one feels one is getting the bang for the dollar being spent. Like I felt when I picked up milk 2 weeks ago. Yes, 2 weeks ago. Coming from India where the milk would not last more than a day, here milk lasts for weeks. It is on my to do list to find out what it is that they add to make the milk last this long.(A friend clarified that the milk sold here is boiled and packed and therefore lasts longer. Thanks) So, I knew we would not consume all of the milk before the "best by" date and so I made some home made panneer. I use my blog as my recipe journal as well, which means, I revisit my own blog to check the recipe of dishes I have tried. Mom's panneer fingers are not on this as it is a business secret for C-store. So obviously, I don't have any written record of the recipe. Being in different time zones from your mother doesn't help either especially when she is definitely going to be fast asleep at the time that you are cooking up your meal.

So I just put together things that would make a good cutlet and it was good. 

Ingredients (makes about 25 cutlets, each of about 1.5cm in diameter) :

For the panneer :

1. Milk (Full fat works best and avoid UHT/long life milk) - 1 .25 litres
2. Curd/Yoghurt - 4 tbsp
3. Vinegar - 1/2 tsp

For the cutlet :

1. Panneer - from the above or about 3/4 cup of shredded/grated/minced panneer
2. Potatoes - 1 large boiled, peeled and mashed
3. Green Chilly - 2 sliced thinly or chopped
4. Red chilly powder - 1/2 tsp
5. Garam masala powder - 1/2 tsp
6. Bread crumbs - about 1/4 cup + more for dusting - see tips
7. Salt to taste
8. Oil for frying

How I made it :

1. Pour the milk into a pan and bring to a boil.
2. Just as the milk boils lower the heat and put in the curd and vinegar. 
3. Mix well till you see the milk curdle and the fat separate. 
4. Turn of heat. Drain the water to get fresh soft homemade panneer. Squeeze out as much water as you can from the panneer. This water can be retained and stored to be added to dough to make softer rotis or make naan.
5. Now, add the panneer to the potato, green chillies, red chilly powder, garam masala powder. 
6. Adjust the salt. 
7. This may be a bit sticky so add the bread crumbs to make a dough that is not too sticky. Alternately, put into airtight container and leave in fridge overnight. 
8. Heat oil in a kadai - sufficient to deep fry.
9. Spread more bread crumbs on a paper or flat plate.
10. Make small discs out of the dough. Dunk in more bread crumbs and press in those bread crumbs. Keep aside.
11. Once oil is hot, deep fry the discs on both sides until golden brown.

Serve hot with pudina chutney or tomato sauce or mustard sauce

Tips :

• You can make bread crumbs from fresh bread. Just put it into a mixie jar and use the pulse option.
• If you want aired out bread crumbs, you could use dried toast or bread dried in the sun. These serve well to form that crust on the cutlets.

Pazham Pori

I got to eat this when I went with Pras for Nisha's wedding. We stopped at one of the famous India Coffee House enroute Palakad, while heading back from Thrissur. It was delicious and melt in the mouth. A perfect accompaniment to tea but also makes for a good dessert when topped with a dusting of icing sugar.

Pras had bought some Nenthram Pazham yesterday and they are like huge. I'm sure they won't get over any time soon and to ensure that they don't end up in the dust bin, I decided to make Pazham Pori. These are from the banana family and have a bit of bite in them. Peeling off their skin requires a little effort and they are a Kerala speciality.

Now that this is a Kerala speciality, you do know that it is one of Pras's favorites too. So, I thought of sending this to The Valentine's Day event hosted by Pari of Foodelicious and Cuponation.

Ingredients (serves 2 as a snack):

1. 1 large nenthram pazham
2. 3/4 cup maida
3. 1 tsp sugar
4. A pinch of salt
5. 1/2 tsp of cinnamon/cardamom powder - using my mortar and pestle I crushed 2 cardamom and a thin stick of cinnamon
6. 1/2 tsp turmeric powder
7. water to make a paste
8. Coconut oil to fry

How I made it :

• Mix the maida, salt, sugar, turmeric powder, cardamom, cinnamon powder alongwith water to make a thickish batter - similar to bajji batter. It should be a bit thick so that it sticks to the banana and not easily slide off. That way you won't have any batter on the banana.

• Heat oil in a kadai.
• Slice the bananas. Don't slice them too thin. They should be about 0.5 cm thick.

• Dip the bananas in the batter and fry

• Let it fry on medium heat for 2 minutes on each side. Drain on paper towel.
• Serve hot with chai. Alternately, dust with icing sugar and serve with some ice cream as dessert.

Upcycled - dal cutlet

Leftovers is something we face from time to time. This time I had leftover cabbage dal. I was torn between making dal parathas or trying something different. I am just back from home and keep thinking of mom's droolworthy cutlets which she sells at her cafe. So I thought of trying out a dal cutlet. Here's my upcycled dal cutlet recipe. Do try it and let me know how it turned out.

Ingredients :

1. 1 cup leftover dal - I had dal with cabbage but used it all the same
2. 1 boiled potato mashed
3. 1 tsp ginger garlic paste - optional, don't add if already present in your dal
4. 1 chopped green chilli
5. 1/4 tsp garam masala - optional
6. 1/4 tsp amchur powder
7. Maida/Corn flour - enough to make the mixture come together
8. Salt to taste
9. Oil for frying
10. Breadcrumbs - 1 cup

How I made it :

1. Mix all the ingredients from 1 to 8 together. 
2. Ensure that the mixture is not watery. I usually make my dal a bit thick and leftover dal does get thick. It should be like the same consistency of may be the aloo mixture for aloo paratha as in the picture shown.
3. Heat oil.
4. Make small balls out of the mixture. 
5. Cover with bread crumbs. 
6. Shape into any desired shape. I made small discs as tikkis.
7. Fry on medium heat till dark golden brown on both sides.
8. Serve hot with tomato sauce or pudina chutney

Thengai Poli/Ubittu

Whilst in Chennai, our company used to sponsor snacks, which used to be my dinner, for those staying back beyond 7pm at work. This was a real motivation for many to stay back until 7pm. One of my favorites was poli. Warm and sweet, these melt in the mouth stuffed rotis were never something that I stayed away from. I saw this recipe on Nag's blog and it reminded me of poli. I had some coconut on hand and so decided to make the poli with the coconut stuffing rather than the dal. This would also make Pras very happy as he is a keralite who loves his coconuts (wicked smile ;))

When I gave Pras the first one, he went "It tastes just like it does in the store brought ones." Well, what more would I want to hear :)

Ingredients (makes 5 polis): 

1. 1 cup of maida - you could use whole wheat if you like
2. 1/2 cup jaggery
3. 1/2 cup coconut grated
4. 2 pods of green cardomom crushed
5. Salt a pinch
6. 1 tbsp oil
7. 2 tbsp ghee
8. Water - 1/4 cup + enough to make a smooth dough

How I made it :

1. Add the pinch of salt to the flour and make a smooth dough. Ply the dough for about 2 minutes before letting it rest for about 1 hour.
2. In the meantime, use as little water as possible to melt the jaggery in. This can be done on the stove top with regular mixing. Cutting the jaggery into smaller pieces help this get done sooner. 
3. Sieve this melted jaggery syrup to remove any impurities.
4. Add the coconut to this and cook on the stove until the mixture becomes sticky and almost dry.
5. To this add the crushed cardamom powder.
6. Now rub some oil onto a plastic sheet. 
7. Take a ball of dough and flatten it out in your palm, making a well in the center.
8. Fill this with the coconut jaggery mixture. Try to put as much as possible. Don't be scared of it coming out as this will be a sticky mixture and wont ooze out or cause too much trouble when rolling out. 
9. Pull the ends of the dough so as to enclose the coconut jaggery mixture and roll this into a thin stuffed roti. You could alternately make it like making stuffed aloo paratha.
10. Cook on a hot tava until both sides brown. Apply ghee generously and take off the heat.

Nilam Special Uzhunnu Vada

Well, we all know how Sandy and Nilam struck at about the same time, except at different places. So it was one of those rainy holidays on which I had to sit at home. Pras was working and so we had no plans of going out. I woke up and soaked urad dal for making my favorite vada. It is the perfect accompaniment to tea on a cold rainy day or may be any day :)

Ingredients (For 10 vadas) :

1. 1 cup skinless white urad dal soaked in water for about 4 hours
2. 1 medium sized onion chopped
3. 2 green chillies finely chopped
4. chopped coriander leaves
5. 1 tsp whole pepper corns
6. Salt to taste
7. Oil for frying

Equipment needed: 

A grinder/food processor

How I made it :

1. Grind the soaked urad dal with as little water as possible to make a thick smooth paste.
2. To this ground batter add the chopped onions, coriander, green chillies, pepper corns and salt.
3. Heat up some oil in a deep pan/wok/kadai.
4. This step is all about frying but if you want to get the right shape of a vada, read on. Keep a bowl of water on the side. Dip the fingers of your right hand in the water. With the excess water wet the palm of your left hand. Now, using your right hand scoop out a sapota sized ball of batter. Flatten it out on your left palm. Now, dip your right index finger into the water and make a hole in the center of the flattened batter.Drop this into the hot oil. Fry until golden brown on both sides, about 3 minutes a side. 
5. Serve hot with a steaming cup of chai and coconut chutney

Tips :

1. Use as little water when grinding. The more water you use, grinding may be easy but getting the right shape and texture for frying will be tough.
2. If you have added a lot of water, you could add some rice flour to thicken the batter.
3. You could add pieces of coconut to the batter.
4. To test the oil, put in a small drop of the batter. If it rises immediately, the oil is hot. You don't want smoking hot oil either
5. Serve with sambar for breakfast

My take on the nippattu

My good friend gave me a sample of her baked nippattu one morning and I flipped. It was just so god damned good. I knew I had to give it a try.
Those of you who do know me very well, I am a sindhi who loves her koki. This dish reminded me so much of the koki. Koki is an onion and green chilli mixed paratha. It is a very famous breakfast across all Sindhi households, eaten with curds, pickle or white butter and sugar.
Now, the nippattu is similarly flavoured and hence the instant liking. The original recipe is here but I added my own twist to it. Instead of 2 cups of plain maida, I used just 1. To substitute the remaining 1 cup, I added 1/4 cup makki atta (cornmeal), 1/4 cup rava, 1/4 cup rice flour and 1/4 cup whole wheat flour. I also skipped the baking soda. I never buy baking soda cause it can be quite harmful for the body I hear. However, I also hear that it is a fabulous household cleaner.

I did follow this recipe and tried baking the nippattu. There were two things that went wrong
1. I lost patience as I was able to bake only two at a time in my oven.
2. Mine were quite crumbly in nature cause of the rava that I had added to the dough.

I left half of the dough back in the fridge and today on this cold rainy afternoon, I fried them as small vadas instead and they were yummy and gone in minutes.

Ingredients :
1 cup maida
1/4 cup makki atta - cornmeal
1/4 cup rice flour
1/4 cup rava/semolina
1/4 cup whole wheat flour
1 large onion finely chopped
4 tsp white sesame seeds
1/3 cup oil
2 tsp sugar
Freshly chopped coriander leaves - as much as you like
1 tsp salt
4 tbsp melted butter - I used salted
3 finely chopped green chillies
1/4 cup warm water

How I made it :

1. Mix all the flours together. Add the salt, white sesame seeds, onion, green chillies, sugar and coriander leaves.
2. Make a well in the center. 
3. Pour in the melted butter and oil. Mix till the mix resembles coarse bread crumbs.
4. Now add the water cautiously. Add little by little until the dough comes together. You may not need to add the entire quantity. As the author of the original recipe suggests, the little water you use, the easier it is to roll out in the baked version.
5. Cover this with a damp cloth or cling film and keep aside for 30 minutes. 
6. Heat oil in a fry pan. 
7. Make small rounds out of the dough and when the oil is hot, drop these rounds in and fry till golden brown on both sides.

Serve hot. 

Whole wheat pop tarts

Off late I've been quite active on the food blogging world and I don't exactly remember how but I came across this blog. I loved most of the recipes posted there but this one stuck on. Today I got down to making these.

Just for the reader's convenience, here goes a list of ingredients and method.
Ingredients for 4 pop tarts:
1 cup of whole wheat flour
1/2 cup unsalted butter - chilled
1/4 tsp salt
1/4 cup iced water
Jam as per sweetness desired
1 egg for egg wash

How I made it :
1. Mix the flour and salt in food processor.
2. Turn on food processor. Add the chilled butter cut into small cubes.
3. When you see crumbs, pour in the iced water until most of the dough collects together.
4. Take this out onto a floured surface.
5. Roll out. Cut into shape of choice.
6. Ensure that the shapes are not more than 1/4 inch thick.
7. Place some jam in the middle of one shape. Place another similar shaped and sized shape on top.
8. Seal the edges with a fork.
9. Apply egg wash.
10. Put in pre-heated oven at 190 degree C and bake for 20 minutes.

It was truly delicious. Do try it. Your kids will definitely love it. I am gonna make this time and again for sure.