Pizza bites

Nothing fancy. There are recipes all over the internet dime a dozen. This just happens to be a tried and working vegetarian variation. The classic recipe is with pepperoni. Also in this version the tomato sauce goes into the dish and is hence easier to serve. The prep for this dish is exactly the same as for pizza. In fact in the last minute you can just decide to make it a pizza, albeit one with only very unimaginative toppings. So let's get started.
The recipe has two parts- dough and filling. Start with the dough.
Warm about 1/4 cup of fluid (water or milk). You should be able to comfortably keep a finger in the water. "Ouch"- hot is equal to "ouch, you killed the yeast". If this subjectivity is too much for you, get a thermometer, we want 60 degrees C. Add 60 degrees C water to 3/4 tsp dry yeast and 1/2 tsp sugar, stir and keep aside while you measure out flour.
For 12 pizza bites you will need 2 cups of all-purpose flour. If all-purpose flour is synonymous with maida for you (which it is not, ask me), then take 1 3/4 cup of maida and 1/4 cup of atta. Add salt to taste and check the yeast now for bubbly froth. No froth? Pack up- next recipe please. Yeast has to be frothy. Pour the frothy yeast into the flour and an additional 1/4 cup plain water. Measure out 1/4 cup water and keep aside before starting to knead. Use the dough hooks attachment on your hand mixer. You will need more water as you knead. Use the measured out 1/4 cup of water, but that is the max you can go with water i.e. 2 cups of flour to 3/4 cup of water in total (1/4 cup with yeast, 1/4 to start kneading and 1/4 as you go on). It is precisely 2 cups of flour to 2/3 cup of water. Since atta soaks a lot we allow 3/4 cup water , but really no more. Knead 5-7 mins with the hand mixer or 15-20 mins after the dough comes together if kneading by hand. Nice smooth and springy ball, coat with a dot of oil to avoid drying and then pizza dough - R.I.P (rise in peace).
Summing up pizza dough ingredients and proportions:
- 2 cups flour (see above about what kind)
- 2/3 cup water in ALL (3/4 if using whole wheat, see above)
- 3/4 tsp dry yeast
- 1/2 tsp sugar
- salt

For the filling you will need:
- 6-7 ripe tomatoes
- A knob of butter (1tsp)
- 10 leaves of of fresh basil or dry oregano/thyme
- Black pepper corns
- 3-4 cloves garlic
- Handful of sweet corn kernels (frozen is fine)
- 75 gms of your favourite cheese (cheddar or mozarella works fine).
- 2 Tbsp Extra virgin olive oil
- salt

Quarter tomatoes and throw them in the jar of a blender. Pulse for 3-5 seconds. We don't want them pureed; just thoroughly crushed small chunks are good. Set on a stove a saucepan or any heavy bottomed vessel with the knob of butter on high flame. Add all the tomato mush and bring to a boil. Then reduce the flame to simmer; cover and forget about it for at least 20 mins.
Meanwhile, crush pepper corns, peel and mince garlic, thaw the corn kernels and cut the cheese into 12 equal cubes/pieces.
Back to the tomatoes. Scrape the sides of the pot and bring the pulp together in the middle. There should be very little water separating out of the tomato pulp, else cook open on a high flame. Add the crushed pepper, salt and minced garlic and stir well on high flame. You should have crossed pizza sauce consistency reached almost a loose tomato paste consistency. Turn off the heat and mix in the corn kernels immediately. After about 2 mins stir in olive oil and shreds of basil.

Assembly. Deflate with flour dusted hands the now risen pizza dough and make a ball with as little handling as possible. Depending on your work surface, roll out the dough as thick as you would for pizza (or a little thicker if you only make thin crust).

 Cut them up into about 3 inch pieces (squares/rectangles) with a knife.

On each piece of rolled out dough place some filling and a piece of the cheese (no grating..yipee!).

Wrap up each piece bringing up the sides and sealing in the filling. Place seam side down on a greased baking dish.

If you do not want them pull-apart style use a large cookie sheet and place them well spaced (totally unnecessary in my opinion). Let rise for another 20-30 mins and bake in an oven pre-heated to 180 degrees C for about 30-40 mins or till the bread looks done. Optionally brush on top with butter and dry spices when still hot. Pull apart (or not) and enjoy.

Blog resurrected with prawn curry

I claim and assert my malayalee roots to excuse myself from explicitly calling the dish Kerala prawn curry. Well it is and most curry posts,especially seafood, unless otherwise qualified will be.
This is a super quick dinner fix; one of those meals about which you can hear non vegetarian Keralites saying.. "I make non-veg meals so that I don"t have too many veggies to chop and too many side dishes to make and just this one curry completes the meal".
A note before we begin, this is not a curry to make if you have umami craving. The prawns are really only meant to flavor the curry and not for biting into. Hence the really small quantity of prawns required. We now begin.
You will need
- 6-8 medium sized prawns (cleaned)
- 1 raw mango from the mango tree outside peeled and chopped.
- 10 curry leaves
- 2 green chillies
- 1/4 coconut
- Red chilli powder
- Turmeric powder
- Corriander powder
- Cumin seeds
- 2 cloves of garlic
- 1 small piece of ginger
- 3 dry red chillies
- 3 shallots/1/4 onion finely chopped
- Mustard seeds
- Fenugreek seeds
- 2-3 Tbsp Coconut oil
- Salt

Ok, that seemed like a long list, but you must admit it's mostly just regular stuff found in any Indian kitchen even when your grocery shopping is due. Set on the stove a pot with 2 cups of water with prawns, mango, curry leaves, slit green chillies, turmeric and salt. When it comes to a boil reduce to a simmer and carry on with the remaining prep. Into the jar of a blender make a paste of chopped coconut (don't bother with grating), red chilli powder, corriander powder, cumin seeds, garlic and ginger. Add water as needed. The prawns must be simmering for about 15-20 mins by now. Add the contents of the blender and bring to a boil. Simmer again for 5 mins for the raw spices to cook through and take off heat. Temper the curry - heat coconut oil in a wok, splutter mustard seeds, add fenugrek seeds, dry red chillies and shallots/onions- pour the hot oil with condiments into the curry and mix. Ladle some curry into the wok to get all the oil. Serve with rice or rice based main dish like idli, dosa, idiappam or appam.
Nothing fancy hence no photo.

Spaghetti with Mackerel

Happy New year and all that! For the elusive reader, here's a sincere apology for not posting for a long time. To be fair to us, it's the terrace gardening that kept us from posting new recipes. So one of these days, when we saw Jamie Oliver's 'Fish with linguine' recipe on his FB wall, we knew this should be tried and tested. Tried and tested we did and owing to its awesomeness, we immediately decided it needs to be shared. 

Here it is for you. We have generously adapted the recipe to fit our taste (and to the ingredients that we had in the kitchen). Not a fish eater? Just skip the mackerel and you get a great, light pasta dish for dinner!

Mackerel - 2 fillets 
Spaghetti (or linguine) - 250 gms
Garlic - 3 large or 4 small cloves
Cherry Tomatoes - 4 to 5 (or one big tomato)
Parsley - few sprigs
Thyme - few sprigs
Lemon -  1 (juice and zest)
Fresh Red Chili - 1
Butter - 1 tbsp
Olive Oil
Sea salt
Pepper 

Directions to cook:

• Set a pot of water to boil for the pasta with a teaspoon of cooking oil and salt. Meanwhile...
• Wash the fillet, apply just enough salt and crushed pepper and keep aside to marinate.
• Peel and slice the garlic cloves, finely chop the red chili, parsley and thyme; also, halve the cherry tomatoes and zest the lemon
• Add around 3 tablespoons of oil in the hot wok, add the garlic; once it starts to show some color, add red chili, half of parsley and the fish fillet (skin side down, else your fish will curl up in the heat)
• Toss and cook the fillet in low heat; it's ok if it flakes and breaks, it's supposed to (if it doesn't, use the spatula to break it up into rough chunks. You don't want a whole fillet in your pasta)
• Add the tomatoes and stir for about a minute
• Throw in the lemon zest and stir for exactly 30 seconds, else the zest loses its flavor
• Turn off the heat and add the lemon juice and give it a stir
• Your pasta must be done now, use tongs to add the pasta from the pot to the wok. 
• Add the butter to the hot pasta and toss to coat
• Add the seasoning, salt followed by the finely chopped spices - Parsley and Thyme

Serve warm!

Spinach and roasted pumpkin sandwich

In the Indian context sandwiches are considered a snack. One that you can whip up in minutes if you have the chutney. Typically a sandwich is just a couple of slices of pure white bread (preferably with the crust trimmed off!!) with green corriander chutney and butter in between and a few measly slices of tomatoes, cucumber, onions and boiled potato. With a good appetite you can easily polish off 5-6 triangles and then some more.
Subway managed to introduce the solid and substantial western of the sandwich. However they have managed to only reach out to a fairly upward crowd and their sandwiches are exclusively referred to as Subway with clear opposition (and rightly so) to the "Indian Sandwich".

Here is one sandwich recipe which attempts like Subway an acceptance of "The Sandwich" as a meal. The preparation is also as elaborate as you would reckon for a meal. The ingredients list for this sandwich:
-Whole wheat sandwich bread (preferably home made, I have a posted a recipe already)
- Pumpkin 300 gm
- Cheese - as much as you like and the kind you like. I used Parmesan.
- Green peppers - 2 Nos. (any colour actually)
- Garlic - 2-3 cloves
- Red chilli flakes or Chilli oil
- Basil leaves - 8-10 leaves
- Cream - 1 Tbsp (optional)
- Olive oil
- Salt

The recipe has three parts: veggies and cheese, dressing and the bread. If you are not using chilli oil, start with the dressing. Mix the chilli flakes in about a tablespoon of olive oil and keep aside. We will come back to this later. Chilli oil is just olive oil with chilli flakes soaking in it for a couple of days or more, so the oil gets infused with the spice.
Now we being with the vegetables and cheese part. Peel and chop the pumpkin in 1/2 cm thick slices i.e. really thin. Just quarter the green peppers, you want longish broad slices. Put the pumpkin and peppers in a roasting pan, drizzle some olive oil, sprinkle some salt and pop it into an oven at 180 degrees celsius. (Pre-heating or semi-pre-heating is good, I never bothered in which case it takes a little longer).
While the vegetables roast, prepare the spinach. Trim he roots and the tough stems and chop roughly. Put a little oil or butter in a pot and add the spinach. On low heat, the greens will take 2-3 mins to wilt and release a lot of water. Cook the spinach through, but save about a tablespoon of the water. Grate cheese and keep aside.
Start dressing. To the chilli oil or the olive oil with chili flakes add crushed garlic cloves and about 4-5 finely chopped basil leaves and mix well. Add the cream if using, the spinach water and mix again- the dressing is ready.
Bread: Lightly toast the bread slices dry. Brown them only slightly. Very stiffly toasted slices of bread don't make good sandwiches.
We are now good to assembles the sandwiches if the vegetables in the oven are done. Check on them in the oven. Remember to give them a stir half way through their roasting time (somewhere around the time you wait for the spinach to wilt). The pumpkin slices would be a nice golden brown when done.
Take two slices of bread, spread some of the dressing on them. Place some spinach followed by cheese, pumpkin slices, one whole leaf of basil and finally two long slices of the peppers. Close your sandwich. Enjoy your meal. If the bread used is home made, I bet you will finish your meal with two of these sandwiches.

Nidi = Italian for nests

Countless Italian foods, mainly pasta, are named after their shapes of after things of similar shape found in nature. For example, did you know "Farfalle" means butterfly, "Orecchitte" means little ears and "Conchiglie" means shells? Google up their images and you will instantly know how the names came about.
This recipe is one along those lines. Nido means nest and Nidi refers to several of them. These nests are made of pancake strips and house roasted vegetables and a makeshift filling with easily available Indian ingredients to substitute the actual recipe which calls for ricotta, as explained in the TV series "Simply Italian". That's where this recipe is inspired from. It can be served just plain, but pairs just excellently with a classic arrabbiata sauce. So here we go.

Ingredients for the pancakes:
1/2 (120ml) Cup Milk
1/2 Cup White Flour (maida)
1 Egg
Salt
Nutmeg

Ingredients for the filling:
2 Tbsp Mawa/Khoya (unsweetened)
1 Tbsp Thick set Yogurt
1/2 tsp Red chilli flakes
4-5 large leaves of fresh Basil
Zest of half a lemon
Salt

Veggies to roast:
Egg plant, Zucchini, Peppers (Green/Red/Yellow), 1Tbsp olive oil, Salt. Parmesan cheese.

Ingredients for the arrabbiata sauce:
5-6 ripe Tomatoes
1/2 Onion
1Tbsp cooking Butter
2-3 pods of Garlic
Salt and Pepper
3Tbsp Extra virgin olive oil.

We start with the slowest. Slice the vegetables to be roasted. Do not chop them. You want to be able to spread them on the pancakes without piling too high. I have not given any measurement for how much of each vegetable because it depends on the size of the veggies. One whole Egg plant might be too much or too less depending on how big the Egg plant is and likewise for zucchini and peppers. So read till the end of the recipe and use your judgement. Apply a few drops of olive oil on a skillet and spread the veggies as much as possible on it and pop into an oven set to 180 degrees Celsius for 20-25mins. Pre-heating is not required.

We start on the next slowest. My recent discovery and my would-be all time favourite- The Classic Arrabbiata Sauce. This sauce is so simple and so awesome and will never let you down. Perfect to be used in any Italian recipe that calls for a tomato sauce or just toss in any cooked pasta grate cheese and you'll have the your Italian cravings satiated in minutes.
Quarter the tomatoes and put them in the jar of a blender. Pulse for exactly five seconds. We are trying to arrive at the consistency of "crushed" tomatoes, NOT tomato puree or paste. Set a non-stick pot on a medium-high flame and pour in the contents of the blender. Rinse the blender with no more than a tablespoon of water to get the remaining tomato and pour into the pot. Peel an onion, halve it and dunk one half into the pot. No chopping, no slicing- just half the onion as such. Plop in the tablespoon of butter, give the three (tomato, onion and butter) a good stir, cover the pot, reduce flame to simmer and forget about it for 15-20mins.

Next, the pancakes. With a hand or electric whisk mix all the pancake ingredients into a smooth batter. It should be quite runny. Ladle out onto a good non-stick skillet to get a large thin pancake. Use up the batter and you should have two large ones. Keep aside.

Filling. Except the basil leaves, mix the other ingredients well with a fork until well combined. The mawa will give a grainy texture, this is ok. Finely snip the basil leaves with kitchen scissors and mix in as well.

Give the tomato sauce a good stir now. Remove the half onion and return the lid. Let it go for another 5-10mins and turn off the heat. Keep aside with the lid on.

The veggies must be done now too. It's time to assemble the Nidi. Generously oil a baking dish (borosil) and keep ready. On a large cutting board place one of the pancakes, spread on it half of the filling in a thin layer stopping about 2cm before the edge. Place a layer of the roasted veggies without piling them. Gently but firmly roll the pancake, leave the last inch or so. Place the other pancake and repeat the same layers. Overlap the left out inch of the first pancake with the starting of the next and continue rolling. It sounds more complicated than it is. You are trying to simulate rolling up a longish mat by placing the pancakes one after the other. You should have a very thick roll of the two pancakes now. Using a very sharp knife, slice the roll into about one inch thick slices and place these on the oiled baking dish. The slices touching each other to hold shape. Grate parmesan cheese on top of the Nidi and bake for 10-15mins in a pre-heated oven at 180 Degrees Celsius until the cheese has melted and cooked through.

While the Nidi bake, resume the tomato sauce. Put back on the stove on low flame and stir in any juices that have separated. Crush the garlic pods with the side of a knife and add it to the sauce. Season with salt and pepper. Turn off the heat and stir in 2-3 Tbsp of Extra virgin olive oil. Never heat Extra virgin olive oil. The virginity is lost! Literally.

Nidi must be done. Serve a couple of Nidi onto a plate and spoon some arrabbiata sauce on them. Serve with good white wine!

Upma + Muffin = Upffin!

Torn between snooty breakfast choice (muffins and coffee) and traditional breakfast choice (upma) we came up with the upffin, which was quite a success. Only one thing was missing, it definitely needs a chutney to go with. We suggest the chat chutneys i.e. the green coriander chutney and the sweet tamarind jaggery one.
It makes a very nice 5pm snack too. The semolina (rava) gives a nice brown crispy outside to these savory muffins.

For four jumbo Upffins you will need:

1 cup Semolina (rava)
3/4 cup plain Yogurt a little on the sour side
1/2 tsp Turmeric powder (Manjal/Haldi)
1/2 tsp Red chilli powder
1/2 large or one small Onion chopped
3 Green chillies chopped (or more as per taste)
1 handful Sweet Corn kernels
1 handful fresh Green Peas
Salt to taste
1/2 tsp Baking soda

For Tempering
3 tbsp Cooking oil, Mustard seeds, cumin seeds and Asafoetida (Kayam/Hing).

Dry roast the semolina in a wok taking care to stir constantly and get an even golden brown colour. Transfer into a bowl and let it cool a bit. Add the yogurt and mix well. You can adjust the amount of yogurt depending on how thick it is. The batter should not be too runny, you should be able to spoon the batter into the muffin tray. Mix in all the other ingredients except those for tempering.
Turn on your oven to 180 degrees Celsius. Grease well and flour a muffin tray and keep ready.
In the wok heat the oil and add the mustard seeds, when they begin to splutter, add the cumin seeds and the asafoetida. Turn off the heat and add the contents of the wok to the batter. Spoon in some of the batter into the wok and back into the bowl to get all the oil. Mix the batter well. Spoon the batter into the muffin tray and pop into the oven (even if not completely heated). Bake for about 20mins or until brown. Remove from the mould and serve with the above suggested chutneys.

Beetroot cake

Eeeew... beetroot in cake? The ugly cousin of carrot somehow didn't make it big in the cake world. Both are vegetables, both are roots, both are more or less neutral tasting and have no strong flavours of their own and take up added flavours well. Why then did only carrot cake make it to the chalk boards of many a café? Somethings are just unfair. Let this recipe change your initial exclamation.


As opposed to plain flour cakes which are more spongy, vegetable and fruit cakes are generally a little crumbly due to the water content in the fruits and vegetables. They pair well with ice cream as a dessert and also are more suitable for drizzling a glaze on them rather than layering and frosting. This cake is no exception. I have not done any glaze on this one. But I will include it in the recipe should you want to try it.

This recipe yields a loaf of 8"x 4.5". You will need


3/4 cup finely grated Beetroot
2 Eggs
1/3 cup unsalted Butter
2 tbsp Olive oil
1/2 cup Sugar
1/3 cup Milk/pouring Cream/plain Yogurt.
1/2  Vanilla pod or 1/2 tsp Vanilla extract or essence
1 cup White cake Flour (maida)
1 tsp Baking powder
1/4 tsp Salt


Leave the butter out in the bowl you plan to mix your batter in while you grate the beetroot and measure out other ingredients. Scrape out the vanilla pod if using. Grease and flour the cake pan.


In a separate bowl mix the flour, salt and baking powder and keep aside. Pour the olive oil over the butter and cream the butter with a whisk (or electric mixer) until fluffy. Add the sugar and vanilla and whisk again until thoroughly combined. Add the eggs one at a time mixing between each addition. Add the flour mixture and the milk alternately in three additions starting and ending with the flour. Your cake batter minus the beetroot is now ready.


A note on the beetroot at this point is in place. You have a choice to make here. You can add the grated beetroot as such or saute it in a little butter before adding it. Sauteing the beetroot beforehand will remove excess water from it and hence improve the texture of the cake. I however didn't bother with this, as I am not much for cooking the beetroot twice; once while sauteing and then again in the oven, which would make it nutritionally null and void. I'd rather have a little crumblier cake than eat beetroot just for its colour. So if you have guests and want to make a better presentation, by all means saute the beetroot in a bit of butter until any oozed juices have evaporated. If sauteing, do it right in the beginning and let it cool down before adding it to the batter else the beetroot will cook the eggs as you add.


So, stir in the beetroot with a rubber spatula, not an electric whisk; the whisk will catch the beetroot shreds and fling around cake batter creating beetroot graffiti in your kitchen! Mix it gently, you can leave a bit of white batter marbled here and there. Pour into the cake pan. Smooth the top and pop into an oven preheated to 180 degrees Celsius. Baking time will be more for raw beetroot than for sauted. Bake for about 25 to 40 mins depending on your oven. A toothpick inserted in the middle that comes out clean indicates that the cake is done. Run a knife around the edges and invert cake pan to remove the cake.


If glazing, a lemon glaze works well. Take about three to four tablespoons of icing sugar and add the juice of one lemon to make a paste. Add water as necessary to get a thick syrupy pouring consistence. Drizzle over the warm cake. Cool the cake on a wire rack before slicing.