Vella Appam

The first thing that comes to my mind is no one in my family knows to make good appams.It always get stick to the bottom of the pan.So it was an long time wish for me to get to know that, so that I can save a family from making poor appams :)

Its a little secret in Kerala, that the Christians in kerala make wonderful appams. And it was proved true from my experience too.Its from Ajoe and Treasa I got this recipe, and it indeed turned out to be good.Now all in my family uses this procedure to make super soft and crisp appams.

Ingredients
1.Sona Massori rice (4 cups)
2.Gated Cocunut(1 cup)
3.Cooked Rice(1 cup)
4.Yeast(1 small pkt)
5.Salt as needed
6.Sugar to taste

Preparation

• Soak the rice for 8 hours before you grind it
• Grind coconut and cooked rice along with th soaked rice until a smooth dough is formed.
• Make sure you do not make the dough watery.Have it in medium consistency.
• Add salt to the dough and keep it aside
• In a small pan, heat 2 tbsp of water and add 3 tbsp sugar to it.Bring it to boil.Now add yeast to the sugar syrup.
• Add the yeast in sugar syup to the dough
• Allow it to ferment it for 8 hours.
• Add salt/sugar as needed when you start preparing appams.

Tip - If the dough is not fermented enough, add some sugar to 1/4 glass of milk and add to the dough 30 mts before you start making the appams.

Falafel - for the Middle East Taste Buds

Today being Sunday, I had nothing much to do..got up pretty late, had some quick fix lunch and was watching some movies. Gopan reminds me every now and then I am being a workaholic now-a-days.Ofcourse, thats not true! So I decided I wouldn't work today.By evening I was bored of being in bed full day long. It wouldn't be hard for you to believe that I even had my lunch in bed.

I thought I wanted to eat Kinnatappam today, called up Ann and she mentioned you may need to soak it for four hours.It was already 8.30 pm and so it was not worth the effort.I wanted to keep myself busy and so thought of something simple to make.

All of a sudden, Falafel came to my mind.I had been thinking of making it for so long.So this is the day.Falafel is a famous appetizer you get in the middle eastern countries.Sabari & Sumi introduced it to me at a Greek resturant, when I visited them at Chicago.I love fried food and fell in love with it at the first time itself.Then I searched for resturants where we get this in Minneapolis as well.Ofcourse, I used to drag gopan every now and then to those.The famous one being Dynos Gyros - The Greek Place.

And now how to make it at home.

Ingredients
1.15oz can of Chick peas
2.Finely chopped Onions (1 no)
3.Finely Minced garlic (1 tsp)
4.Parsley or coriander (3 tsp)
5.Pepper powder(1 tsp)
6.Cumin powder(1 tsp)
7.Coriander Powder(1 tsp)
8.All Purpose Flour (3 tbsp)
9.Salt as required
10.Oil

Preparation

• Pat dry the canned chick peas
• Coarse grind the chick peas in to a mixture or mash it with a spoon.
• Mix all the ingredients mentioned from 2-9
• With the palm of your hand, make small balls out of it
• Deep fry it in oil until golden brown
• Serve it with Hummus or tomato sauce

Vada Curry

I know, if you are not a tamilian - this may sound a little odd to you. You must have heard of vada but not vada curry - right. It so happened, the other day one of my collegue got this for lunch.I was impressed, it was really good.

You can either have it with Chappati or Rice - But I was told that it goes best with Kal Dosa!
And..Here, let me tell you how to make it!

Ingredients
1. Channa Dhal (1.5 Cups)
2.Onion (3 cups)
3. Tomato (3 nos)
4. Turmeric
5. Sambar powder
6.Coriander Powder
7.Garam Masala
8.Curd
9.Ground nuts(15 nos)
10.Cashew (20 nos)
11.Green Corinader Leaves
12.Green Chillies (3 nos)
13.Grounded Pepper

How to make vada
Soak Chana dhal for 4 hrs.Coarse grind it for 5-10 mts till you get a thick mixture.
Mix 1/2 cup of onions with it and add a pinch of salt to it. Fry it in oil.
Tip - Apply oil inyour hand so that the patty doesn't stick to your hand
If the water is more in the mixture, vada breaks up

And now the curry
Fry the onions to Golden brown with one or two bay leaf in it.
Add the sambar powder,turmeric and coriander powder to it and Saute well.
We can now add the tomatoes and fry them until we get a thick paste
To this, make the vada into pieces and add.You may want to add 2 glasses of water to this paste and let it boil.
In between Grind the green chilly seperately and grind the cashew and Ground nut seperately.
Add these paste to the boiling curry.
After 5 mts, mix a spoon of garam masala in urd and add to the curry.
You can also pepper now for taste.
Add water as needed for consitency and let it boil for another 10 mts.
Garnish it with Coriander leaves.

Your Vada cury is ready.

Cocunut Custard

This is my first french recipe.Last week at work, our receptionist got this creamy dessert.It was really Yummy.But the time I was at her desk, I just had a spoonful.But it was really wonderful.
And here goes the recipe.
Ingredients
4 Eggs
1 can Condensed milk
1 can milk
1 can shredded coconut
Beat the first three mixture well.Sprinkle the shredded coconut on the top.Heat the oven to 350F.Take a bigger bowl add water in it.Keep the bowl with the mixture inside the bigger bowl.Bake it for approximately 1 hr. You can either eat it warm or refrigenate it

My First Blog

....I know what your thinking, Yep, I agree I am late in this blogging game.

But as the saying goes - Better Late than Never...

You know what brought me to this part of the world...

1.My Boredom

2.My Loneliness

3.Ofcourse, as my husband says - Lack of intrests in anything in the world..

Ya, so all of a sudden I thought of what should I be blogging...and I think right this moment my intrests are in cooking.Not that I am a great cook, but I m bored of the same food I eat.And ofcourse I hardly cook at home.

Since Change is vital, let me also do something different starting today.