Pappu Thokku (Chana Dal, Lime)

Ingredients
Chana dal - 2 cups
Cumin seeds - 2 tea spoons
Green chillies - depends on how hot chillies are and how much spicy you want. I used 3 hot green long peppers
Lime juice - 1 table spoons (Adjust it according to your taste)

For tadka
Oil - 1 table spoon
mustard seeds - 1 tea spoon
urad dal - 1 tea spoon
red chillies - 2 -3 pinched small

Method of preparation
Soak chana dal for couple of hours. This gives the dal a little softier touch when grinded.
Grind it with green chillies, cumin, Do not make it too smooth paste. It has to be a little grainy.
You can add the lime juice and tadka at this point. Now top it with fresh coriander and serve with hot rice.

-- Will add pics soon.

Veggie Kabobs (BBQ)

Remembering hot grilled kabobs on a winter day. This post was supposed to go during summer. but I got a little lazy but what better time it is than a chilled day and remembering about hot grilled healthy stuff.

-------------

Now today the day is really going to be hot and humid and I felt that, today is the day this should be published. well simple to make and a healthy option too, especially for picky eaters also. This can be your main dish, side dish or just a snack too. So try it out when you get time. and be creative :). Thank you to my friend Sharmila, who make it at our home, Yumm.....

As you all might have observed that any BBQ or grilling takes hours of soaking veggies in the sauce/syrup. Well unlike that, this will take just few minutes. 

Ingredients

Green Pepper

Red pepper

Red onions

Zucchini

Paneer (make sure you get the firm paneer, otherwise they break easily while we slide). I will post the brand and the name of the paneer I used later. 

Yogurt

Shan Kabob Masala 

Method of preparation

Mix the yogurt with the kabob masala. Adjust the spices accordingly, you can add more red chilli powder, salt etc as you needed. Now chop the veggies almost same size, cubes/rectangles, so that when we grill them, everything is evenly cooked. Soak the veggies in the yogurt mixture and put it in the fridge for 15 minutes. You can leave it for some more time inside, or take them out and keep it.

Now take the skewers and arrange it according to you taste. Put it on the grill and turn it slowly when one side is done. Your veggie kabobs are ready to be yumm yumm in your tumm tumm :). 

Some more visual feast. Enjoy !!!!

Tomato Thokku/Pachadi (long term)

To all my dear readers, this tomato thokku or pachadi can stay for long period like more than a one month or so. So we can make it once and keep enjoying it for close to one month or more. I learned this recipe from my mother in law when she was visiting us last month. try it and do leave your comments as usual :) Thank you all.

Ingredients
Tomato (Get good red ones) - 8
Red chilli powder - 1 cup (or 1 big sambar spoon ish)
Tamarind - little more than lemon size
Salt - 1 cup and little more
Mustard seeds powder - 1 table spoon
Methi powder - 1 and 1/2 table spoon
Oil - 8 table spoons
Mustard seeds - 1/2 table spoon
Asafoetida (Hing) - 1/2 table spoon

Method of preparation
1) Take a kadai or pan (take wider one) and add couple of spoons of oil. Cut the tomato's into medium sized pieces. Once the oil is heated, add the tomato's to it.
2) Remove the seeds from the tamarind. Now spread the tamarind on the chopped tomatos. Add salt to it.
3) Do not mix it. Once the tomato's are cooked, turn off the heat. Now add the red chilli powder and other powders to it.Mix everything and leave it for couple of minutes.
4) Blend the above mixture. not too pasty but just for couple of seconds.
5) Do the tadka/popu/poNi by taking oil in a small pan, heat it and then add mustard seeds. Once mustard seeds starts spluttering, add the hing to it and turn off heat. Add the tadka and mix well. (Oil should be oozing out a little. )

Note: If you feel that oil is more, then do not worry. Oil, salt and red chilli will be more in the items which needs to last for long time.
This Thokku/pachadi is eaten with white rice or with any other thing.
It can be eaten the instant it is made too. So enjoy it the way you like it.

(Will post some pictures soon).

Pesaru pappu pachadi/Moong dal ki Chutney

This is one of the quick and easiest pachadi's to make. Probably more authentic one too. I learned this from my attagaru when they were visiting us last month. here goes the recipe:

Ingredients:

Moong dal - Soaked in water for atleast for two hours

Hing (Asafoetida)

Red chilli powder

Turmeric

Salt 

For tadka:

Oil

Mustard seeds

Jeera

Hing (Asafoetida)

Curry leaves (optional)

Method of preparation:

Add the salt, red chilli powder, turmeric to the soaked and drained moong dal. Grind it coarsely in a blender.  Do the tadka with heated oil in a small bowl. Add mustard seeds and let it splutter. Add jeera, hing and curry leaves. Add tadka to the chutney. Your chutney is ready to serve. This is generally goes good with white rice and ghee (or oil).

Chinthakaya Pachadi

(Took lot of break for posting this ... but finally did)
I loved when one of my colleague actually got this for lunch. I loved it so much, that I had to ask for recipe and share with you all. Her version ( I do not know the name), was much spicy and yummy tooo but since I use less green chillies the taste came out to be a little different. Here goes the yummy pachadi recipe:

Ingredients
Chintakaya paste - 3-4 spoons (generally we get it from india - green chintakaya paste)
Garlic (few pods)
Red chillies
Green chillies
Peanuts
Sesame seeds
Salt to taste
Mustard seeds
Jeera(Cumin seeds)
Dhaniya powder/seeds
Asafoetida
Curd
Tamarind - little bit (soaked and get thick water of it)
Curry leaves

Method of preparation
Dry roast the peanuts, sesame seeds and red chillies.
Grind green chillies, garlic, sesame seeds, peanuts and red chillies.
Add the Chintakaya paste, curd, tamarind liquid and grind together. Add salt as needed and very little water for it to grind and mix thoroughly.

In a pan, add some oil. Add dhaniya, mustard seeds (let them splutter), jeera, and curry leaves. Take a small bowl with little water and add asafoetida to it. Mix it and then add it to the above and close the lid. After couple of minutes add the grinded paste from above. Cook for about 5 - 10 minutes until the oil leaves the sides of hte pan or floats on top. Enjoy it !!!!

Mixed vegetable raita

Mixed veggies here means, all I added was grated carrot, onion, tomatos and american cucumber. I believe may be I can experiment by adding the deep fried bhendi and boondi  to the raita just before I serve. hmm.... will take that experimentation part later on and here is the recipe I used.

Ingredients
Onions - chopped finely - 1 small or can use even less too
Tomato's - Chopped finely - 1 or more depending on your love to it.
Cucumber - Chopped finely (similar to onions)
2 carrots grated
Yogurt - needed to make raita
Salt - can add from 1/2 - 1 spoon depending on sourness/sweetness of yogurt
For tadka
Oil - 1-2 tablespoons
Mustard seeds - 1/4 tea spoon
Asafoetida/hing/Inguva - a pinch or more
urad dal - 1 tea spoon (can add more depending on your how crunchy you want)
Curry leaves - a handful (optional)
Crushed red chillies - 1-2 (lightly fry them either in a small amount of oil or without and crush them nicely in mortar with pestel or in blender if you do not have it). Add it carefully as it might increase the spiciness on how much you add.


Method of preparation
Mix all the raita ingredients. Make tadka by keeping a small bowl on stove and add oil to it. Add mustard seeds and after they splutter add the urad dal , asafoetida and curry leaves. Add the red chilie paste, tadka to the raita mixture and serve it chilled with any rice item like biryani, mint rice, or spinach rice. I would love to have it with roti or plain rice too. Its individual opinion or options... you can try out number of them.

Onion Tomato Salad

I am so tempted so try this at home that I made it twice in a span of two weeks. Well very easy to make, tasty and yet another side dish ready in few seconds. My grandfather used to make this when I was staying with him while studying my bachelor's. So here goes the recipe:    

Ingredients

Onion - 1/2 chopped finely

Tomatos - 2 chopped finely

Oil - 1-2 table spoons

Salt to taste (I used 1 and 1/2 spoon)

Red chilli powder - 1 table spoon (you can adjust this according to your taste buds)

Jeera powder - 1/2 tea spoon (optional)

Coriander leaves - as many as you like (finely chopped)

Method of preparation

1)  Mix onions and tomatos finely chopped. Add red chilli powder, salt (Jeera powder) to above along with coriander leaves and mix thoroughly either with hand  or spatula.

2) Do tadka in a bowl. Add oil to it. Once oil is heated add mustard seeds and then  urad dal to it. You can add some red chillis to this if needed. Add asafoetida and turn off the heat. Cool it and add it to the onion tomato mixture. Your side dish is ready. This goes well with rice but can have it with roti also if you are like me. Enjoy !!   

April 2020 - Made this again recently and here is it. I did not add the Jeera powder this time. 

Mamidikaya/Mango Charu

This is another recipe which I love. Easy to do and yummy to taste. I believe a modified version of this called "aam ka panna" is very famous in Maharastra. So lets see this charu recipe:

Ingredients
Raw Mango (taste it to check if it is sour)
Green chillies
Curry leaves
Water
Salt to taste
Oil
Mustard seeds
Cumin seeds

Method of preparation

1)Peel the mango skin and chop it into small pieces. Add little water to mango pieces and put it on stove. (mango pieecs should be drowned in water. Do not add too much water at this point. We can add more water while making charu.)

2) After it is done try to mash the pieces with hand or masher until it is kind of soft water. If you want you can filter the water.
3) Take a kadai and add oil to it. Add mustard seeds and let it splutter after the oil is heated. Add jeera (cumin seeds) to it.
4) Add asafoetida to it now and also green chillies at this point. Now add the mango mixture and water to it.
5) Add salt to it and boil it for 5 minutes. 

This charu goes well with plain dal or any dal of your choice with rice.

Mamidikaya Pappu/Mango Dal

This is another famous one from Andhra Pradesh. This dal is usually made in summer when we get the sour mangoes. Here goes the recipe.

Ingredients
Raw Mangoes - 1
Toor Dal - Cooked (if uncooked, then cook it along with peeled, chopped raw mangos)- 1 cup
Curry leaves - a few
Salt to taste (1 and 1/2 tea spoon)
Green chillies - 2 slit and choped
Mustard seeds - 1/2 tea spoon
Oil - 1 table spoon
Jeera - 1/2 tea spoon
Turmeric - 1/2 tea spoon
Coriander powder (Dhania powder)- optional - 1/2 tea spoon

Method of preparation
1) Prepare dal as you would normally do, by adding dal, little turmeric and Jeera. You can add Peeled and chopped mango also while you are cooking dal in pressure cooker.
2) Take a kadai and add oil to it. Add mustard seeds and let it splutter. Now add jeera (optional as it is contained in dal while cooking), green chillies, curry leaves and now add raw mango pieces (only if you did not add it in dal).
3) If you added mango pieces to dal, then add the total cooked dal at this point. Add salt and coriander powder and your dal is ready. Garnish with coriander leaves (optional).

If using Electric pressure cooker, then put cooker in the browning mode. Add oil to it and repeat from step (2) of above, except you will be adding uncooked dal to it and add sufficient water and then cook it on high pressure for 3 minutes for dal to be ready. After you take out dal in serving bowl garnish with coriander leaves.

Serve hot with Rice and ghee.

Onion Tomato Yogurt Chutney - Perugu pachadi

This is a very famous raita from my side to accompany with any kind of rice item mostly either biryani's or fried rice items. Simple to make and jhatpat flavor.

Ingredients
Onions - 1 small - finely chopped
Tomatos - 2 small or 1 large finely chopped
Yogurt - 2-3 cups
Cilantro - Finely chopped
Curry leaves - a few for tadka
Oil - 1 table spoon
Mustard seeds - 1/2 tea spoon
Asafoetida - 1/2 tea spoon
Green chillies - finely chopped (depends on flavor)
Urad dal - 1/2 table spoon (this adds the crunchyness in between)


Method of preparation
1) Mix Onions, tomatos, green chillies cilantro (coriander) in a serving bowl. Now add salt to it and mix it with hand.
2) Prepare tadka by taking a small tadka kadai and add oil to it. After oil is heated, add mustard seeds and let it splutter. Add asafoetida, green chillies urad dal and curry leaves to the oil. turn off stove when the urad dal is slightly golden but do not wait until they turn black.

3) Add yogurt and mix properly. Add  prepared tadka to the yogurt mixture and your raita is ready to serve.

Ginger Yogurt (Allam Perugu) chutney

The other day when we were at my cousin's place, she prepared this chutney, which goes well with either utappam or with paratha's also. It was quick to make, good for your tummy and yummy to eat. So here goes the recipe from her:

Ingredients
Ginger - small piece (grate it or smash it in mortar)
Yogurt - desired quantity (probably 1 cup)
Salt to taste - (1/2 tea spoon)
Lemon juice - 1/2 tea spoon

Method of preparation
Mix all the ingredients well and serve it cool with either hot utappam or paratha.

Coconut - Putnalu Chutney

 Well this is a simple recipe which I make at home. Only problem with me is taking out the coconut from the kuduka(coconut) itself. So the other day I saw the coconut pieces frozen from an asian store. I immediately picked it up. It got a nice use from then. I can make coconut chutney in seconds. well other than ingredients list the method of preparation should be very easy.


Ingredients
Coconut pieces (either fresh or frozen) - if frozen, put it in microwave for a minute or so.
Green chillies go very well with the recipe but I had green chillies with no spicyness, so I aded little fried red chillies also. So vary the spicyness depending on what you have.
Chick pea dalia - Putnalu - a fistful or less may be
You can also add a little cashew for making the thick chutney if you like (Optional)
For tangyness - you can use either tamarind pulp or yogurt. I used one spoon of each (yogurt as well as tamarind pulp)
Salt to taste
For Tadka:
Oil - 2 table spoons
Mustard seeds - 1 tea spoon
Cumin seeds - 1/2 tea spoon
Chana dal - 1 or 2 table spoons
Asafoetida - two pinches
Red chillies - upon your taste
Curry leaves - few

Method of preparation
Grind all the ingredients except tadka items. If needed, add some water while grinding. Do the tadka on stove and add all the ingredients under tadka. Add tadka to the grinded mixture and your chutney is ready.

The chutney can be accompanied with many items or tiffins like Dosa, Idli, utappam or upma etc. It can also be used as a side item with rice. We had the hot vegetable upma so here is our version of coconut chutney with upma photo.

Gongura-Mint-Moong dal

I used Electric pressure cooker for it and I am going to tell you the same recipe here. You can use a regular kadai on stove and cover and cook it. People can avoid Onion and garlic if they dont like it.

Ingredients

Gongura leaves - 1/2 cup

Mint leaves - 1/4 cup or even less

Moong dal - 1/2 cup

Green chillies - 3 (you can use red chilli powder also)

Salt to taste - I used 1 and 1/2 spoon

Oil - 2 table spoons

Turmeric - pinch/less than 1/2 tea spoon

Cumin seeds - 1/2 tea spoon

Onions - 1 medium sized, finely chopped

Garlic - 2-3 pods peeled and chopped.

Method of preparation

1. Connect the electric pressure cooker to the socket and click the "Menu" button thrice to get to "Browning" mode. Click "Start".

2. Add oil and a minute later add cumin. Now add garlic and green chillies, stir it. Add onions to it a minute later and then let it saute for a minute. Now add washed gongura leaves, mint leaves, moong dal, turmeric, red chilli powder (if neccessary). Add 2-3 cups of water according to your desire.

3. Change the mode of the cooker to "High Pressure" by clicking "Cancel" to cancel current mode and then hitting "Menu" twice. Now click on time twice to increase it to 3 minutes and then click start. When the water starts heating up, add salt to it, mix it and then cover it up. Your dal is ready in 5 minutes or so. After the pressure is down, transfer the contents to a serving bowl.

Palakura Peas Pappu/Spinach Peas Dal

I did this dal last week and my family loved it. So wanted to share this recipe with you all. Hope you try it and like it too. I did not have amchur powder at home so I replaced it with chat powder I had. But you can use amchur powder if you have it.

Ingredients
Spinach - washed and chopped
Peas - 1/2 cup
Tomato (optional) - 2 small
Toor dal - Cooked
Turmeric - 1/2 tea spoon
Cumin seeds - 1 tea spoon
Oil - 1 table spoon
Salt - 1 and 1/2 table spoon (you can add more depending on your taste buds)
Red Chilli powder - 1 and 1/2 table spoon (you can add more depending on your taste buds)
Chat masala - 1 table spoon (alternately you can use amchur/lime for sourness)
Coriander powder - 1 table spoon

Method of Preparation
1) wash and cook dal as you do regularly. Take a kadai, add oil and heat it. Add cumin seeds and then spinach and peas to it.
2) stir for a  minute or until spinach comes close, add tomatos to it. Add rest of the ingredients including salt to it. Add Dal also.
3) At this point make sure you mix in between and then cover the kadai, because it might spil on you. Once everything gets mixed properly and is at a good heat rate, then switch off the stove and take it in a serving bowl.

Your simple dal is ready to serve and eat.

Sorakaya Perugu Pachadi/Sorakaya Raita/Doodhi yogurt chutney

Ingredients
Sorakaya/Doodhi - Peeled, Chopped and Boiled in water
Yogurt/Perugu/Sour cream
Salt to taste
Coriander

For tadka
Oil
Mustard seeds
Red chillies
Cumin seeds

Method of preparation
1) Peel, chop and boil doodhi pieces in water . Add salt to water if you want the pieces to be a little sour.

2) Take a serving bowl. Add doodhi/sorakaya pieces to it along with Perugu and salt to taste.

3) Prepare tadka by adding oil to a small bowl. After oil is heated add mustard seeds. After they splutter, add cumin seeds, asafoetida turn off.

4) Crush the fried red chillies either with pestel and mortar or in blender. Add tadka and the red chillies crush to the serving bowl. Mix everything nicely so that the taste spreads out evenly.

Your raita is ready to serve.

Mango avakaya/pickle - In-laws recipe

Doesnt it look awesome and tempting? The mango season has started back in India and it is the time when we too want to eat the newly made chutneys, whether they may be instant or they are for long term. So I got this raw mangoes from store the other day and decided to it for my baby's first birthday occasion. Guess what the total chutney above is finished. I was happy. So here is the simple recipe for above:

Ingredients
Raw Mangos - 2 washed, peeled and chopped into very small pieces
Red chilli powder - 3-5 tbsp (depends on how spicy you like)
Salt - 3-4 tbsp (definitely use less salt than red chilli powder)
Turmeric - 1/4 tbsp
Fenugreek powder - 1-1and1/2 tbsp
Oil - 3 table spoons
mustard seeds - 1/2 tbsp
asafoetida - 1/4 tbsp
Red chillies - 2 no. cut into small lengths

Method of preparation
1) Take a serving bowl and add mangos chopped into it. Now put the salt and mix them thoroughly with hand. Try sqeezing the mango pieces after you mix it. This will mix the mixture nicely.

2)Now add turmeric, red chilli powder and fenugreek powder (menthi podi). do not mix it now.

3) Prepare for tadka by adding oil into a small tadka bowl and then add mustards seeds. Wait until they splutter, add asafoetida and red chillies and turn off the stove.

4) Add tadka to the mixture in step 2 and mix everything. If you feel that you need to add more oil, you can do so by adding little warm/hot oil to the mixture. Your chutney is ready. You can directly serve it or you can wait for few hours which will make then mangos taste even better as they grasp all the flavors nicely.

Cucumber carrot yogurt dip/chutney

I wanted to take a nice picture but with the camera I have the following is the only picture which was looking good. This item can be accompanied with biryani/fried rice or with normal rice or roti. Tastes good, healthy and natural (mostly). This is my way of doing this chutney, I will mention about the authentic way also after I collect the correct details soon.

Ingredients
cucumber - 1
Carrots - 2
Yogurt - 2 cups
Dahivada raita powder - 1 spoon
Oil - 2 spoons
mustard seeds - 1/2tea spoon
urad dal - depends on the crunchiness you want (may be 1-2 spoons)
Coriander - depends on your taste - 2-3 spoons (optional)
curry leaves - Optional
Green chillies - Optional (chopped very small probably one or two)
asafoetida - a pinch

Method of preparation
1) Peel the skin off of cucumber and grate it to your desired size. Now squeeze out the additional water out of it and take it in a serving bowl.
2) Now add grated carrot and yogurt to it. Mix them well.
3) Add salt if desired or you can add lemon juice and spinach as an alternative to it.
4) Put tadka in a small bowl. Add oil, after heated add mustard seeds. After mustard seeds starts splutter, add green chillies, asafoetida, urad dal, small portion of curry leaves.
5) once urad dal is turning light brown or crunchy turn off heat and add the tadka to the yogurt mixture. Add coriander also to it mix it and serve chilled if needed.


Note: If you feel yogurt mixture is thick or if yogurt is little sour  then add milk to it. This will make the thick to thin paste and also compensate the sourness of yogurt with its sweet taste. 

Beauty Tip: After you squeeze juice out of cucumber grated. Apply it to your face and leave it on for few minutes and wash away with warm water. This will make your skin look and feel smooth. Frequent apply will result in much better results.

Authentic Vankaya Pachadi/ Eggplant Pickle

This is an andhra recipe from my mother in law. I wanted to share this recipe as I feel this is an authentic recipe. so here it goes:
Ingredients
Eggplant/ Brinjal / Vankaya - fried in little oil
Red chilies - 4 or 5
Green Chillies - 2 or 3
Urad dal
Mustard seeds
Menthulu / Fenugreek seeds
Tamarind - little, soaked in water
Salt
Coriander
Method of preparation
1. Take a kadai and do tadka/popu/poni in it. Add little oil after it is heated, now add mustard seeds, fenugreek seeds, red chillies, green chillies, urad dal.
2. Grind the above tadka along with tamarind water, coriander and salt.
3. Lastly add fried brinjals to above and grind. Do not grind it to total paste.
4. I love onions taste along with the brinjal/eggplant. go ahead and add chopped onion to the pachadi and you wont repent it. If you do not like onion taste then please skip this step.
Note: If you like a little crunchy taste then add tindora chopped into very very small pieces to the above. You wont believe but the taste will be too good having crunchy feeling in between.

Hope you like the recipe and will try it.

Bean Dip

Its nice to go out to lunch and dinners sometimes. I tend to learn lot of new items whenever I got out. One of them is this Bean dip. We tasted it today at our relatives home as appetizer. It was served along with Tostitos chips. I can guarantee, if we add little less salsa then it is perfect as a healthy snack for children when they are home from after school. Meaning this can be part of afternoon snack. Hope you all will also like it.

Ingredients

Pink bean tin

Hot Salsa

onions

cilantro

Cheese

Jalepenos

Method of preparation

1. Empty the can of beans. Wash and drain the beans in colander. Do the same with Jalepenos.

2. Blend the beans with salsa to paste in a grinder/blender.

3. Add it in a serving bowl which is microwave safe and heat the mixture for 2-3 minutes in microwave so that it is kind of cooked up.

4. Now spread cheese, onions, cilantro, Jalepenos and put it in microwave for another 2-3 minutes or until cheese is little melted.

5.Now you are ready to serve your bean dip with any chips. Best combination for this is Tostitos type chips (or corn chips).

Sabudana vadiyalu(small papad)

This recipe is very easy simple tasty and wonderful.

Ingredients
Sabudana (Saggubiyyam)
Salt
Green chillie paste (Optional - if you want them to be spicy then add this)

Method of preparation
1. Soak Sabudana for 4- 5 hours in water.
2. Drain Sabudana and add it to a hot kadai/vessel and let it become kind of soggy paste. You should be able to take it out with a spoon.
3. Switch off the stove and add very little salt to it. If you like you can add green chilli paste at this point. Mix all the above.
4. Take a tray (any tray but wide enough). Using spoon or spatula drop very small quatities on the tray (by maintaining enough distance between one drop and other).


5. Put the tray in sun light for a day or two by turning to other side once one side is dried out totally. These vadiyalu dries out very quickly if the heat is adequate. Your sabudana vadiyalyu are ready at this point.



Before you eat them, fry them in oil and they will become crunchy and big (similar to papad but not of that much big size). These vadiyalu are good to eat with rice and sambar or rice and rasam combination.
Note: I am going to post pics of this so that it will give a nice pictorial view and idea of how they look at every stage.