Pineapple Menaskai

This is a South Indian recipe, slightly sweet and is served as a side dish with rice and vegetable curry. It usually calls for freshly roasted and ground spices, but I substituted whole spices with powdered spices which I quickly roasted. This worked for me as all the spice powders I used were home made and we roast the spices before powdering. The only one I needed to work on was the fenugreek seeds.

4 slices of pineapple (I used the tinned variety)
8-9 fenugreek seeds (roasted and powdered)
1 tsp coriander powder
1/2 tsp cumin powder
1 tsp red chilly powder
1 inch piece of jaggery (crushed)
1 tsp sugar
Water
 For Tempering:
Mustard seeds
Cumin seeds
Curry leaves
Oil

Method:

1) In a small pan, mix the coriander powder, chilly powder and cumin powder and lightly roast it.
2) Chop the pineapple slices into small pieces.
3) Boil the pineapple pieces with a little water, ensure not to over cook.
4) Now add all the powders (cumin, coriander, fenugreek seeds and chilly), mix well and cook for a while.
5) Add the jaggery and sugar and keep stirring.
6) In a seperate pan, heat a little oil and add mustard seeds.
7) Once the mustard seeds splutter, add the cumin seeds and curry leaves. Fry for a bit and then pour over the pineapple pieces.
8) Serve hot or cold, tastes good both ways.

Tomato and Carrot Bisque

This is my version of bisque and at the risk of falling into the blow-my-own-trumpet category, I'll state that it tastes superb... hand on heart its tasted amazing for the few ingredients that went into it!!!

This is a low fat vegetarian version (I've eliminated cream) and all the ingredients, spices and herbs are easily found in an Indian kitchen!!!

The end result is an aromatic soup, that is both nutritious and perfect for a rainy or cold winter day, when all you want to do is sit at home ...read a book and eat a cup of wonderful soup!!!

Ingredients:

1/2 kg Ripe Tomatoes (diced)
200 gms Carrots (diced)
2 cloves of garlic (peeled and roughy chopped)
1 small Onion (peeled and roughly chopped)
Black Pepper (Powdered)... I like the flavor so tend to use it liberally
A handful of Coriander leaves and stem (roughly chopped)
2 heaped tsps of Rice Powder
1/2 tsp Sugar
Salt to taste
4-5 cups of water
Oil

Method:

1) In a large pan heat the oil and add the onion and garlic.
2) As the onion starts to soften and brown a bit, add the carrot pieces and salt.
3) While the carrot is cooking we start adding the pepper powder
4) The carrot will cook in about 5-10 mins, at this point add the tomatoes and 2 cups of water
5) Another 10 mins of cooking and the tomatoes will soften
6) Add the Rice powder and mix well.
7) Keep cooking till the tomatoes are completely mushy.
8) Add the chopped coriander and sugar and mix well.
9) Cool and pass through a blender. Ensure that the whole lot from the pan is blitzed (including the burnt bits if any that are stuck to the pan, this helps amplify the flavor. I normally use the same pan for cooking the bisque, so this also helps ready the pan for when the mush is blitzed).
10) Return the paste to the pan and add more water.
11) Bring to a boil and then simmer for 5 minutes.
12) Bisque is ready to be enjoyed as it is or with a toasted cheese sandwich :)

Sweet Chutney

15-20 Boiled Dates,
1/2 cup Tamrind Pulp
1/2 cup Jaggery
1 tsp Chilly Powder
1 tsp roasted and powdered Cumin Seeds
1/4 tsp Black Salt
Salt to Taste

1) Grind the dates to a pulp
2) Add the tamrind pulp and jaggery
3) Bring this mix to a boil
4) Add the chilly powder, cumin seeds, salt and black salt.
5) Keep boiling till it thickens
6) Cool
7) Sweet Chutney is ready for use

My Cooking Holiday...

As they say, lets start from the very beginning...

Here I am, barely four days away from my self imposed exile from the corporate world... my parents decided to relocate to our hometown in Mangalore and I decided to go along...

When I started off on this journey, it was with a great sense of relief that I've taken some decisive action... even though the decisive action was in the form of quitting without another job in hand (something that I'd promised myself never to do very early on in my career)... but somehow this decision seemed right... so I stuck on with it, in spite of several temptations...

The minute I resigned I booked myself into a holistic healing programme at an ashram outside Pune, thinking that I'll relax for a bit and think what I want out of life....but now as the time to go there is around the corner I have started developing cold feet ... to be honest who am I fooling, I'm just not the kind who will appreciate the sitting around waiting for massages, yoga and restricted food intake... If there is one thing that I know about myself its my undying passion for FOOD...

Give me four square meals and all is well in my world... I like all things about food, right from making it from scratch... to the serving it to fellow devotees... to attaining seventh heaven on tasting divine food... the kitchen from where the food came be damned... 

It occurred to me that given my feelings on the subject I could take a cooking vacation, I remembered reading about it on the internet a few lifetimes ago, yeah...learn to cook exotic food while on holiday... seemed like a super plan, a few google searches later I realised that cooking holidays are still mostly targeted at the western tourist willing to spend in dollars and better still in pounds and there was nothing for an Indian looking to enjoy a similar experience...

Not one to give up... I soon hit on another plan... why not take a cooking vacation in my own home... with my Mum as my instructor.... it helps that she is the bestest Mangalorean cook in Mumbai... my friends who drool at the very mention of her Neer Dosas and Curries will vouch for this....

So next week will see me arrive in Mangalore on my birthday, no less and I intend to chronicle each tentative step on what has now officially been christened.... My Cooking Holiday....