Indian Potatoes in Red Coriander Sauce {Recipe}

This is a quick and easy Potato Recipe from Complete Indian Cooking by Mridula Baljekar, et al. I have tried quite a few recipes from this book with good success and this one was a must-try for two reasons.

1. Its the simplest recipe in the book!

2. It has the least number of ingredients and still looks so good.

Actually, there's one more reason: I love coriander. I hardly ever use coriander seeds in anything other than vatha kozhambu and the like but this recipe calls for whole coriander seeds. The flavour was delightful.

Potatoes in Red Coriander Sauce

Serves: 2

Preparation time: 15-20 mins

Source: Complete Indian Cooking by Mridula Baljekar, et al.

What I Used:

A dozen baby potatoes (or 3 potatoes, cubed)

1.5 tsp coriander seeds / malli

1.5 tsp cumin seeds / jeera / jeerakam

4 garlic cloves

3 tbsp thick tamarind juice (or 1 tbsp readymade tamarind paste)

1 pureed tomato (or chopped fine)

A few curry leaves

1/2 tsp sugar

2 tbsp oil

Salt to taste

Coriander leaves / kothamalli to garnish

How I Made It:

1. Boil the potatoes in water until they are cooked yet not mushy. You can pressure cook for 1 whistle to make the job easier.

2. Grind the coriander seeds with the cumin seeds and garlic cloves to a coarse paste using a pestle and mortar or your small mixie jar.

3. Heat oil in a pan and add the ground paste with the tamarind juice, tomato puree, curry leaves, salt and sugar. Lower fire to medium-low and cook until the oil separates (about 7-10 mins)

4. Add the potatoes and stir well until coated with the sauce. Cover and simmer for about 5 mins. Garnish with fresh coriander leaves and serve hot.

Note

- Instead of using whole coriander and cumin seeds, their powders can also be used. This will help you avoid the grinding, although the flavour will change a bit. It still tastes good, I have tried it both ways :)

Masala Kuzhi Paniyaram Recipe-Kuzhi Paniyaram Recipe

I thought I had posted this recipe yesterday but looks like I was dreaming while working - again! Anyway, here it is, my quick fix masala paniyaram recipe that gets made each time I have leftover dosa maavu. Originally part of the Chettinad Cuisine, its quick to prepare, easy and a very nice snack for evening tiffin. I love Chettinad recipes! Their love for food shows in their recipes, I feel.

You will need a paniyaram chatti/aebleskiver pan to make this, unfortunately, so if you don't have one yet, please do something to fix the situation ASAP.

Masala Kuzhi Paniyaram Recipe

Preparation time: 15 mins

What I Used:

Dosa/idli batter - 3 cups

Onion - 1, minced

Green chillies - 2, sliced round

Halved urad dal/split black gram/ulutham paruppu/uzhunnu parippu - 1 tsp

Red chilli powder - 1 pinch (I add it for the colour)

Hing/asafoetida/kaayam - a generous pinch

Greated coconut - 1 tbsp (optional)

Curry leaves - a few, torn into small pieces (optional)

Salt - to taste

Oil - 2 to 3 tbsp

How I Made It:

1. Mix all ingredients except oil into the dosa batter.

2. Heat the paniyaram chatti and add 3-4 drops oil into each hole. Once it heats, add spoonfuls of batter into each hole until its more than 3/4th full. Let it cook until the bottom is browned and crisp.

3. Turn over and cook the other side. Make sure that the stove is at medium-low so that the inside also gets cooked without burning the outside.

4. Once both sides are brown and crisp, drain on a kitchen napkin.

Serve hot with chutney and hot tea/coffee.

Thakkali Muringakka Aviyal Recipe / Tomato and Drumsticks in Coconut

I don't know if this a common Kerala recipe but ever since I can remember amma has been making this a quick side dish for Chicken Biryani. Her rationale is, biryani is intense and doesn't have coconut and any Malayali should know that we always pair curries with coconut and without coconut together, to balance the flavours.

Amma sent me the recipe through my uncle who typed it out while she listed the things to be done. The picture was taken in Kottayam when I was there this August and amma made it, not me :)

Thakkali Muringakka Aviyal Recipe

Source: My mom

Preparation time: 30 mins

What Is Needed:

4 tomatoes, sliced into six long pieces

1 drumstick / muringakka, cut into 3" pieces

1/2 cup grated coconut

12 peeled shallots / chinna vengaayam / cheriya ulli

2 flakes garlic

1/4 tsp jeera / cumin seeds / jeerakam

1 tsp red chilly powder

A few curry leaves

1/4 tsp mustard seeds / kaduku

1 tbsp oil (preferably coconut oil)

How Its Made:

1. Add the chopped drumstick to about 1 cup water with with some salt and the chilly powder. Keep on a medium flame and cook until soft. The mixture shouldn't be too watery, so if it is, boil some more on a low flame.

2. To this, add the cut tomatoes and cook some more until the tomatoes begin to soften.

3. Grind together - coconut + jeera + garlic to a coarse paste.

4. Heat oil in a pan and add the mustard seeds. When they pop, add the shallots and curry leaves. Fry for about 2 mins, until the shallots soften.

5. Next, add the ground coconut paste and fry for another 1 min. To this, add the drumstick and tomatoes. Mix well. Simmer for 2-3 mins until well combined. Adjust salt.

Serve hot with steamed white rice or chicken biryani.

Condensed Milk Pound Cake - Step by Step Recipe

Its Friday and I am quite exhausted. The past few weeks have been a whirlwind at work and I haven't been able to do things outside of it as much as I'd have liked to. But let's talk about some condensed milk goodness and work on the stress, shall we?

I can't begin to talk about how much I love condensed milk. When I was small, I used to add it to toast, dip plain vanilla cake in it, top my cupcakes with it, have it with roti, dosa, you name it! Even now, I almost always have a tin of condensed milk in the pantry, ready to get added to anything that takes my fancy.

That's a lot of talk for a tired girl so on to the recipe now. This condensed milk pound cake clearly won over a fool-proof one banana-banana bread I made recently, in this poll, so on to the recipe, one step at a time.

As always, a dish of the final good stuff. There's a reason why my cake looks a bit dense and hole-y. More about that in a bit.

Let's the flour first. 1 1/3 cup all purpose flour or maida.

Add that into a sieve with 3/4 tsp baking powder.

Sieve about thrice until the baking powder and the flour are well combined.

Bring together the sieved flour from all four corners of the paper. Yes, that's the paper we get every morning. TH and I can totally read Mandarin (not!).

Next, we need 1 cup powdered sugar. I used brown sugar but white will work just fine. Add this to a bowl.

Top this off with 1 cup soft butter. I slightly melted it because I forgot to keep it out before baking but butter at room temperature is what we need here.

Beat the butter-sugar mixture well using an electric beater for 2 mins until fluffy. If using hand, beat well for about 5 mins.

Open the milkmaid can. Lick off the excess on your fingers, smell it, lick some more. Come on, I insist.

Once you are done with the above, measure out 1 cup of it and add it to the butter-sugar mixture.

Beat for another 2 mins (or 5 mins by hand).

Break 2 eggs in another bowl and whisk for 2 mins using a fork. Set aside.

Add the whisked butter-sugar-condensed milk mixture to the flour mixture with one pinch salt. Mix until just combined.

Top it off with the whisked egg. Combine gently without beating.

Add 1 tsp vanilla essence to the batter and swirl around a few times.

There we have our batter.

Pour into to a greased loaf pan or cake tin.

All set to go into the oven. Bake in a preheated oven at 180C for about 30 mins until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.

The top will turn golden brown and the cake will rise to almost double the amount of batter.

Ok, now the story of my cake. I forgot to set my oven temp to 180C so the cake baked in a really hot 220C oven for 30 mins and the sides started burning while the center was still fudgy. I had to take it out at that time so the cake wasn't as soft as it can be.

Still, this was one good cake, have to say!

Here's the recipe, all in one place.

Condensed Milk Pound Cake

Recipe adapted from here.

Makes an 8" square cake or one standard sized loaf

What I Used:

1 1/3 cups all purpose flour or maida

1 cup sweetened condensed milk

1 scant cup powdered sugar (I used a little over 3/4 cup)

1 cup unsalted butter at room temperature

2 eggs

3/4 tsp baking powder

1 tsp vanilla essense

1 pinch salt

How I Made It:

1. Sieve the flour and baking powder until well combined. You can also whisk it well in a bowl until combined, if you don't have a sieve.

2. Beat butter and sugar together until soft and fluffy - 5 mins by hand, 2 mins by electric beater. Then add the condensed milk and repeat for the same time, until well combined.

3. Whisk eggs in a bowl for 2 mins with a fork and set aside.

4. Add the flour to the butter-sugar-condensed milk mixture and mix until just combined without beating too hard.

5. Add the eggs, vanilla essence and salt and combine well again.

6. Transfer to a greased cake tin or loaf pan and bake in a pre-heated oven at 180C/325F for 30-35 mins. Insert a toothpick at the center to test if the cake is done.

7. Cool, slice and serve.

A bunch of us are having some fun on the Edible Garden fans page on Facebook where I occasionally treat members to some giveaways. Want to join us? Click here!

Paneer Butter Masala Recipe | Restaurant-Style & Step by Step

Let's talk about Paneer Butter Masala today. Not just any kind, the kind that you get in Indian restaurants. Why? Well, I've already posted the Paneer Butter Masala Recipe I usually make, long back. Its also one of the most popular recipes on this site for two reasons:

- since its a popular Indian dish, a lot of people have tried it from my site and sent me feedback.

- this is the only recipe that has received as many good feedback as disappointing feedback.

Most people said this or a variation of this - "I tried your paneer butter masala recipe today. It came out nicely, I did everything you mentioned but it didn't come out like the one we had in that North Indian restaurant last weekend and my husband/wife/mom/dad/sibling loved! Help!"

I guess they found my Paneer Butter Masala Recipe too homely!

In most Indian restaurants, dishes are more creamy and have thicker gravy. The reason is very simple - they use cream. They use it as the base of every dish you order and it may make the dish arguably tastier. This is not hard to whip at home provided you have no qualms about adding that bit of cream and kicking up the amount of oil a notch.

So here it is, my second Paneer Butter Masala Recipe, like they serve in Indian restaurants!

Oh did I mention its going to be step-by-step recipe? Also, a huge thanks to my cousin Divya for giving me the basic recipe. She has adapted this from Vah Chef's recipe here. Ok here goes, a picture of the final dish.

I'd say the only thing that's different from this dish and the one you get in Indian restaunts is the difference in the colour. That's because they add red food colour and I didn't.

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