Taro Leaves Dolmades

Every dish from every cuisine has a counterpart in another cuisine – This may be a rather sweeping statement, but it is not too far from the truth. And if they don’t it is easy enough to adapt it to your own cuisine. This is sort of what I did with this recipe. I had these beautiful BIG Taro leaves hitting me in the eye and I knew they were edible and what’s more very tasty too. For those of you who have not tasted taro roots, these have a brown hairy inedible skin and when peeled and roasted can taste a lot like potatoes. Taro roots are used in many different Indian preparations, depending on which part of the country you are from – The roasted south Indian version is best known to me and best liked too. When they are boiled and peeled, they do assume a rather slimy and squishy texture and that to me was not appealing for the longest time and to date I am squeamish about touching these. When we visited Pune a couple of years ago, I saw these teeny tiny kinds that the cook of the house just pinched the skins off without boiling them – She also peeled them before cooking them, an idea I have yet to try. 

But getting back to the leaves, I made a green gravy type dish with it earlier and that tasted amazing. Their mere size lends itself to a wrapped dish of sorts. And ever since we tasted the dolmas in the Middle East, I have loved them, had various not to great versions of them back home in the US. They can be really oily and the rice stuffing always made me feel a bit guilty.  Here I was with the taro leaves (have yet to buy grape leaves) and the remainder of the stuffing from the sweet-beet samosas and I said ... hmm (not rubbing my chin) and this is what resulted from it.

A sensational dish – which you’ve got to try in your own kitchen should you be fortunate enough to come across these leaves.

Ingredients

1 extra large Taro Leaf

Stuffing of your choice (I plan to try other stuffing as well)

For this I used left over sweet potato, beetroots & paneer

Preparation

Wash the leaf – they are like lotus leaves and the water just rolls off them

Cut the stem so you can lay them some what flat

The leaf has wonderful ridges to cut right along them – I made my cuts about 4-5 inches wide tapering down to the main stem, following the ridge.

Place the stuffing in the middle and fold over, there should be enough leaf for a generous fold over and wrap.

Repeat until all the stuffing is used – An extra big leaf allows you at least 6-8 wraps.

Spray the outside with olive oil or

With a brush gently smear some oil over the wraps

Place in your steamer (idli steamers will work too) and cook on medium heat for 12- 15 min.

Indication of a cooked leaf is it will turn dark green and look oily.

Serve by itself or with rice. Enjoy this healthful and delicious dish and make your own versions of it and let me know how they turned out.

Cheers until the next recipe

Sweet & Beet Samosa

Rather than make the usual potato based samosas, I decided to get to of my most favorite veggies, sweet potatoes and beetroots together to make this universally favorite and known Indian appetizer. You know you've created a winner recipe when you kids cannot keep their hands of the food - It took a lot to keep them away from the samosas at least until I got a chance to photograph it - I feel like this cruel mom when i do this, the kids understand the long-term value of this short but excruciating wait, I hope :)
Tomorrow is Varalakshmi pooja day - when Goddess Lakshmi who epitomizes wellness and prosperity is welcomed into our home and propitiated with sweet and salty offerings by way of food; flowers and a garland of mantras. I am so happy this festival comes in the summer when my daughters are not in school and it can be treated as a very special occasion, often more than even Deepavali when it is business as usual unless it falls on a weekend.

With no garlic or onion, this is a good recipe to consider making for festive occasions. Trust me you will be hooked on these samosas if you get a chance to make it or have it made by your help.

I have a picture gallery of the recipe - pretty self explanatory - at least for the stuffing.
NOTE: MAKE YOU STUFFING FIRST

Ingredients for the Dough

1 cup AP Flour
2 tbsp Sooji or cream of wheat (slightly coarse)
1/2 cup of warm water
1/2 tsp salt
2tbsp olive oil

Mix the dry ingredients and add the oil and mix - Add water slowly making sure you only use as much as you need to make a non-pasty, firm but soft & fine dough. Pinch into 5-6 balls.

For the veggie stuffing - sweet potatoes, beetroots, green chilies, salt -

Steam the sweets and beets. 

Strain or dab off any excess water

Mash the sweets

Grate the beets

chop the chilies finely add the salt

In a pan add 1 tsp of oil and the veggies and cook for a couple of minutes

Prepare the dough and roll the pinched balls into 5-6 inch wide tortillas/chappatis

Cut right through the centre dividing them into 2 half moons

Wet the corners with a touch of water and fold to create a cone.

Press ends together to make sure they stick well. 

Now spoon in the stuffing, pushing it into the cone tightly. 

Fold the dough over the stuffing and close the ends by pinching them together.

Deep fry in fresh oil. 

Serve with dip of your choice - I did with some homemade sweet& spicy tomato jam which i have yet to blog about.

Fufu Flour Fritters

When I first saw this at the Indian grocery store, i was intrigued by it - Flour made with Plantain? apparently used a lot in African countries like Ethiopia. The recommended use for it is to make pancakes, but it was afternoon when I pulled it out of my pantry to read those instructions- and was not waiting until the morning to try it. I put freshly picked zucchinis from my garden to work to make these delicious bajjis or fritters - as my daughter observed, this flour is really tasty and makes for real tasty bajjis.

Ingredients
1 cup Fufu Flour
1/4 rice flour
1/4 cup besan
2 tsp chili powder (I used sambar powder)
a pinch of asafetida
Salt to taste
about 3/4 cup of water to mix into a fluid batter
oil to fry
2 medium sized zucchinis

Preparation

Cut the zucchinis into 1/4 inch rounds

put fresh oil in a deep pan and heat

mix the ingredients to make the batter

Ensure the oil is hot enough by dripping a little batter into it - If the batter pops up to the surface quickly, it is ready

Dip the zucchinis in the batter making sure it is fully coated on all sides.

Repeat the process until the pan is full but not over-crowded

cook until the batter is golden brown

Remove from oil, draining them completely with a ladle that has holes in it.

Place on a dish lined with paper towel.

Serve hot with ketchup or by itself

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Colorful Quinoa Kichdi

If food were meant to be alluring, tempting and seductive, then this dish nailed those desires. As simple as it was to prepare, I am classifying this as an anytime treat - This was one of the first dishes I made with my home grown veggies, and I realize I have over 20 recipes that I need to catch up on, what with the pickling, saucing and chutney-ing of all the tomatoes growing in the garden. This dish has exactly what you see in it - veggies, quinoa, and chives blossoms for decoration. A healthy one pot meal

For this you need veggies of your choice - I used tomatoes, broccoli, bell peppers (orange and yellow), green peas, cilantro and chives blossoms and fresh sage leaves for garnish - green chilies for heating up.

Steam cook the quinoa; sautee the veggies; mix them together in a pan with the heat on - allow them to blend for 2-3 minutes and then serve hot.

steam without whistle in pressure cooker

the veggie medley being sauteed

Sage

This is made separately for my daughter with sauteed broccoli on the side :)

Home Garden Veggie Tian

This is an adaptation of the French dish Tian, which mainly consists of vegetables, cut in circles and baked. By adaptation, I mean my version has sambar podi to liven things up for the Indian palate. What is special about this dish? It was made with homegrown, organic zucchinis, squash and tomatoes, the only outsider being potatoes. It is a very easy recipe to put together. The only suggestion I have after making it once, is to half boil your potatoes if you're adding them, since they take much longer to cook than the other vegetables. It's a colorful and extremely visually appealing dish and I hope you will attempt it in your kitchens. You can be sure to elicit the "wow"s from whomever you're serving it to.

Ingredients
Serves 10-12

2 large red tomatoes
2 large pink potatoes (peeled)
2 large zucchinis
3-4 medium/large squashes (very large squashes get too seedy)
2 Tbs sambar powder
1 cup of grated cheese (I used mozzarella and cheddar)
Garnish with herb of your choice (I used thyme and rosemary for this one)
Finely chopped spring onion chives
Oil spray
Salt to taste

Preparation

Peel potatoes.
Cut every vegetable (and fruit) in 1/4 inch thick circles.
Cook the potatoes in the microwave for about 5-6 minutes.
Prepare your baking pan by spraying it with olive oil.
Set the oven at 400 degrees Fahrenheit.
Separate the circles by vegetable and keep them apart.
Mix sambar podi with salt and sprinkle it over each of the veggie discs.
Arrange them in the pan in the order of your preference, alternating colors.
Bake this for 25-30 minutes.
Reduce the heat of the oven to 350 degrees.
Now pull the dish out.
Add the herbs and chives first and top it with the cheese.
Cook at 350 for 20 minutes, or until the cheese is golden brown.

Enjoy by itself, or with freshly baked French bread.
Until next time,
Au Revoir!

Cherry Rasam (South Indian Soup)

I made this rasam over 2 months ago when i blogged my Cherry Pie and Cherry Kachal. Believe it or not, I have over 20 recipes I need to blog and I keep falling back more and more - with the kids at home and a dozen other distractions, it seems hard to get on with blogging - esp since I have been also undergoing acupuncture  for what I have dubbed "computeritis" It hits you right where the nexk meet the back and shoulder and it feels often like a hundred pins are being jabbed on a particular spot, relentlessly - I risk that pain each time I get online, but writing and blogging have become necessities and in many ways define what I do other than being a caring mom - My Chinese Medical doc has advised me to cut back on the computer hours and stop to do some neck rolls, and other stretches - no more than 2 hours a day is her recommendation for computer use. It is past midnight, one of those insomniac and restless nights when I got up so as to not disturb anybody else to do my thing - this I hope will also help me sleep.

If you have not had a cherry rasam yet, you must certainly put it on the list of things to make, try sooner than later - It is incredibly tasty - seriously - the sweet& tart flavors of the cherry combined with the aromatic flavors of our rasam powder, freshly ground coriander and black peppers, slightly roasted coconut sends this rasam to a whole new level as rasams go. 

The recipe

Ingredients

1 cup of cherries

2 tsp of Rasam powder

5 cups of water

1tso each of coriander seeds, grated coconut,  cumin, black pepper 

2 red chilies (optional) 

salt to taste

butter/mustard seeds/ cumin seeds/ cilantro/curry leaves to temper

Preparation

Bring the cherries to boil in the water -

In the meantime, roast the dry condiments, grind with a tad bit of water 

Add the rasam powder along with the condiments and spin it too

Now add this to the boiling cherries

Add salt

At this point I just filtered most of the cherries, ground them up and added them back to the rasam -leaving a few to bite into like we do tomatoes

Taste to see if it has the tartness you desire or if it is too sweet --Either ways a tsp of lemon after it has been removed from the stove is an option - i had no need to do that.

Pour rasam into serving dish

Temper the mustards cumin and the curry leaves and add to the rasam - 

add finely chopped cilantro for garnish

Serve HOT as a soup or with rice and pappad and a delicious veggie on the side :)

Check out my other Rasams
Cucumber Rasam
Mysore Rasam
Clementine Rasam
Blood Orange Rasam
Garlic Rasam
Beetroot Rasam