Hayagreeva - A Bengal Gram dessert

It was the Tamil New Year a couple of days back and we'd almost forgotten. Last year, being our first New Year together, we made Vadai and Payasam and celebrated it by going to the temple. Being good kids, basically. This year around, we were way too lazy. And I didn't want to make payasam. Or Vadai. I was venting my problems to my friend and she spoke of Hayagreeva. Initially, I didn't remember it. Then, it came back to me. I'd eaten this ages ago in Bangalore when I'd been to Rayara Matha with my grandmother. I loved the idea and A loves Karnataka food and we are always game for something new. So, the sweet was Hayagreeva and then I decided to make Cham's Kuzhi Paniyaram as the savory component of the Naivedyam. I couldn't take pics of the Paniyaram because we were way too hungry and we ate it as soon as we were done! I took the Hayagreeva pics the next day to post it. The pics aren't great, because I'd lost interest by then, but the dish surely lived upto its name. I followed her recipe to make Hayagreeva. I didn't use as much ghee as her and reduced the recipe by half. Also, I ran out of jaggery, so I used some brown sugar too along with the small amount of jaggery I had. It came out wonderfully, much to my surprise and I loved the consistency too! Here it is.

Ingredients

1/2 cup Chana Dal
1/3 cup brown sugar/jaggery
1-2 cloves
1 tbsp cinnamon/nutmeg
1 tbsp cardamom powder
1/2 tsp Khus Khus/Poppy seeds
4 tbsp ghee or clarified butter
1/8 cup coconut/coconut milk
1 tsp cashewnuts
1 tsp raisins

1. Fry the Chana Dal in 1-2 tbsp of ghee and once its brown and the aroma wafts through your kitchen, pressure cook it.

2. Melt jaggery/brown sugar with some water to make a syrup.

3. Add the spices - cardamom, cloves, cinnamon or nutmeg to the jaggery/brown sugar syrup.

4. Meanwhile, dry roast the coconut and poppy seeds or, alternately you may fry them in ghee. I preferred to dry roast it. Once its done, add this mixture to the syrup.

5. Let cook for a minute or two and then add Chana Dal. Mash it a little before adding it. It should not be totally mushy, but at the same time, it should not be whole Chana Dal.

6. Let this mixture simmer for a good 15-20 minutes, until the consistency is such that it becomes gooey, and the Dal has 'almost' absorbed all the liquid. The mixture will also turn a dark brown.

7. On the side, fry some cashewnuts and raisins in 1 tbsp of ghee and add this to the Hayagreeva just before taking it off the gas.

8. Just before taking the Hayagreeva off the gas, add the rest of the ghee - around 1 tbsp is remaining and mix well. Serve hot.

The original recipe calls for 1/2 cup of ghee. I reduced this and it still tasted pretty good. This is a fairly simple dish to make. Temples in Karnataka serve this gooey and almost liquidy and with a lot more ghee than even the original recipe asks for!


I'm sending Hayagreeva to MLLA-10, a brainchild of Susan of The Well Seasoned Cook, and hosted this time around by Courtney of Coco Cooks. This also goes out to Srivalli's Mithai Mela. Congrats on the remarkable achievement, Srivalli! :) You have every right to binge on every Mithai that comes your way!

Ragi Roti (Millet-Flour Flatbread)

I've been trying to eat healthy and maintain a diet chart and a fitness log for sometime now. Not been very regular until recently. Its not easy when you have a husband who loves to bake and bakes something almost every night. Ya, last night was chocolate torte - Day 1 of Experiment Torte. He experiments something everyday to perfect it. Sigh. And I'm the guinea pig, mostly. And all because I have sophisticated taste, you know? But then, there's a limit somewhere no? So, I don't eat them now *determined look*

So, the last time I pranced around the Indian store, I saw Ragi flour and bought it after a little jig in front of it. Ya, I dance a lot at the Indian store to trashy music. Because I miss it. In fact, the stuff I miss about India is the noise levels and the random chaos, and the number of people on a street at one point in time. This way, no one knows how much noise I make. Which is a LOT.

Coming back, Ragi flour is just one of the items that I've hoarded in my pantry, apart from Kokum and some other stuff that I'm unable to recognize now. Then, she sent me this video. While I loved everything in the video but the Gourmet person cooking something, I absolutely identified with the bit about Ragi Mudde and Ragi Roti! I 'almost' grew up on such food. No, I wasn't an angel of a kid to enjoy it then. But then, I've eaten it and have some great memories associated with it. My granddad suffered from Diabetes and was a very disciplined man. His lunch everyday was Ragi Mudde with spicy Sambar. Ragi Mudde, by itself is bland. A huge reason why I hated it as a kid. But eat it with a dollop of ghee and a tons of Sambar, and you got me there. My youngest sis loved this even as a kid, surprisingly. She survives on junk food now, believe it or not!

Another thing that my granny made with Ragi flour was Dosa. I wasn't too fond of it, coz I found it too soggy for my tastes. However, I loved the Ragi Roti. Made like the more popular Akki Roti, my mom spiced it with onions, green chillies and coriander. I loved the earthy taste of Ragi Roti. Well, it is through this dish I learned the meaning of earthy food. I rediscovered this dish after literally 10 years (I think we stopped cooking Ragi after my sis grew out of it and my granddad passed away!) I had this for lunch today with some Tomato-onion chutney and some yogurt. I loved the kick that the chillies gave an otherwise bland Roti. We're doing the whole 'empty the fridge' challenge unofficially this week. I checked and we could go for another month with the stuff we have! So, here's to a quick emptying of our refrigerator and pantry!

Presenting to you the most nutritious and diet-friendly food! Don't go by the pictures or the colour of the food. They just don't matter in this case!

Ingredients

1 cup Ragi flour

1/2 cup onions - chopped finely

8-10 green chillies or jalapeno, chopped finely

3 tbsp coriander, finely chopped

1 tsp oil to grease the flour

Water to knead the dough

Salt to taste

1. Make a dough of the above ingredients. Add just enough water to make into a thick dough. It is not going to be rolled out into a Roti, but is going to be flattened on a Tawa or a greased plastic sheet. You can add more onions if you wish.

2. Use a parchment paper or a greased plastic sheet or ziplock cover and press the balls of dough to flatten it into a Roti shape. Like this.


3. Transfer the flattened dough onto a hot skillet or Tawa greased with a little oil or butter or ghee. Let cook. The light brown Roti will turn into a dark chocolatey brown roasted flatbread.

You can eat this with any Chutney or dip. The idea is to make the dough spicy or the chutney spicy, so that the blandness of the Ragi flour doesn't come through. I loved, loved, loved this 'for one' lunch of mine and will surely be buying Ragi flour in bulk and make this a regular at home going forward.

I was talking about this dish with a friend of mine and she mentioned that the dough itself could change its texture or nature because it is made just out of Ragi without addition of rice flour or whole-wheat flour. I'm really not sure if that could happen because I made very less dough and finished it in 30 mins :D I made this for A in the night and it was tough to press and flatten it then because the dough had let out water and broke into pieces as I transferred onto the tawa. So, use as less water as possible to make the dough. If you try it, do let me know how it came out for you, and how long you kept it for. I'd love to perfect making these Rotis!

I understand the significance about organic food and realize that we just need to go back to the basics to eat and live healthy. I'm not someone who eats organic food for the simple reason that I cannot afford it at this point in time of my life. I'd love to grow my food too, but there is no space around me. Also, I do think that we should eat all kinds of healthy food, albeit 'non organic.' In such a situation, my easiest way out of bad food habits is portion control and just back to basics. And I've found that only recently (after I started cooking mostly) that eating healthy does not have to be eating non tasty food. Here's to a healthy living with tasty food!

The mouth water-ring Kodbale!

It all started with Amma coming to Chennai to see us off at the airport when A and I were leaving for the US. After marriage, that is. She thrusted, in my hand, a packet of the delicious Kodbale. At this point, I must say that I'm not a fan of fried stuff like Murukku or Kodbale, so I refused to take it citing weight issues. She anyway stuffed it in my bag.

We reach the US, unpack and fall ill, not necessarily in that order. Both of us come down with the Flu which was making its rounds in our region in the US. We were too tired to talk to each other, leave alone cook! However, that did not stop us from sorting out the 'kalyana bhakshanam' and other assorted eats sent by our parents. Imagine running a temperature of 104F and removing packets of Murukku and Kodbale and the numerous thokkus. Sigh.

Well, to get back, A's eyes fell upon these Kodbale and he devoured them in 2 days. A, being A called/emailed/voice-chatted with Amma and told her how much he liked the Kodbale and pestered her for the recipe. So one day, she gave it to us and A made it. And boy, can he cook or what! :) I was impressed. If anyone can make 'bhakshanam,' then they've arrived in my world! So, here is the recipe and see how ours came out!

Ingredients:

1 cup All-Purpose flour or Maida
2 cups Rice Flour
1/2 cup grated/dessicated coconut
3-4 red chillies
2 Tbsp butter
Salt to taste

1. Grind coconut and red chillies with very little water. Just enough for it to get mixed and still remain mostly dry.

2. In a mixing bowl, add Maida or All-Purpose flour, the rice flour and the salt. Mix these dry ingredients well. Once they are mixed and do not have any lumps, add the butter. Make sure the butter is fairly soft and not hard. This ensures that the dough comes out uniform, and more importantly, gets done fast! Now, mix all of this to make a dough. Do not add water yet.

3. To this mixture, add the coconut-chilli paste. Mix again. Then add water in very less amounts. We do not want a runny dough here. The dough should be fairly thick!

4. Now, take a lemon-sized ball and roll it horizontally to form what we used to call a snake when we were kids :)

5. Now, place this snake :) on a plastic sheet or a plate and roll it into a bangle. Yeah, 'bale' in Kannada is bangle! Like this -

6. You can either roll them out this way and then fry them in batches or do the frying of the Kodbales and the rolling on the side simultaneously. There is no danger of the dough getting dry or anything like that. Take another peek!

This recipe makes 20-25 Kodbales and is fairly simple to make. In fact, the very nutrition and calorie conscious A was shocked by the very less amount of oil that the snack soaked. The key was to add very less water!

This is our first post, and we are really excited about this blog :) Do let us know what you thought!