Idli/dosa paste

I finally made my own idli paste...this is how u do it
take 5 portions of rice (boiled rice). The portions can be in anything...cups, tumblers...anything.
Boiled rice is better than normal rice. But do not get the long one...get salem boiled...
the rice is small small....witish and off witish...
if it is the normal rice also it is ok but take only 3 portions...
soak it in water for about 4 to 5 hours

take urad dal (ulundhu in tamil) 1 portion. add a handful of methi seeds (vendhayam in tamil, menthya in kannada). soak in water for about 1 hour.

optionally take sabu dana (jevvarussi in tamil) and soak it in water for 2 hours.

after the soaking time is over....wash each of the soaked items separately about three to 4 times and starin the water.
Me being a slight environmentalist....I advice you to collect the water that comes out of washing these ingrdedients into a bucket and keep it for drinking for your pet (as it does have nutrients) or atleast pour it for plants and not to waste the water...
if you dont have plants then please get some...

put the urad dal into grinder and por water a little and grind into fine paster for about half hour. The paste will keep fluffing time after time and water must be poured now and then during the grinding so that the paste does not get too thick and dry.
after this, add the rice (and jevarussi if that has been soaked) to the urad dal paste and let the grinder further grind for anotherhalf hour to 45 mins...
keep adding little water at a time so that the grinder does not get stuck and the paste is not too thick.

finally add about 1 to 2 handfuls of rock salt and grind for sometime.

now take out the paste and keep it aside in a vessel till it ferments (it will raise if left for sometime in warm conditions).

then store in refrigerator.

note:
1. The same flour can be used for idli and dosa
2. if you want flour only for dosa you can add a little lesser urad dal. (1 urad dal portion for 8 portions of rice)
3. the grinding can also be done in mixie....but this is not as good as grinder

Tasty storable south Indian curry powder

Take a small cup of dhania, few red chillies, 1 tsp pepper balls, 1 tsp jeera, 1 tsp kadalai paruppu (Tamil) or kadle bele ( kannada).
Fry the above ingredients without oil in a pan for about 3 minutes. Do not allow colour to turn black. Grind it in a mixie and store.
This can be used as a powder with every curry that you make. Goes very well with brinjal and capsicum. You can also fry ladies finger, slit it and stuff this powder and serve.
It is equivalent to the north Indian garam masala.
Additionally, you can grate coconut. Fry that separately without oil till the moisture is gone and the coconut turns brown. And store it separately in a bottle. This can also be used along with the curry powder which will enhance the taste .

Got to try this...really

Moong dal halwa is something I love... I need to try this when I make it..
While making moong dal halwa, add one tbsp flour to ghee and fry for one second before adding the ground moong dal. This will prevent the dal from sticking to the pan.

Chopping raisins is made easier if you grease the knife with a little butter.

Oily vessel cleaning

It seems used tea powder can be used to clean oily vessels....I am going to try this right today

Remove odors

To remove food odors from the refrigerator, ad 4 tsps of mustard seeds to ¾ cup of water and keep it in the refrigerator. The smell will go away within 2 hrs.

To remove odor from a flask, put half cup vinegar in it and wash with cold water after half hour.

Pesrette and adai

This blog is actually not meant for recipies. But since I typed the recipies for my friends, I thought it might help someone else also. So here are 2 tasty recipies.

Pesrette:

payatham paruppu (Tamil)/ Hesaru Kaallu (kannada) – 2 cups (soaked overnight)
ulundhu (Tamil)/ Urad dal (Hindi) – ½ Cup (soaked overnight)
Pachai arusi (Tamil)/ Rice – ½ Cup (soaked overnight)
Green chilli pieces

Grind the rice in the grinder. Add the payatham paruppu and ulundhu and grind till coarse paste. Add the chilli pieces and salt while grinding.
Prepare like dosa.

Adai:
Kadalai paruppu (Tamil)/ kadle bele (kannada) – 1Cup
Thoram paruppu (Tamil)/ Thuvar dal (Hindi)/ Thogre bele (kannada) – ½ Cup
Ulundhu(Tamil)/ Urad dal (hindi)
Soak the above ingredients together for 3 to 4 hours.
Rice – 1 Cup – soak for 3 hours and grind first
Aval(Tamil)/ Beaten rice/ Poha(Hindi) – soak for ½ hour and grind it with the rice above
Add the rest of the ingredients and grind in grinder till you get a coarse paste. Add salt whie grinding. Chopped onions and green chillies can be added optionally to the paste after grinding.
Prepare dosa with the paste.

Alternatively:
Boiled rice (3 cups)+ ulundhu(1/2 cup) +thoram paruppu (1/2 cup)+ gram dal (1/2 cup)
Put everything together and soak for 5 to 6 hours. Add salt and red chilli while grinding. The paste can be coarse and not very smooth.
This can be used to prepare the dosa.

Tips for seedai - Gokulashtami (Krishna Jayanthi)

This is the second year of my marriage. Last year I was a helper to my Mom in law for making all the bakshnams (variety of dishes for festivals). Not this year. I really wanted to learn. So yesterday when I was at amma's place I decided to try out the most important dish for the next upcoming festival which is Gokulashtami or Krishna Jayanthi; it was the seedai.
I have decided to share my experiences and the tips I gained with others so that anyone trying it new will find it useful.
Vella seedai is normally made in a jaggery saturated water which comes to a certain consistency (paagu). But this never worked out for amma. So this time we tried it differently. This is not the authentic way. But it is easier and worked well.

First of all, some tips. Everyone scared me that the uppu seedai may burst splashing oil all over the kitchen. It might even splash on the person who is doing it which will burn the skin terribly leaving horrible marks....HUH!!!
amma had a tip...and all that i was scared about did not happen.
1. Before deep frying the seedai we make round balls out of the dough. this must be done and the seedai must be let to dry for sometime on a newspaper or a cloth. The seedai actually bursts due to the moisture content coming in contact with hot oil.
2. Do not make really round balls. Just make the balls sort of round and leave it. Making the balls into a perfect round sometimes leads to bursting (although I do not know the reason).
3. While frying, use long handled spoons so that you are at a good distance from the stove and any spurting of oil will not affect your face.
4. Make sure the spoon and the kadai etc that would come in contact with oil are really dry. Any little moisture can lead to spurting out of oil.
5. Keep a heavy lid ready. The lid of a cooker would be good. In case sudden spurting of oil starts, put off stove close the kadai with the lid and move far away.

Now, after stating all the precautionary measures, let’s get to how to make seedai.

Uppu seedai:
Ingredients:
rice flour (powder)
Ulundhu (urad dal)
Butter
Water
Oil
Asafetida
Ellu (Til)
Salt
Coconut pieces (very small pieces)
Chilli powder (optional)

Fry the ulundhu without oil (just to heat it) in a kadai. Let the colour change. Keep it aside for cooling. Once cooled, make a powder of it in mixie and keep aside.
Heat the rice flour in kadai. Let the colour start changing to brown(take off flame when the colour just starts changing. Don’t let it become fully brown). Spread on a newspaper and let it cool.
Take one cup of heated rice flour. Add 2 tbsps of ulundhu flour. Add salt, asafetida, ellu, and 2 tbsps of butter. Chilli powder can be added if required. Mix well with hand till butter blends well with the flour. Add water slowly and keep mixing to make dough. Check if the consistency is ok to make round balls.
Make round balls and put on a newspaper. Leave it aside for 15 to 20 minutes.
Heat oil in kadai.
To check if oil is heated, put a small piece of the dough into it. If the dough piece immediately floats to the top and starts getting fried, then the oil is ready for heating.
Put the balls into the oil. Let the balls roll from the side of the kadai (do not throw it into oil as it would lead to spurting of oil). Make sure that there is not too much oil. The number of balls that you put in should fill till the brim.
Let the balls get fried a little. Then use a long handled spoon(with holes would be preferable as it would lead to draining of oil back into the kadai) to turn the balls over so that they get fried evenly from all sides.
Wait till the colour of the seedai balls change to a slight red(do not let it become too brownish. If that happens, then it will be burnt).
Put the seedai in another vessel where u can drain out the excess oil. You can also use tissue papers to take out the excess oil.
Uppu seedai is ready to serve.
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Vella seedai:
Ingredients: rice flour (powder)
Ulundhu (urad dal)
Jaggery
Water
Ellu (Til)
Elakka powder(Elaichi powder)
Coconut pieces (very small pieces)


Fry the ulundhu without oil (just to heat it) in a kadai. Let the colour change. Keep it aside for cooling. Once cooled, make a powder of it in mixie and keep aside.
Heat the rice flour in kadai. Let the colour start changing to brown(take off flame when the colour just starts changing. Don’t let it become fully brown). Spread on a newspaper and let it cool.
Take one cup of heated rice flour. Add 2 tbsps of ulundhu flour. Mix well and keep aside.
Take one cup jaggery. Add ¼ cup water. Heat in kadai. Once the jaggery has dissolved take it off the flame (before I starts getting thick. The jaggery must just dissolve). Strain it using a steel strainer to remove dirt in jaggery (do not use plastic strainer or a small strainer with a steel net as it will melt due to the hot jaggery. So only use a thick big steel strainer).
Let the jaggery water cool down. Add the ellu and elaichi powder, Coconut pieces to the jaggery water. Now add the mixed flour little by little and keep stirring. Add flour till the dough consistency is such that you can make round balls.
Make round balls and put it on newspaper.
Heat oil in a kadai (little more than the oil used for uppu seedai). Check if the oil is heated as mentioned before in uppu seedai.
Add the balls to the oil once heated from the side of the kadai. Do not throw it into oil. When the seedai has fried a little, turn it over using a long handled spoon so that it gets fried evenly on all sides.wait till colour changes to a little dark brown and take it out. Put it in a vessel and drain the excess oil.
Vella seedai ready to eat now!!!!

Difference between dals

I found it very difficult to differentiate between the various types of dals available. When I cooked, I knew which one to use. But if I had to buy it, I did not know its name. Also some dals looked similar and I was confused when the shopkeeper asked me which one I wanted. So here is a blog to help someone in my condition (specially from my mom)

I have listed 4 important types of dal here.

1. Uddin bele (kannada), ulatham paruppu (tamil), Urad dal (hindi)
It is dirty white in colour. You get it in oval shape and it is really small in size. You also get broken ones in which the oval shaped dal is in two halves.
Used for making flour (paste) of vada, idli, dosai etc. very good for strong hip bones.

2. Masoor dal (hindi): this is pink in colour. Really tiny. Very easy to identify as it has a distinct pink colour.

3. Kadalai paruppu (tamil), Kadle bele (kannada): Bright yellow in colour.
Hemispherical in shape.used for sambhar, rasam etc.

4. Thoram paruppu (Tamil), thuvar dal (hindi): lighter yellow than the previous one. Also hemispherical in shape, but not as round as the previous one. Flatter compared to the previous one. Used in kootu etc.

The most confusing are the last two types as they look quite similar with a very subtle difference.

Stop crackling mustard every day

My grandma used a very useful tip that I would like to share. In most Indian cooking, we crackle mustard seeds and put in our dishes. This is called Tadka (hindi) or oggarnne (kannada) or thalippu (tamil). This is a small job. But the vessel used for this gets oily and needs washing every time. Instead, what can be done is, you can crackle lot of mustard at a time and then drain the excess oil. This crackled mustard can be stored in a bottle and used every time for cooking. It will not get spoilt for months together. It saves time of doing the crackling and also washing the vessel.

Storing salt

To prevent salt from getting moist add some rice grains to the bottle of salt. The salt will remain fresh and the sprinkle holes will not get blocked either.

Kitchen tips - Old jam

If jam becomes thick, add cream and make it into a tasty pudding.

Kitchen tips - use whey

Don’t throw away the whey remaining after making paneer. Use it to knead chappathi dough or prepare gram flour batter for bhajjis.