Shirin's Special Goat Biryani- A delectable combination of spiced meat & rice!!!!

Eid Mubarak my friends!!!!

We visited our friend's house for the weekend and they celebrate bakrid one day before us, so we got to celebrate Eid with them. We enjoyed spending time with our friends. Kids had lots of fun time playing, all nighter, watching movies and so on. 

Usually we make some easy breakfast and then start the biryani process but at my friend's house they prepare the biryani in the morning and will have it for breakfast. We thoroughly enjoyed the biryani for breakfast. It was a new experience. As my friend Shirin, made this in her version,  I gave this biryani her name.

My friend, marinated the meat with spices and yogurt, cooked the rice separately and deep fried the onions. She then assembled it by layering and adding lemon juice and saffron milk in between. For breakfast, a delicious, scrumptious, finger licking and mouth watering biryani was ready. We relished the biryani the rest of the day.

I noticed a thing that this biryani doesn't require too many ingredients like a normal biryani. Hope you like the recipe and try it out. Please let me know how it turned.

 Ingredients:

Marination:

• Goat- 3 lbs
• Green chillies (slit)- 10-15 numbers
• Ginger- Garlic Paste- 3 tbsp
• Yogurt- 2 Cups
• Garam Masala- 2 tbsp
• Salt- as required

1. Basmati Rice- 6 Cups
2. Water- 11 Cups
3. Fried onions (sliced)- 8 numbers
4. Garam Masala- 3 tbsp
5. Lemon Juice- 1/2 Cup
6. Saffron with Milk/ Orange food color with milk- 1/4 Cup

Method:

For Marination:

1. Marinate the goat, yogurt, ginger-garlic paste, slit green chilies, garam masala and salt. Keep this aside for almost 3-4 hours or overnight. Cook this on medium flame for almost 2 hours or the meat gets tender.
2. Deep fry the sliced onions in oil till it gets golden brown. Keep this aside on a kitchen towel. Reserve the fried oil for assembling.
3. Rinse and soak the rice for 30minutes. After 30 minutes, drain the rice. Heat water required for the biryani and when it gets boiled add the drained rice and salt, mix and keep the lid and let it cook for 20 minutes on low flame. After 20 minutes switch off the flame and keep it for 10 minutes without mixing. Slowly fluff the rice using a fork.

For assembling:

1. In a deep bottomed vessel layer with a tbsp of fried onions, spoonful of goat masala, tbsp of garam masala and cooked rice and repeat the process and make sure that the top layer is of rice. 
2. Poke holes and pour the lemon juice and saffron milk in each hole and close with a lid. Let it cook on low flame for about 15- 20 minutes.
3. After 20 minutes, open the lid, mix and enjoy with raita.

Simple and Easy Veggie Omelette

This Veggie omelette is appetizing and easy to make. This is versatile. You can add as many vegetables as you like. Now a days I am in love with broccoli, that I like to include them in my daily menu in one or the other way. Sometimes I simple saute the broccoli florets in olive oil along with salt and pepper and sometimes I like to have them raw. I love salad greens and so I add the broccoli florets in these along with cherry tomatoes and little bit of salad dressing.

Omelette in our house is either plain or just add the regular chopped onions and green chillies. This thought of adding broccoli in egg came when I was about to eat lunch. As my husband doesn’t like veggies, it is better to make when he is not around.. ;) And so I tried this along with capsicum and it was mindblowing. My daughter loves everything what I make and when she came back from school, I gave this as an after snack and she was loving it to the last bite.

This can be had as a breakfast, lunch or dinner. Very filling, tastes good and in no time we can prepare this.

I have posted frittata in one of my earlier posts in which cheese is added and this one is much different Just try this out and let me know.

Ingredients:

1. Eggs- 2 nos
2. Onions (chopped)- 1 no
3. Tomatoes(chopped)- ½ no
4. Green Chillies (cubed)- ½ no
5. Red Capsicum (cubed)- ½ no
6. Broccoli florets- a handful
7. Salt- as required
8. Pepper- 1 tsp
9. Oil- 1 tsp

Method:

1. Heat oil in a pan. Stir fry onions, green chillies, tomatoes, broccoli and capsicum pieces, till the raw smell disappears. Add salt.
2. Break and beat the eggs in a bowl and pour this on the sauteed veggies on a low flame.
3. Sprinkle pepper powder and when it is cooked on one side, flip and enjoy warm omelette.

Vada Pav- An amazing street food

This is a  lip smacking Indian street snack which is available almost in all the stalls and restaurants in India. In this recipe, boiled and mashed potatoes are spiced, coated in gram flour batter and then deep fried. The fritter is served inside a butter toasted buns along with dry garlic chutney/ coriander chutney/ tamarind chutney.

Every day by evening, my mind will be thinking of making something healthy for my husband and daughter. With the craving for a spicy and a tangy chaat, I ended up with this not so healthy chaat as it’s not possible to find any chaat here. I love the dry garlic chutney a lot. And once when I learned how to make it, I made a lot and stored in refrigerator, and that is what I am using as a spread on bread and rotis…

Ingredients:

• Pav- 8 nos

For the filling:

1. Boiled Potatoes- wnos
2. Green Chillies- 3 nos
3. Ginger and Garlic Paste- 1 tbsp
4. Oil- 1 tbsp
5. Mustard Seeds- 1 tsp
6. Asafoetida- ½  tsp
7. Turmeric Powder- 1 tsp
8. Salt- as required
9. Besan- ½ Cup
10. Turmeric Powder- 1 tsp
11. Salt- as required
12. Oil- for deep frying

Method:

1. Grind the green chillies and ginger, garlic paste to a fine paste.
2. Heat oil, splutter the mustard seeds and add asafoetida powder. Add the boiled and mashed potatoes.
3. In the above add the green chillies, ginger and garlic paste. Mix well. Add the turmeric powder and required amount of salt.
4. Divide this into 8 equal proportions and keep this aside.
5. Heat oil for frying in a kadai.
6. Combine the besan, turmeric powder, salt with required amount of water. It should be thick with dropping consistency.
7. Dip each of the potato balls in the above besan mixture and coat well. Drop these in hot oil and fry till golden brown. Drain on absorbent paper.

For the Dry Garlic Chutney:

1. Garlic cloves (crushed)- 4 tbsp
2. Dry Coconut grated- 4 tbsp
3. Red Chilli Powder- 2 tbsp
4. Oil- 1 tbsp

Method:

1. Heat oil, fry the garlic for about 2 minutes. Add the dried coconut powder and stir well.
2. Switch of the flame, add the red chilli powder and salt.
3. When it is cooled down, grind to a fine powder. Keep this aside.

Assembling the vada pav:

1. Slice each pav into half and spread some garlic chutney inside and place one vada in each pav.
2. Complete the process with remaining and serve along with Salted green chillies and Tomato ketchup.

Simple Stuffed Brinjal Curry/ Gutti Vankaya Curry/ Vazhuthananga Niracha Curry

I am a big fan of brinjal. Brinjal in any form(except raw) I would love to gobble up. But after marriage, intake of brinjal has come down as my husband doesn't love this veggie at all.. :(

So whenever I am in Kerala or when my parents or in- laws are visiting us, I would get a chance to eat this. As most of my life was spent in Andhra, I love the bhagare baingan/ gutti vankaya koora - a specialty of Hyderabad.

This curry is entirely different from bhagare baingan. This is a simple and easy-to-make recipe. This is a perfect finger licking dish that can be served along with rotis, naans, chapatis and rice. Try this out and you will love this for sure.

In this dish, the brinjals are stuffed with a simple masala, shallow fried and cooked and simmered in tamarind gravy. And here is the recipe...

Ingredients:

1. Brinjal- 6-7 nos
2. Onions- 2 nos
3. Shallots- ½ cup
4. Green Chillies- 3 nos
5. Ginger and Garlic Paste- 1 tbsp
6. Red Chilli Powder- 2 tbsp+ 1 tbsp
7. Turmeric Powder- 1 tsp
8. Coriander Powder- 3 tbsp
9. Garam Masala Powder- 1 tsp
10. Fenugreek Powder- 1 tsp
11. Tamarind- lemon size
12. Oil- 2 tbsp
13. Mustard Seeds- 1 tsp
14. Cumin Seeds- 1 tsp
15. Fenugreek Seeds- 1 tsp
16. Curry Leaves- few
17. Salt- as required

Method:

1. Soak the tamarind in a little warm water.
2. Slit each brinjals diagonally with the stalks intact. Mix 1 tbsp of red chilli powder and salt in a bowl using little amount of water. Stuff this mix in the slitted brinjals and keep this aside.
3. Heat oil in a pan, lightly fry these brinjals for about 10 minutes on medium flame and keep this on kitchen towel.
4. Chop the onions and shallots using a blender. In the same above oil splutter mustard seeds, fenugreek seeds and cumin seeds.
5. Add the chopped onions- shallots mixture and stir well till they turn translucent. Add the slited green chillies, curry leaves. After about 5- 10 minutes add the ginger and garlic paste.
6. As the raw smell disappears add the brinjals and lightly stir for about a minute. Now add the red chilli powder, turmeric powder, coriander powder and garam masala powder. Add the tamarind water and add about a ½ Cup of water and let this boil for about 15- 20 minutes on low flame by closing with a lid.
7. At last add the fenugreek powder, stir and switch off the flame and serve along with piping hot rice and enjoy.

Egg Roll- Street Food in lunch box...

At the place where we are staying, there are so many street food shops nearby. You will find a whole range of varieties from rolls to chats to parathas.. you name it.. Among all these shops, the one which we all love, is those Kolkata roll shops. I love to have hot and spicy egg rolls and so my little one loves it a lot. But these shops for some reason does not compromise on the quantity of the oil they pour in it. Oil drips from those rotis !!! So we thought of making these at home in the way we want it and this also ended up being one option for my sweetie’s lunch box.

I prefer to make this with wheat instead of maida as wheat is more nutritious. For the stuffing, I used onions and green chillies. You can also use cabbage, capsicum, tomatoes and so on. You can make these egg rolls to pack in lunch boxes, to carry for picnics and as a quick dinner too.

This is simple, easy and takes very little time, especially when you have a stock of chapati dough :-)

Ingredients:

1. Wheat Flour- 2 Cups
2. Water- as needed to knead
3. salt- as required
4. Oil- 1 tbsp
5. Tomato Ketchup- 2 tbsp
6. Schezwan sauce (optional)- 1 tbsp
7. Eggs- 2 nos
8. Onions (sliced)- 2nos
9. Green Chillies (chopped)- 3nos
10. Lemon Juice- 1 no
11. Salt- as required

Method:

1. Knead the wheat flour, water, salt and oil in the form of dough for chapatis. Make small balls and roll out these balls with a rolling pin and cook them on a hot tawa and drizzle oil to cook evenly.
2. Meanwhile beat the egg with a pinch of salt and keep this aside.
3. Pour 2 tbsps of egg on one side of the half cooked chapati and spread using a spoon. Apply oil on it, flip the side and cook on low flame. Repeat the process with all the chapatis.
4. Now place one chapati with the egg on top on a plate. Spread the tomato ketchup then spread little schezwan sauce.
5. In a bowl mix the onions, green chillies, lemon juice and salt. Spread this mixture on top of the chapati and roll it. Cut and serve.

Kulikki Sharbath / Shaken Lemonade

Back to Bangalore after a long vacation from Kerala. In the scorching heat of Kerala, I have seen a lot of road side stalls where they sell this amazing drink. I was told that this is an excellent drink to cool yourself. I wanted to try this from one of the stalls but wasn’t sure about the water. So I tried it at home and realized why this drink is so popular in Kerala.

This is a perfect thirst quencher. There are so many names for this drink like “taste of Kochi” or “new generation drink” and so on. A perfect blend of lemon, green chillies, sugar and ice cubes. We can also add little crushed ginger and also basil / sabja seeds. Just you need some simple ingredients and an amazing magical drink will be ready within minutes.

Ingredients:

1. Lemon- Half a lime
2. Sugar- 1 tbsp
3. Green Chilli- 1 no
4. Water- ½ a glass
5. Ice Cubes- few

Method:

1. Squeeze the lime in a glass along with sugar, green chillies, water and ice cubes.
2. Cover the glass tightly with another glass and shake well for about 30 sec.
3. Serve it by adding a small piece of lime and enjoy an amazing drink.