Quick Chilly Mushroom

As must be evident from Varsha’s innumerable posts, Sunday meals at our house is always special, generally some authentic Goan fish preparation and seldom chicken. I have given up eating non-veg since a very long time. To compensate, Varsha always tries to make some vegetarian preparation for me.

This is an impromptu recipe that we came up with. Preparation time less than 15 minutes flat, therefore the name “Quick Chilly Mushroom”.

Ingredients –

Mushrooms (10-12 large bulbs),

1 tsp Ginger Garlic paste,

Garlic cloves (7-10),

½ tsp Pepper powder,

1 large Lemon,

1 tsp Soya Sauce,

1 tsp Vinegar,

2 Green chilies,

½ dried curry leaves powder (dehydrate curry leaves in the oven, once cooled crush into powder. Can be stored for months in the refrigerator.)

1 tsp Corn flour,

Salt to taste,

2 tsp Clarified Butter (Ghee, preferably home made)

Method-

Wash and clean the mushrooms and cut them into 2-3 pieces each, length-wise, ensuring there is a little bit of stalk and bulb with every piece. Squeeze a lime and set aside.

In a small bowl mix ginger garlic paste, pepper powder, vinegar and Soya sauce. Apply this mixture to the already cut and lemon soaked mushrooms.

In a hot pan put the ghee. Once the ghee melts add the chillies (make only 2-3 pieces of a chilly) and the garlic cloves (whole cloves with the skin). Let the flavours start mixing. To this add the cut mushrooms. Cook initially on a slow flame for 5 minutes. Stir occasionally.

Mushrooms tend to get cooked soon. To this add the corn flour. If you feel the preparation sticks excessively to the bottom of the pan, feel free to add some ghee.

Cook for another 5 minutes.

Serve hot as a starter/side dish.

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Brinjal Boats

I saw these brinjal boats on Sapna Sardessais Facebook page the other day. She is a well-known personality in Goa and has published many famous cook books. She keeps posting amazing photos of dishes cooked in her kitchen on her facebook page and are absolutely drool worthy. Thanks Sapna for this recipe.

These boats are very simple to make and are deliciously tasty. Do try them. Here is the recipe.

Ingredients –

4 long variety purple brinjals,

1 med sized onion finely chopped,

2 boiled and mashed potatoes,

1 tbsp chopped coriander leaves,

1 tsp ginger garlic paste,

½ tsp turmeric powder,

1 tsp red chili powder,

1 tsp coriander seeds powder,

½ tsp cumin seeds powder,

½ tsp garam masala powder,

½ tsp amchroor powder,

Salt to taste,

2 tsp oil

Method –

Cut the brinjal length wise and scoop out the center with spoon to make 8 hollow boats.

Chop the scoped brinjal into fine pieces and keep aside.

Heat 1 tsp oil and fry onions till light brown.

Add ginger garlic paste and all the masalas and stir fry for a minute.

Now add chopped brinjal and cook till the brinjal is cooked and is mushy. Add boiled potatoes, coriander leaves and salt. Mix well and switch off the gas.

Apply a little salt to the hollow brinjal boats and leave it for 5 minutes approx.

Stuff the brinjal potatoes stuffing in the hollow brinjal to make a boat. Stuff all the brinjals, coat them with fine semolina or bread crumbs and shallow fry on the both the sides till the brinjal skin gets cooked.

Serve hot with tomato ketchup.

 

 

 

Radish Greens Salad

Hello everyone!!! I am back after a long time…. We were on a small vacation to Goa the whole last week. We all had an amazing time there. Ate a lot of goodies prepared by my Mom and not to forget the cakes of Goan bakeries :-). So my next couple of recipes will be the ones made by my Mom on our visit there. So here is a Radish Greens Salad recipe for you. It’s a very simple salad made in most of the Goan households. Use very tender Radish leaves to make this. (Choose the leaves whose radish is very small and tender). So off to the recipe…

Ingredients-

15 to 20 radish leaves,

1 onion,

1 green chili,

2 tsp lime juice,

2 tsp grated coconut (optional)

Salt to taste

Method-

Finely chop radish leaves, onion and green chili.

Add lime juice, salt and coconut and mix well.

Spring Onion Zunka (Kandyachya Paticha Zunka)

Zunka bhakri is a specialty among the Maharashtrians. For those who don’t know, the key ingredient for this delicacy is chick pea flour (Besan). I have eaten Zunka of capsicum but this one with spring onions is my favorite. This is my mom’s way of making it and I have no idea of when she has learnt this. This is very uncommon in Goa. Nevertheless, we all love it….You can also add green chilies to give it a spicy kick. I have omitted green chilies because my parents cannot handle pungent food. So off to the recipe…

Ingredients-

1 bunch of spring onion (only the green stalk) finely chopped (approx 3 cups),

1 cup of onion bulbs of the spring onion chopped lengthwise,

2 tomatoes finely chopped,

1 cup of chick pea flour (besan) dry roasted for 5 to 6 minutes till the raw smell does off,

15 cloves of garlic,

1 “piece of ginger,

3 tsp oil,

1 tsp mustard seeds,

1 tsp cumin seeds,

½ tsp turmeric powder,

1 tsp chili powder,

1 tsp garam masala powder,

Salt to taste,

2 cups of hot water

Method-

Heat oil in a pan and splutter mustard seeds and cumin seeds. Add onions and fry for a minute.

Crush ginger to a fine paste and add it o the onions. Lightly crush garlic and mix it with the onions and continue frying till the onion turns golden brown.

Add turmeric powder and tomatoes and continue frying.

Mix in the red chili powder and the garam masala powder. Fry for a minute.

Add the spring onion leaves, season with salt, mix well and cover the pan and let it cook for 5 minutes.

Now add the besan, mix well and add the hot water. Mix all the contents well and cover the pan and let it cook. Keep stirring in between.. Serve hot with bhakris or chapattis and with some raw onion on the side.

Paneer Mushroom Chili

This is another Indo Chinese dish that needs to be cooked on a high flame without covering the pan. The capsicum should remain a little crunchy. You can also add baby corn and spring onion.

 Ingredients –

200 grams paneer (Cottage cheese) cut into cubes,

10 mushrooms chopped into 4 pieces each,

2 medium sized capsicum cut into cubes,

1 onion chopped lengthwise,

12 cloves of garlic finely chopped,

1 “piece of ginger finely chopped,

3 green chilies finely chopped,

½ tsp pepper powder,

3 tsp soya sauce,

2 tsp tomato ketchup,

2 tsp green chili sauce,

Salt to taste,

2 tbsp oil

Method –

Heat oil in a wok and fry ginger, garlic and green chilies for a minute.

Add onions and fry for another 2 minutes.

Mix in all the sauces and also put paneer and mushrooms.

Stir the contents well and add pepper powder.

Keep stirring for time to time.

Add capsicum and little salt.

Cook for another 5 minutes and switch off the gas.

Paneer Masala

We all were bored of eating same food everyday so I had plans of making Paneer Koftas for lunch.  I mashed boiled potatoes, mixed it very well with ginger garlic paste and kasoori methi and mixed all this with grated paneer, made small balls and started deep frying with hot oil. Koftas started melting in the oil :-(. . It was common sense not to fry grated paneer balls but I lacked it at that time :-). I was very disappointed looking at it and I wanted to throw all the kofta mixture straight in the bin. I was also tensed as it was almost lunch time and I didn’t know what to put in the ground masals. Milo made use of the kofta balls by making a starter with stuffed papad. It tasted amazing. See the below pic.

In the mean time I quickly went and I got frozen paneer from the stores and made this paneer masala. Both the dishes tasted good. We all liked it.

The basic ground masala is the same one used in Mushroom Masala.

Ingredients-

200 grams fresh/frozen Paneer,

2 medium sized onion cut lengthwise,

1 small tomato,

1 tsp sahi jeera,

1 bay leaf,

½ tsp garam masala powder,

Salt to taste,

3 to 4 tsp cream (optional)

3 tsp oil

Grind to a fine paste the following –

5 cloves of garlic,

1” ginger,

2 green chilies,

3 tsp chopped coriander leaves,

1 tsp roasted poppy seeds,

½ tsp roasted badishep,

1 tsp roasted coriander seeds,

2 cloves,

2 pepper,

1 small piece of cinnamon,

8 cashew nuts,

½ tsp fresh/frozen grated coconut

Method-

Heat oil in a heavy bottom pan, crackle sahi jeera and fry bay leaf.

Now fry onion till golden brown. (Approx 5 minutes).

Put the ground paste in the fried onions and fry for another 4 to 5 minutes.

Now put the paneer, tomato and garam masala. Season with salt.

Cover the pan and let it cook till paneer is done.

Now mix in the cream and let it cook for 2 to 3 minutes.

Serve hot with roti/naan

Drumstick Masala Curry

Drumsticks are found plenty at my mom’s house. They have a tree which yields many of these during season. I used to get fed up eating them when I was small. Here in Mumbai we have to buy them and it’s not cheap – now I have started liking them. J

We use drumsticks only in dal. For a change I wanted to make something nice out of them. Recently I tried to make a curry with grated coconut (not ground).Milodid not like it. He does not like pieces of coconut in his food. It should be ground to a fine paste. So I searched the net for some recipes, took ideas from various blogs (I went through so many blogs that now I don’t even remember from which blog I took this). The original recipe didn’t use tamarind. Also the coconut and onion were not roasted before grinding.

This curry tasted amazing. Milo said it just tastes like some non vegetarian curry. My FIL said a few prawns in this would taste very nice. Verdict – All liked it.

 Ingredients- 

10 to 12 index finger size pieces of peeled drumsticks,

1 medium sized onion chopped length wise,

1 small up dry grated coconut,

1 medium sized tomato chopped,

1.5 tsp coriander seeds,

1 tsp jeera,

2 cloves,

1 cardamom,

1 small piece of cinnamon,

12 flakes of garlic,

1” ginger,

1.5 tsp red chili powder,

1 tsp Mustard seeds,

Few curry leaves,

2 tsp tamarind extract,

Salt to taste,

2 tbsp oil,

water 

Method- 

Dry roast onion and coconut till brown. Once cooled, grind it with coriander seeds, jeera, cloves, cardamom, cinnamon, garlic, ginger and red chili powder.

Cook drumsticks in little water and salt till 3/4^th done.

Heat oil in a pan and crackle mustard seeds, add curry leaves and fry the masala paste for approx 5 to 7 minutes.

Add drumsticks along with the water, tomatoes, salt and tamarind extract.

Cover and cook till drumsticks are fully cooked.

Garnish with coriander leaves and serve hot with rice or chapatis.

Mushroom Masala

I get to learn many recipes from Supriya – my colleague and friend. Many a times she gets tasty food in her lunch box which we all relish. We both often discuss about food and what new dishes to prepare on the weekends. This recipe was given to me by her and I have prepared it N number of times.

It tastes very nice just like any restaurant dish. Thanks Supriya for your recipe.

 Ingredients- 

1 pkt button mushrooms (12 to 15 pieces) cut into pieces,

2 medium sized onion cut lengthwise,

1 small tomato,

1 tsp sahi jeera,

1 bay leaf,

½ tsp garam masala powder,

Salt to taste,

3 to 4 tsp cream (optional)

3 tsp oil

Grind to a fine paste the following –

5 cloves of garlic,

1” ginger,

2 green chilies,

1 tsp chopped coriander leaves,

1 tsp roasted poppy seeds,

½ tsp roasted badishep,

1 tsp roasted coriander seeds,

2 cloves,

2 pepper,

1 small piece of cinnamon,

8 cashew nuts,

½ tsp fresh/frozen grated coconut

 Method-

Heat oil in a heavy bottom pan, crackle sahi jeera and fry bay leaf.

Now fry onion till golden brown. (Approx 5 minutes).

Put the ground paste in the fried onions and fry for another 4 to 5 minutes.

Now put the mushrooms, tomato and garam masala. Season with salt.

Cover the pan and let it cook till mushrooms are done.

Now mix in the cream and let it cook for 2 to 3 minutes.

Serve hot with roti/naan.

Soya Paneer Masala

I had an opened pack of fresh cream that I had to use in 3 days. Luckily I also had paneer in the fridge which I had brought to use in mushroom masala (recipe to follow soon) but forgot to use it. So to use and finish both the items, I made this Soya Paneer Masala with a flavor of kasoori methi in it. It tasted good.

 

Ingredients- 

200 gms paneer cut into cubes,

12 to 15 soaked and boiled soya nuggets cut into fine pieces,

2 tsp kasoori methi,

3 big onions chopped length wise,

3 big tomatoes boiled and pureed,

8 to 9 garlic flakes,

A piece of ginger,

3 to 4tsp fresh cream (I used Amul cream),

1 tsp sahi jeera,

2 tsp red chili powder,

2 tsp garam masala powder,

¼ tsp turmeric powder,

Salt to taste,

Coriander leaves for garnishing,

Oil

Method- 

Heat oil in a wok and splutter sahi jeera. Add onions, ginger and garlic and fry till onions are golden brown.

Grind this to a fine paste with chili powder, garam masala powder, haldi powder and little water. 

Heat a little oil and fry this ground masala till oil separates. Add tomato puree and continue stirring.

Add salt and a little water and bring it to a gravy like consistency.

Add soya nuggets and paneer. Cover the lid and let it cook.

Now add milk cream and crushed kasoori methi (lightly roast kasoori methi in a small pan).

Let it cook for 3 to 4 minutes more. Garnish with coriander leaves and serve hot with naans.