Bhakhri, shaak, khichdi and kadhi is the ultimate comfort food for me. Dinner is called vaalu in Gujarati, and this is a typical combination for dinner in a Gujarati household. There are subsets of this combination of course, which are also quite popular like bhakhri-shaak and khichdi kadhi.

Moving counter-clockwise and starting from bottom left, the picture shows bhakhri, khichdi, shaak, kadhi and a papad on the top. You can also see jaggery and ghee on the bhakhri. Even though this might look like a super long post, making these for dinner is not at all complicated. I just like to make sure I do not miss out on any detail. 
Bhakhri (A soft and crispy Indian bread)
Bhakhri is ideally prepared with slightly coarse wheat flour, lending it a distinctly soft and crispy texture. Bhakhri lasts longer than the fulka roti, doesn’t turn soggy the next day. In fact, bhakhris taste just as yummy on the next day if not better, with a cup of chai.

Bhakhri (A soft and crispy Indian bread) – Makes 8 to 10

Ingredients

1. Whole wheat flour – 2 heaped cups (Use slightly coarse wheat flour, if available)
2. Oil – 1 tbsp
3. Salt – 1 pinch

Method of preparation
Add salt and oil to the wheat flour and mix well. Adding oil while kneading the dough is called adding mon in Gujarati, and this oil is the key to crispy bhakhris. Slowly add water and knead into a tight dough (harder than that of roti). For 2 cups of flour, you should roughly require about 3/4 to 1 cup of water. Make laddu sized balls from the dough and smoothen each of the balls indivially into slightly flattened balls like shown in the picture.

Take a slightly curved tava (not totally flat), and put it on low heat. Roll out one dough-ball into a thick chapati. Let it cook on low heat on one side and before it gets pink spots, turn it on the other side and let it cook till it gets nice pink spots. Put a few drops of oil on the tava and cook the first side first. Press gently with a flat turner ladel to make sure all sides of bhakhri are getting cooked. Cook on the other side, for a few seconds only as it is cooked already. Spread out the bhakhris as you make them, on a paper or an inverted steel strainer so that all the steam escapes without making them soggy. Once they cool a bit, you can stack them in a dubba or casserole.

You can eat it with any rasedar subzee and kadhi(sample recipes below) or with grated jaggery and a little ghee.

Bataka nu fotravalu shaak (A potato curry with potato peel intact) – Serves 2 to 3

This is a very basic and quick potato curry and this is probably the first things I learnt from my mother. It is so simple that unless you try really hard, you just can’t mess it up!

1. Potatoes (big) – 2 nos
2. Onions (big) – 1
3. Coriander – 1 tbsp, chopped
4. Turmeric powder – 1/2 tsp
5. Mustard seeds – 1/2 tsp
6. Red chilly powder – 1 tsp
7. Cumin powder – 1 tsp
8. Coriander powder – 1 tsp
9. Oil – 1 tbsp
10. Asafoetida – 1 pinch
11. Salt to taste

Wash the potatoes thoroughly and scrap them lightly with a knife, to remove any dirt or blackened parts. Chop the potatoes and onions into 3/4 inch cubes. Heat the oil in a thick bottomed kadhai. When the oil is hot, add mustard seeds, asafoetida, turmeric powder and the chopped potatoes and onions. Add 2-3 cups of water, salt and put a lid on it. Let it simmer for about 15 minutes. Check from time to time to see if more water needs to be added. When the potatoes are cooked properly, add the cumin, coriander powder ( or you can just add dhanajeeru) and red chilly powder. Let it simmer for a couple of minutes and then switch off the flame. Garnish with chopped coriander.

Kadhi – Serves 3

When people said Indian “curries” are famous all over the world, well, I believed they were talking about this kadhi, till a long long time. In those days, kadhi was one of those routine dishes, prepared once in a week, for a break from the monotony of the daal. I didn’t see anything so special about this dish, for it to be so famous. But then firangis were known to fall for strange things .

Anyway, so when I figured that the much hyped curries and kadhi are actually two different things, all of a sudden my interest and respect for kadhi grew. Don’t know why. Enough of blabber for the day. Over to the recipe.

Ingredients

1. Slightly sour curd – 1 cup
2. Besan – 2 tsp
3. Green chillies – 6
4. Ginger – small piece
5. Curry leaves – 5
6. Fresh coriander – 1 tbsp, finely chopped
7. Cinnamon – 1/2 inch
8. Cloves – 4
9. Jaggery – 1/2 cup, grated
10. Mustard seeds – 1/2 tsp
11. Cumin seeds – 1/2 tsp
12. Oil or Ghee – 2 tsp, for vaghaar (tadka/tempering)
13. Salt to taste

Method of preparation

Blend the dahi with enough water using a wooden or electric blender and make buttermilk of desired consistency. Take half a cup of water and mix the besan well so that no lumps are formed. Add the besan, grated jaggery and salt to the buttermilk and put the vessel on low flame. Chop one green chilly finely and grind the rest of the chillies with ginger into a paste. Add the chilly-ginger paste in the kadhi. Let the kadhi simmer for at least 15 minutes. The kadhi will turn frothy. According to popular belief, a kadhi’s worth is gauged by the number of times it is brought to a boil. And the criteria for success is 18 times! In Gujarati such kadhi is called adhaar ubhra ni kadhi. Digression over, back to business. I don’t literally follow the dumb rule of 18, just let it simmer for 15 odd minutes and we are good.  Now, take a small pan for tadka and heat oil in it (I used oil, but ghee is preferred.). When hot, add mustard seeds, cumin seeds, asafoetida, curry leaves, chopped green chillies cloves and cinnamon. Let it simmer for a couple more minutes, garnish with chopped coriander and serve it piping hot with rice or with a meal like this.

Any Amdavadi worth his/her salt will swear by Raipur na bhajia. Non-resident Amdavadis like me, would kill for a plate of Raipur bhajiyas, even when they are in the city just for a few hours. The Raipur Bhajia House near the Raipur Darwaza at Ahmedabad sells the best bhajias in the city. The menu is quite limited. Boiled potato bhajias, Bataka wadas, Methi bhajias and Khaman is all that is available at this shop. Earlier, the shop used to be right in the middle of a very busy junction, causing much traffic problems. So, the shop has now shifted a little on the side, but the popularity of these bhajias remains undiminished. The shop sells just bhajias and no accompaniments whatsoever. No fried chillies, no onions, no chutneys, no water and not even a plastic bag. From as long as I can remember, they have been selling the exact same bhajias wrapped in newspaper with a cotton thread. And people continue to throng this shop. No matter what time of the day or year you go, you have to stand in a queue. The one thing I love apart from the food ofcourse, is that they have a separate queue for women foodies, which is usually much shorter . If you are not an Amdavadi, do pay a visit to the Raipur bhajia house when you are in the city and you’ll thank me.

Obviously, within a couple of days of me being in the city, I had my dose of Raipur bhajias. Driven by the enticingly delicious batakawadas, my mother and I decided to try and decipher their magical formula. Well, we did manage to get close to the Raipur bhajia version with the filling, but their perfect crispy cover still needs to be worked on. So, here come our attempt at cracking the Raipur bhajia house’s bataka vadas.

Now, the bataka wadas that we usually prepare are slightly different. In fact, there are a lot of versions of bataka wadas, but more on that later. The same preparation is called Batata wada in Bombay and other parts of Maharashtra, and is slightly different than this version I’m going to write about today.

Bataka wada – Raipur bhajia house style (Serves 4)

Ingredients

For the filling

1. Potatoes – 6
2. Coriander seeds – 1 tbsp
3. Sugar – 2 tsp
4. Mustard seeds – 1/2 tsp
5. Fennel seeds – 1 tsp
6. Coriander leaves – 1/2 cup
7. Green chillies – 6 to 8
8. Ginger – 2 inch piece
9. Turmeric powder – 1 tsp
10. Salt to taste
11. Asafoetida – 1 pinch

For the batter

1. Besan – 1 cup
2. Rava – 1 tbsp
3. Salt to taste

Groundnut oil for frying

Method of preparation

1. Boil the potatoes in a pressure cooker. Peel and mash them when cold.
2. Grind the ginger and chillies in a paste. Ginger is a key ingredient in this recipe. Be liberal while adding ginger.
3. Grind the coriander seeds roughly. Do not use a mixie, just roughly grind them with hand using the traditional stone or steel grinder.
4. Prepare the batter by slowly adding water to the besan, stirring continuously with a spoon. Mix the rava in 1 tsp oil and add to the batter. Add salt to taste and set it aside for 10-15 minutes.
5. Heat a tbsp of oil in a pan. Add mustard seeds, asafoetida, turmeric powder, fennel seeds, coriander seeds, ginger-chilly paste and the mashed potatoes. Add salt and sugar to taste. Mix well and prepare small balls for the filling.
6. Heat oil in a thick pottomed kadai for deep frying. When the oil is hot, take a tbsp of the hot oil and pour it in the batter. It will make a chhhshhh sound . Dip the roundles in the batter and fry them carefully.
7. Serve with green chutney, sauce or any other chutney of your choice.

As promised, I am back from a hiatus. Had a nice vacation at home and this recipe of a sweet called Malpua is going to mark the beginning of a series of recipes, all by my mother. Every time I visit home, I am reminded of at least a couple of delicacies, that were fairly common at home but have been forgotten by me over time.

Malpua is a very old and traditional sweet preparation. It is very common to see temples where Malpuas are served as prasad. My mother mentioned the other day that Malpuas and doodhpaak is a favourite combination for some people. The ingredients that go into making Malpuas are very easily available in any Indian household and theoretically, the recipe too is quite simple. If you haven’t got a chance to ever have Malpuas, I suggest you eat it somewhere first and then give the recipe a shot. Malpuas are pure indulgence, so dont look at the dripping ghee and enjoy the bliss!

Malpuas (makes 10-12)

Ingredients

1. Wheat flour – 1 cup
2. Jaggery – 3/4 cup, finely grated
3. Pepper corns – 1 tsp
4. Fennel seeds – 2 tsp
5. Ghee, for deep frying

Method of preparation

1. Take the wheat flour, add finely grated jaggery to it and make a batter that is slightly watery than that of dosa.
2. Add pepper corns, fennel seeds and set it aside for 10 mins. Check if the jaggery has dissolved completely.
3. Take enough ghee in a thick bottomed, flat frying pan (as shown in the pictures) and heat it.
4. After the ghee is hot, take the batter in a small katori/bowl and pour it quickly into the frying pan, from about a foot’s height. As you pour the batter, it will automatically take a roughly round shape and develop small holes in it.
5. Fry one malpua at a time, each malpua of the size of a puri or a small fulka roti. Fry both the sides till the edges turn reddish and a little crisp.

Malpuas are ready to be gobbled. You can serve them with basundi or doodhpaak or rabdi, the traditional way. However, they taste equally good by themselves. If you face problems with the malpuas being too thick or too hard, the key trick is getting the consistency of the batter right. Also make sure that there is enough ghee for deep frying.

Vegetarian Delight touched the 10,000 visitors benchmark yesterday. WordPress doesn’t count my own visits to my blog, so the ten thousand number is genuine and therefore quite flattering. Its funny, but at times when I haven’t cooked something for a while,even I refer to this blog to brush up the details of the recipe. I must admit that since last month or so, I have been a little lazy on the cooking front and have just been cooking just to survive. Plus the husband is travelling since last week so I do not spend more than 10 minutes per day in the kitchen. I have been living on strawberry flavoured corn flakes with raisins and cold milk. And when it gets too milky or when all that sugar starts giving me a mild sugar-high, I push myself to make a bowl of kanda poha or upma, at the most. Cooking ain’t so much fun when you have nobody to appreciate or even share it with, you know.

So dear readers, I would like to thank you all for your continued interest in this blog and for making more than 10,000 hungry visits to my blog. Boy, I can’t seem to get over that number! Now that I have the much needed push, I pwomish to get back to regular food blogging.

Keep the comments coming.

Ya ya so I am in one of those short-lived “I’m going to eat healthy” phases. Sticking to the theme of quick and simple recipes I’ve been following since last couple of posts, here’s an ultra simple soup that tastes yummy, especially on those wintery nights, cuddled inside a blanket on a bean bag, with a nice book to read.

Spinach(Palak) and onion soup – Serves two

Ingredients

1. Spinach – 1 cup
2. Onions – 2 large
3. Freshly ground pepper
4. Salt to taste
5. Butter – 1 tsp (optional)

Method of preparation

Clean the spinach leaves thoroughly. Atleast in India, spinach is notorious to be full of dirt. Remove the stems and roughly shred the spinach leaves. Peel and roughly chop the onions into quarters. Pressure cook the spinach and onions with 4 cups of water. After two whistles, switch off the gas. Blend the cooked spinach and onions with a blender, add salt and freshly ground pepper and boil for a minute. Add more water, if required. If you aren’t watching your calories, you can top it with a little butter.

Rotis dont taste all that great when cold, hai na? Chilly paratha is a quick and yummy little recipe to turn the dull and boring looking cold chapatis into an interesting filling meal. For a light evening dinner or even a snack you can use the leftover rotis from morning to prepare kotthu parotta (as it is called in Chennai).

Chilly paratha/ Kotthu parotta

Ingredients:

1. Chapatis or Parathas – 8 to 10
2. Onion – 1
3. Tomato – 1
4. Green chillies – 2
5. Capsicum – 1/2
6. Curry leaves – 5
7. Curd – 1 tbsp
8. Turmeric powder – 1 tsp
9. Red chilly powder – 1/2 tsp
10. Oil
11. Salt to taste

Method of preparation:

Shred the chapatis or parathas into 1 inch long and thin pieces.  You can also use kitchen scissors to cut them.Beat the curd, add salt, turmeric and chilly powder and pour it on the shredded chapatis. Mix well and keep it aside for the chapatis to soften a little.  Chop all the vegetables into thin 1 inch strips. Slit the green chillies lengthwise. Heat oil in a thick bottomed pan, add curry leaves and onions and stir fry till the onions turn pink. Then add capsicum and tomatoes and stir fry on high heat for another 1 or 2 minutes. Add the shredded chapatis and close the pan with a lid. Let it simmer for a minute or two. That’s all! Chilly paratha is a self sufficient meal, however you can serve coconut or dal chutney with it.

When it comes to breakfast, poha rules supreme! This recipe I am posting is mainly based on my mommy’s, with a few additions I picked up during trips to villages in Maharashtra. There are quite a lot of variations of this dish, like in Pune kanda(onion) poha is common while in some parts of MP, boiled green peas are added. I am posting the recipe that I use daily and you can customize it to your own taste.

Poha for breakfast (Serves 2)

Ingredients:

1. Poha (Beaten rice), medium thickness variety – 2 fistfuls
2. Potato – 1 medium
3. Onion – 1 large
4. Green chillies – 2
5. Coriander leaves – 1 tbsp, finely chopped
6. Curry leaves – 5
7. Lemon – 1
8. Sesame seeds – 1tsp
9. Peanuts – 1 tbsp
10. Sugar – 1 tsp (optional)
11. Mustard seeds – 1 tsp
12. Turmeric powder – 1 tsp
13. Asafoetida – 1 pinch
14. Salt to taste
15. Oil – 2 tbsp

Method of preparation:
Take a large bowl and soak the poha in water. Gently wash the poha and drain all the water immediately. While the poha softens, peel and finely chop the potato into 1/2 cm cubes. Finely chop the onion and green chillies. Dry roast the peanuts, remove the hull and split them into halves. Alternatively, you can also use the ready made split peanuts available in the market. Heat the oil in a thick bottomed kadhai. Add mustard seeds, sesame seeds, peanuts, asafoetida, green chillies, curry leaves, turmeric powder and stir for half a minute. Then add the chopped onions and potato. Add proportionate salt and close it with a lid. Pour a little water over the lid and let it simmer on slow flame for 7-10 minutes. Check if the potatoes have been cooked properly. Once cooked, add the poha, salt, sugar if you like and again close the lid and let it simmer. After a couple of minutes, switch off the flame, squeeze the lemon juice and add the chopped coriander leaves. You can serve it with pickle or chutney of your choice. You can also garnish the poha with sev or bhujia.

Its monsoon. And when it rains, I crave for crisp and fried food like bhajias with a cup of adrak chai. One such monsoon special crispy fried preparation I like is sabudana vada, which is also used a fasting dish. Even though they taste absolutely yummy in monsoon, go easy on them as sabudana is hard on our stomachs and our digestive systems are not in their best behaviour in monsoon.

Sabudana vada (Serves 3 people)

Ingredients

1. Sabudana – 1 cup
2. Potatoes – 2
3. Green chillies – 5 to 7
4. Peanuts – 1/4 cup (optional)
5. Coriander leaves
6. Lemon – 1
7. Salt to taste

Method of preparation

Soak the sabudana for 6 hours in water just enough for them to be immersed. Boil the potatoes and mash them. Add mashed potatoes, crushed chillies, finely chopped coriander, salt and some lemon juice to the sabudana. Optionally, you could also add some peanut powder (For peanut powder details, see the post below). Mix everything evenly and make flattened roundles. Dont worry if the roundles are not very pretty looking, the vadas are usually slightly uneven in shape. Heat oil in a pan and deep fry the roundles on both sides. Sabudana takes a little while to cook, so be patient while frying else the vada remains “kachcha” from the inside. Serve sabudana vadas with sauce or any chutney of your choice. Yenjaay!

Tomato Onion Koshimbir (A Maharashtrian salad)

This salad or kachumber or koshimbir reminds me of the summers spent at Ajji’s (Naani’s) house. This preparation is a representative of a typical Maharashtrian koshimbir that usually has finely chopped veggies, the quintessential peanut powder and a tadka for tempering. You can try new salads with grated cucumber or kheera or grated carrot instead of tomatoes and onions, on similar lines.

Tomato Onion Koshimbir (A Maharashtrian salad)

Ingredients

1. Tomatoes – 2 nos. finely chopped
2. Onion – 1 big, finely chopped
3. Coriander leaves – finely chopped
4. Green chillies – 2 nos. – lengthwise split into halves
5. Peanuts – 1 tbsp
6. Asafoetida
7. Mustard seeds
8. Sugar – 1 tsp (optional)
9. Salt

Broil (dry roast) the peanuts on a tava or in a kadai without using oil. Keep stirring frequently. When the peanuts get pink-brown spots on them, switch off the flame. Spread out the peanuts on a plate and let them cool. After they are cool, hull the peanuts(the papery outer covering) and grind them coarsely. Now this peanut powder is a common ingredient in Maharastrian cooking, so in typical households this powder is prepared and stored for a week or so. Then, just mix the finely chopped tomatoes, onions, peanut powder, salt. Add sugar if you like a hint of sweetness. For the tempering or tadka, take 1tsp oil in a small kadai, when the oil heats, add mustard seeds, asafoetida, curry leaves and green chillies. Switch off the flame and pour the tadka on the koshimbir. Mix well and garnish with coriander.

Besan pudas or teekha pudla as we call it in Gujarati, is a quick and simple snack. We sometimes also make it for breakfast or in the evening when we are going for a light dinner. On days when you come home from a trip and the vegetable basket is empty or when you are too tired to cook anything elaborate, pudas are a convenient option.

Besan ke pude/pudla/dosa
Ingredients

1. Besan – 1 big cup
2. Rava – 2 teaspoons
3. Kasoori methi – 1 tbsp (optional)
4. Garlic – 3 cloves, crushed
5. Red chilly powder
6. Dhania powder
7. Salt
8. Asafoetida

Method of preparation:

Add rava and other ingredients to besan and make medium-thick batter (slightly watery than dosa). Kasoori methi is optional, the pudas taste good even without the methi. Keep aside for an hour. I am an impatient cook and I tried to skip that wait for 1 hour, but the pudas then dont turn out soft and porous. That 1 hour wait makes all the difference. Then pour the batter using a ladle and roll out thin pudas (like dosas) on a nonstick tava and add a few drops of oil if required. Pudas or pudlas can be served with tomato chutney/curd/pickle.