Goan Prawn Curry

Hello people of the earth! (Or, outside too. I can't be partial, you know?)

Goa is one of my favorite places in the whole wide world. And being in 12th, you can rarely go anywhere. It's house-school-tuition arrest basically. And it's less miserable than I just made it sound. So, what do you do when you're nostalgic about "those easy days"? (don't worry everyone talks like this, it isn't just me. I'm pretty normal.)

Answer: Eat.

(Tip: no matter what the question is, if you say "eat", I'll give you 10/10)

And nothing reminds me of Goa more than a big bowl of coconut-y prawn curry with plain steamed rice. Not a thing. And the funny part? I didn't even have a prawn curry when I was there! Well, maybe I'm not THAT normal. Maybe it's the idea of a steaming hot yellow seafood curry and plain rice that fits perfectly with the idea of sitting by the beach, chill in the air, drink in your hand, wondering about "those easy days". Paints a perfect picture.



INGREDIENTS AND METHOD

1. Marinating the prawns

What you'll need:

Method:

Marinate! Duh. And refrigerate for 30 min-1 hour.

2. Making the Curry Paste

What you'll need

Method

Heat 1 tbsp. oil in a non-stick pan.

Add the onion, ginger and garlic and cook till the onion becomes translucent.

Add in the coconut and mix.

Take this mixture off the heat and let it cool slightly.

Add the onion-coconut mixture with the remaining ingredients to a mixer jar and process till a smooth paste is formed. Add water if required.

 End result.

3. Making the Prawn Curry

What you'll need:

 Method

Sauté the onion, ginger and garlic in oil for 1-2 min.

Add in the prawns and cook for 1 minute, stirring occasionally.

Add in the prepared curry paste.

 Add the coconut milk and let it cook, lid on, for 3-4 minutes, until the fellow crustacean is cooked to perfection. :)

 Serve with steamed white rice.

❤

Mushroom Ravioli

Hello people of the earth!

So first of all, sorry for being away for almost a month. No excuse this time...just...studies.
When I'm free, I do one of these three things: eat food, think about food or make food.
Kitchen time is a must for me. Normally, I would end up baking. But last time, I made this:

Mushroom Ravioli

I'm sorry about that little drop on the plate....I'm not that good with serving, not that patient with cleaning and not that smart with photography. Sorry.

 

What is a ravioli, you ask? Well, it a type of dumpling made of a filling sealed between two layers of thin pasta dough.

I love this recipe! It is so simple, and most of the ingredients are always available in our homes. Aaannddd it has mushrooms!!! (surprise, surprise!) If you have seen the blog before, you know how much I love mushrooms.  And best of all, you can prepare this inexpensive meal in under an hour, but it will taste like you worked all day! 

The key to the dish is making the perfect pasta. And it's not rocket science. Nothing about this recipe is(relief!).Kneading it ensures the formation of gluten from gliadin and gluetenin proteins (Yes, I did my reading). It creates an elastic, stretchy, perfect dough. Once you make your own pasta, you'll never go back to the store brought version again.

 The raviolis can be formed and stored in the freezer for weeks. So all you'll need to do is make the 15 minute sauce and you'll have for yourself a filling meal in a rush.

Let's get cooking now, shall we?

INGREDIENTS:

Serves 2

 

For the Pasta Dough:

1 cup Plain Flour

2 eggs

Pinch of Salt

 

For the Filling:

1 tbsp. Olive Oil

1 large Onion (finely diced)

100 grams  Mushrooms (diced)

2 cloves of garlic

Salt to taste

1 tsp. Pepper Powder

1/2 tsp. Nutmeg

1/4 cup Coriander (roughly chopped)

1/2 tsp. Lemon Juice

2 tbsp. grated Processed Cheese

1 tsp. Cream

 

For the Sauce:

1 tbsp. Olive Oil

1 large Onion (finely diced)

2 cloves of Garlic

Salt to taste

1 tsp. Pepper



1 1/2 cup Vegetable/ Chicken Stock

1/2 cup grated Processed Cheese

 

METHOD

Making the pasta dough:

1. Combine the flour, eggs and salt and mix with a fork/ spoon till a breadcrumb-like mixture is formed.
2. Transfer the mixture to a flat, workable surface, roll up those sleeves and get kneading nice and hard, for 10-15 minutes or until the dough is soft to touch and doesn't stick to your hands.
3. Once the dough is made, wrap in cling film and refrigerate for half an hour.

Making the filling:

1. Heat the oil in a thick bottomed pan.
2. Add the onions and sauté till translucent.
3. Add the garlic, mushrooms, salt and pepper and sauté till mushrooms are cooked.
4. Take the mushroom mixture off the heat and add the coriander, nutmeg, lemon juice, cheese and cream.
5. Let the mixture cool.

Making the sauce:

1. In the same pan, sauté the onions and garlic in the oil.
2. Add the mushrooms and cook till soft to touch, but not fully cooked.
3. Add in the stocks, cream and cheese and let the sauce reduce to half.
4. Season as required.

Forming and cooking the ravioli:

1. Put water to boil in a large, deep pan with 1 tbsp. oil and a generous helping of salt.
2. Transfer the dough to a well floured, flat surface and roll to about 2-3mm thin.
3. Cut circles out of the dough with a cookie cutter or an upside down glass.
4. Put about 2 tsp. stuffing in the middle half of the circles.
5. Fill a small bowl with water, dip your fingers in, and moisten the outer edge of the dough circle. This will help the two circles stick together.
6. Take another pasta round and press the ends of the two together.
7. Lightly press the ends with a fork so as to ensure the filling doesn't escape when boiling.
8. Put the formed raviolis on boiling water for 3-4 minutes, until they start to float.
9. Dry the raviolis with a paper towel and add to the sauce.

Serve. :)

 

 

Indian Style Tikka Burger

 Hello people of the earth!

Monsoons are finally here. And in this amazing weather, would you rather stay in the kitchen and cook tedious meals or sit by the window with a cup of tea with your favorite snack doing nothing?

The latter for me, sure.

And for such gloomy days, we all need easy to make, pick me up food. And what could be better than combining two classic comfort foods...the classic Indian paneer/chicken tikka and an American burger. And make it healthier.

Healthier, why? No mayo. No cheese. Just a simple yogurt sauce and mint chutney to compliment and cut the richness of the meat/paneer.

If you have the meat marinated, it takes only half an hour to make the burger. I highly recommend marinating (especially the chicken) a day before. The more time given to marinade to penetrate inside, the better.  I like to keep marinated chicken in the freezer. Makes life easier.

 

INGREDIENTS AND METHOD

1. Marinade

INGREDIENTS

• 200 grams boneless chicken
• 100 grams paneer(cottage cheese)

Make your own tandoori masala, here.

 METHOD

Add the curd, ginger garlic paste and lemon juice and mix thoroughly.

Add in the spices and mix.

Coat the paneer and chicken pieces and keep in the refrigerator overnight.

2. Yogurt Sauce

INGREDIENTS

• 3/4 cup chopped carrot.

METHOD

Mix everything together.

4.

Cook the paneer and chicken on a medium heat until cooked. Turn in between to ensure even cooking.

5. Assembling the Burger

Condiments:

• Toasted Buns
• Cooked chicken and paneer
• Finely chopped Cabbage/ Lettuce
• Sliced Tomatoes
• Thinly sliced Onions
• Prepared Yogurt Sauce
• Mint Chutney (Find recipe, here)



Place the cabbage and tomato slices on the toasted bun.

Following the veggies, add the chicken/paneer.

Top with the sauces.

Finally, add the thinly sliced onions.

Top with the bun.

❤

Sunset Ombre Cake (Photo Guide)

Hello people of the earth!

"A party without a cake is just a meeting."- Julia Child

There couldn't possibly be a better way to describe the importance of a cake. So when someone asks you to bake one, you just don't say no.

I made this cake for a teacher of mine on Teacher's day. It was a 2 kg (8.8 lb) cake, we were 15 people and the cake was over in about an hour. Says a lot doesn't it?

The cake is a chocolate cake (Yes, again. There's never enough chocolate) with a chocolate whipped cream filling. For those of you who are new to the world of cake decorating, this is the cake for you. So easy to make. Plus, it makes you look like a total pro.

This particular decorating style is called 'Ombre'. The dictionary defines ombre as " gradual blending of one color hue to another, usually moving tints and shades from light to dark". Basically, it's like shading. The ombre trend is everywhere...hair, nails, clothes and what not. So why not make a cake with it huh?

Ombre is one of my favorite cake decorating styles. And there are reasons:

1. Its pretty simple.

2. Errors can be covered very easily.

2. No fancy tools required....just a spatula.

3. It looks sooooo pretty.

NOW TO THE ACTUAL CAKE

The chocolate cake recipe I used is the same I wrote about in my first post. I didn't lie when I said it was a recipe to swear by.

Things you'll need:

Edibles:

1. Chocolate cake, chilled.
2. 500ml  Vanilla flavored Whipped Cream
3. 125 grams Chocolate, chopped
4. Chocolate Chips
5. Yellow and Orange Food Color
6. Edible Hearts

Tools and misc.

1. Turn table (Optional)
2. Spatula
3. Icing Bags
4. Triangle cake decorating tool

That wasn't such a long list, was it?

 The steps are as follows:

The Filling: Chocolate Whipped Cream

Melt the chocolate and add to 200 ml of whipped cream.

Filling The Cake

Add 1-1 1/2 cups of the cream and spread with a spatula, going for inside to outside.

Add desired amount of chocolate chips and add another layer of the cake.

Result.

Base Coats

Can't let any of that chocolate cream go to waste, can we? Cover the cake with a thin coat of the cream. Can be totally skipped.

Give the cake a vanilla whipped cream covering just to seal the cake crumbs and the dark colors in place.

Mix in the food colors, a little at a time.

Fill the icing in piping bags.

Icing

Starting from the bottom, pipe layers of the icing all the way around the cake till you cover a good amount of the cake with a color.

I piped three layers.

The layers don't need to be piped very precisely . It's fine if you have more icing on some places and less on others as we are going to come back to it anyways.

Switch to a lighter color and pipe in a similar manner.

Cover the top of the cake.

As I said, you don't need to be precise.

Smooth the icing out using a spatula DIPPED IN HOT WATER.  This gives a smooth finish.

Keep on turning the cake as you smoothen it out to merge the different colors into one another.

Smoothen the top out by holding the spatula at a place and turning the turntable in a clockwise direction.

Keep the triangle tool steady and rotate the turn table.

Hold the spatula at a place, making 45 degrees with the top and rotate the turntable, moving the spatula inwards.

Scatter the hearts over the top.

❤