Soft Oatmeal Cookies

Soft Oatmeal Cookies

Do you have trouble getting oatmeal in your kid’s tummy?

Do they eat oatmeal when it’s disguised?

Then this is a recipe for you. These cookies disappeared in no time.

Of course I made quarter of the recipe below and ended up with the usual questions as to why I make tasty foods so little where there.

So you can “#FireUpYourOven"  with the full measures.

Soft Oatmeal Cookies

Recipe Source: Here 

Ingredients:

Soft Oatmeal Cookies

• 1 cup butter, softened
• 1 cup white sugar
• 1 cup packed brown sugar
• ½ cup curds
• 2 pinches baking soda
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 3 cups quick cooking oats
• ¼ cup raisins
• Cherries a few (Optional)

Method:

• In a bowl mix all the ingredients.
• Cover, and chill dough for at least one hour.
• Preheat the oven to 180°C/350° F.
• Grease moulds or cookie sheets.
• Roll the dough into walnut sized balls, and place 2 inches apart on cookie sheets.
• Flatten each cookie press in the cherry cut in two pieces.
• Bake for 8 to 10 minutes in preheated oven.
• Allow cookies to cool on baking sheet for 5 minutes before transferring to a wire rack to cool completely.

Come back tomorrow to see what cookies I have for you….

Day 7

Check out the Blogging Marathon page for the other Blogging Marathoners doing BM# 51

An InLinkz Link-up

Hi! First time here? Well then you are Most Welcome! I hope you keep coming back for more here. If you are my regular visitor then Thanks, for you encourage me to experiment more!! I would like you to please click on my link below and like my Facebook Page. I will be happy if you can follow me on on Twitter too!

 

Savoury Oats

Savoury Oats

Oats the daily breakfast for many is something that I have Indianized to suit our tastes.

This is the version that I make often and let me make it clear the girls do not eat it at all but we love it.

I had posted this version long ago now I have improvised on it for Blogging Marathon #45.

Ingredients:

• 1 cup oats
• 2 cups water
• 1 tsp ginger garlic paste
• ½ tsp sambhar masala
• ½ tsp black salt
• ¼ cup boiled corn or vegetables of your choice
• 1 green chilli, chopped fine
• Salt to taste
• Dhania/ coriander leaves  to garnish
• Spring onion greens,to garnish

Savoury Oats

Method:

• Mix the water, ginger garlic, masala, salts, and vegetables and bring to rolling boil.
• Add the oats and green chilli.
• Mix well and switch off.
• Serve hot garnished with coriander leaves.

Notes:

• I always use Quaker oats but last time I brought Suffola oats and they needed more water.

Hi! First time here? Well then you are Most Welcome! I hope you keep coming back for more here. If you are my regular visitor then Thanks, for you encourage me to experiment more!! I would like you to please click on my link below and like my Facebook Page. I will be happy if you can follow me on on Twitter too!

 

Savoury Corn Fitters from New Zealand

Savoury Corn Fitters

Now that school has reopened I have a problem what do I give in the kiddos tiffin box?

To add to my woes she does not have a breakfast, barely gulps down a small cup of milk. 

 She comes home for lunch but she wants something delicious in her tiffin box. Her idea of delicious and mine are mine are poles apart.

 The day I give something she does not want we end up having the tiffin uneaten but loaded with excuses like I had to go to the staff room as I am the CR etc.

About this time I was researching recipes for this trip around the world. I fell for the simplicity of these delicious corn fritters. It also what doctor ordered an egg…

Sorry those who do not eat eggs replace it with 1 tblspn of egg replacer or 1/3 cup of cream.

The original recipe has cheese and ham included but I did not add as I did not have time to grate the cheese and ham I do not do. Please feel free to use them if you like it.

Also the original recipe used flour or maida, APF I replaced it with oats. Another thing she refuses to eat.

The whole thing went down well with tomato sauce. Infact she ate one of the fitters before she left for school… Ahhhhhhh relief!!

Savoury Corn Fitters

Savoury Corn Fitters

Cuisine: Kiwi Cuisine

Recipe Source:Kiwi Faves 

Ingredients:

• ¼ cup red capsicum/pepper, chopped
• ¼ cup yellow capsicum, chopped
• 1 medium onion, chopped fine
• 1 ½ cup oats
• ¼ cup spring onion chopped
• Salt and pepper
• 1 eggs
• 1 can cream style sweet corn,1 tin
• ½ tsp baking powder
• rice bran oil for frying

Method:

• In a large bowl mix together the capsicum, spring onion, onion, salt and pepper mix well.
• Add the sweet corn, mix well.
• Add the oats and give it a nice good stir. Check the seasoning.
• Add the egg/ egg replacer, baking powder. Mix well.
• If you feel the batter is dry add a tblspn or two of water. The batter should be of dropping consistency.
• The original instructions said “Heat 2 tblspn of oil in a non- stick pan add a tableful of batter in the hot oil.”  I did that but then  preferred the method of adding the ladleful of batter  on the hot pan and then adding oil to the sides of the batter, much like how we add oil to a dosa but of course I need a little more oil than the dosa needs. And I did that from the second batch that I made on the same pan. Suit yourself.
• Fry till golden on both sides.
• Serve them with tomato sauce.

Notes: 

• I used the circular cookied dough cutter that i kept on the tava/ skillet and added the batter in it to get the perfect sized round shaped.

Savoury Corn Fitters

An InLinkz Link-up

Check out the Blogging Marathon page for the other Blogging Marathoners doing BM# 44

Hi! First time here? Well then you are Most Welcome! I hope you keep coming back for more here. If you are my regular visitor then Thanks, for you encourage me to experiment more!! I would like you to please click on my link below and like my Facebook Page. I will be happy if you can follow me on on Twitter too!

Cheese Stuffed Rajma Cutlets

When I buy some ingredients for my pantry I get carried away. I know that there are some things that we read family will not eat but still I buy it, hoping that at least this time they will eat.  

I end up losing each time, one such ingredient is rajma or kidney beans. Not only they refuse to eat it not even consider it as a healthy option. Why I do not know but they just don’t like it. So last time I stuck the soaked & boiled rajma in the freezer and was wondering what to do with them.

Oats Bisi Baali Huli Anna

Oats the wonder grain is a new addition to our diet. The most easily available (read I have not checked) form being the rolled oats that I try making on a regular basis. The girls refuse to do anything with it claiming all sorts of reasons from downright stinks to tastes yucky. We have heard them all.

So how do I get them in them? Well I sneak them in like today’s Sunday special being Bisi Baali Huli Anna. Their favourite!!

I generally do not make the masala that Amma used to make for making this rice so special.  I promise I will post the authentic recipe soon. In fact I am surprised that I have not posted the recipe as yet.   No wonder so many of you have commented that I have Goan style cooking featured in my space. Maybe because cooking Karnataka style food is comfort cooking.

Yorkshire Parkin(?)/Cake

Why the question mark after the Parkin you may ask?

 Well I did not know what Parkin is till this moment and what I have baked is definitely not parkin.  Parkins are North English form of ginger bread. I left out the most important ingredient ginger not because I don’t have it my people do not like ginger much. So it is more of a cake than a parkin.

The whole story began When Susan of a The Well-Seasoned Cook put up this beautiful picture of Yorkshire Parkin I flipped.

 I had to make it!

Egg-less Buttery Cookies~ A Sweet Punch

When Priya posted her egg less buttery almond cookies I could not resist them. I had such a craving for them that I baked them immediately.

 Me and follow recipes? Surprised are you not?

Well there are times when I do follow recipes, but you are correct I did not follow it to the T made a few changes to suit our tastes and my pantry contents. I baked them 3 times now.

Healthy Savoury Dosa~Bloghop Wednesday

There are 2 events around which my kitchen revolves these days they are ….
First is my Event – The Lets Get Stuffed ~Bell Peppers or Capsicum and second is The BlogHop Wednesday!

I expect all of you my dear friends to don your thinking hats and send me exiting entries for stuffing the Bell peppers or Capsicum. Here are some of mine.

And yes I am a part of this exciting experiment started by Radhika of Tickling Palates. We are paired with different partners every other Wednesday and this week I am paired with Kalyani also known as Mom Chef!
 
The title suits her to the T or should I say C? Amazing recipes & pictures!

I was totally at sea for I was just seeing each recipe seemed better than the earlier one! Finally I choose the simple Healthy Oats Dosa or The Savoury Oats Dosa!!

Here is Kalyani’s recipe …

Here is mine as usual I had to fiddle with the ingredients. My husband’s my best critic and friends words not mine so I was expecting a total failure in the system so I was quite amazed at the results!!

My daughter, the younger one loved it and polished off 3 small ones. Mind you I am not complaining she is most welcome it is a BIG COMPLIMENT! The “kurkur kombdi“ that is the loosely translated as the brooding hen or clucking hen eating without complaints!

Ingredients:
1 cup Oats, crushed
1 tblspn rice flour
½ cup Rava
1 tblspn barley flour (optional)
¼ cup besan/kadli hit/chana daal flour
Salt
Chopped green chilies (optional)
Chopped coriander
1 onion, finely chopped
½ cup butter milk
Oil
For tempering: Mustard seeds, jeera/ cumin seeds, and hing/asafetida

Method:
1. I soaked all the dry ingredients in the butter milk and since the batter was not the consistency needed for dosa hence I added water.
2. Let it stand for 15-20 minutes.
3. Make the tempering by heating the oil and spluttering the mustard, jeera/cumin seeds/jeerigi and hing/asafoetida. Pour in the batter. Mix well.
4. In the batter add the chopped onions, coriander, chillies and salt.
5. To make the Dosa: add a ladle full of the batter on the non-stick tava lightly greased.
6. Spread lightly. Cover and cook.
7. Flip on the other side cook and serve with chutney or as kiddo had with tomato ketchup.
After the first Dosa I did not use oil at all.

Thanks Kalyani for this wonderful inclusion in my daughter’s diet and Radhika for I have the opportunity to meet new friends and try different recipes!

Please do send me some entries for my event here.

Archana

Oats Chikki/Granola

Oats Chikki/granola

I had some muesli about which I had plans to convert to granola but postponing. As a result it started racing fast to it expiry date and now being on leave, I decided to do something to stem the rot.

The firs thing I did was heated it lightly in a kadhai to give it some crispness. Then I let it cool.

Meanwhile I got out my hoard of dry fruits after stealthy glance all around to see if anyone is watching me. Grab a few almonds; pistachios it does not matter how many will count later.

 At a leisurely pace I got out my cashew nuts, walnuts , raisins, groundnuts warmed them up too just to get rid of the raw  nutty ( I like the smell but I need to get rid of the moisture from them after storing them in the fridge).

In  Goa we get different kinds of cashew nuts right from the big ones whole, the ones split into two  or which is broken bits tukda kaju, to  the smallest bit Kani ,that can be directly used in Kheers no need to make smaller pieces . I generally buy this and use it for grinding into curries as they are cheapest and cost efficient.

Since I do not have good honey and was reluctant to use sugar I used chikki jaggery that is beckoning me everyday to do something different out of it.

These measure are by no means standard you can adjust as per taste, needs and budget.

To sum up I used:

Muesli  or rolled oats (about 500 grams)

 20 almonds,

15 pistachios

About cup full of Kaju kani

¼ cup raisins  

½ cup of groundnuts.

½ cup of roasted til/sesame seeds

I used 215 grms of this jaggery cut into small bits

½ cup of homemade ghee

Method:

1.       As I have already said warm everything right from the muesli to the nuts.

2.       When they cool down coarse grind.

3.       At this point of time I started wondering about the quantity of the ground mixture I had so I weighed it. It measured 750 grms I used   580 grams should have used only 500.

4.       In a thick kadhai add the ghee and jaggery.

5.       The jaggery will melt and start boiling. Test it to see if it has reached the hard ball stage. (A drop of jaggery in cold water should form a hard rock when pressed).

6.       Add the muesli 500 grams only or as much as much as needed to form 1 lump and mix and stir fast. Transfer to the kitchen platform and roll out to the ½ inch thick roti.  Cut when cool to desires size and shapes.

7.       Store in an airtight container.

I made the mistake of adding too much of muesli and so my granola/chikki  would not set.  So to rectify matters I transferred it to a tray and baked it at 230°C for 10minutes.

Spaghetti and Vegetable Balls

Spaghetti 

My daughters picked up a packet of spaghetti the other day from the local supermarket and have been pestering me to make spaghetti and meatballs, mock meat of course!

Where on earth, or should I say in Panaji, will I find mock meat?

So I Googled for recipes for Spaghetti and Meat balls unfortunately every recipe I landed on call for ground beef (guess I used wrong key words :-) ), any way they were just grinning through all my efforts finally asked me do we have to tell you? Just invent? 

For the sauce as I already had some lasagne sauce & hence ½ kg tomatoes was too much for me. I suppose ¼ kg would be enough. Also the spaghetti should be boiled in a bigger vessel.

Ingredients:

For the Veg. meat balls:

4 boiled potatoes

200 grms paneer

Salt

2 tsp chilli powder

½ tsp dried oregano powder

¾ cup rolled oats

1 cup bread crumbs

Oil for frying

For the sauce:

4 cloves garlic, minced

10-12 stalks of coriander (no leaves as I have run out of coriander), minced

2oilve oil

½ tsp oregano

1 onion, chopped fine

½ kg Tomato (As I had about 1½ cups of sauce I had made for lasagne lying in my freezer I dumped it too in the sauce)

2 tblspn tomato ketchup

1 tsp chilli sauce

½ tsp Soya sauce

Sugar (optional)

Method:

For the Veg. meat balls:

The veg balls being shallow fried

1.       Grate the boiled potatoes, paneer and mix all the ingredients to form soft dough.

2.       Make small marble sized balls and fry them, reddish. The choice is yours either deep fry them or shallow fry them like I did.

3.       Keep aside.

For the sauce:

Tomato sauce just before it staterd bubbling

1.       Make a cross on the tomato near its stalk. Heat enough water in a pan and dump the tomatoes for about ½ hour.

2.       The skin peels easily after this, puree the skinned tomato in the mixer. Keep aside.

3.       In a pan add the garlic and coriander stalks with the oil and brown the garlic.

4.       Add the oregano, stir and add the onions fry till soft and translucent. Add the pureed tomato at this point I added the lasagne sauce too.

5.       Bring to a boil adding the ketchup, Soya and chilli sauces, sugar salt.

6.       Adjust the amount of sauce and the seasoning.

7.       Just before serving thicken the sauce using corn flour in water.

For the Spaghetti

1.          In boiling water toss the spaghetti till it is cooked.

2.          Drain and cool using running water. 

3.         Toss a little oil over the spaghetti to prevent sticking.

To serve:

1.          Arrange the balls on in a deep dish and pour the thickened sauce. . (You have to cook the meat balls in the sauce in the actual recipe but since my meatless balls are already cooked and appear to be fragile I followed this way as we do for koftas).

2.        Ladle the spaghetti on the plate and the balls and sauce.

  

Eggless Oats Cookies

Egg-less oats cookies

This is a variation of this recipe where in I had promised myself that I will smuggle in a few oats and I did it. Not one person who tried them out, that includes my elder daughter's college mates.

Ingredients:

1 cup whole wheat flour

1 cup Bombay Rava, roasted

½  cup besan

1 cup oats, heat a little for ½ a minute in the microwave ground with 10 almonds

1 cup ghee

1 cup sugar

1tsp baking powder

3 tblsps curd   

 3 tsp cocoa powder

¼ tsp instant coffee

Method:

1.  Mix all the ingredients to form soft dough. This I did in the morning.

2.  Cover the bowl with the dough with a cling film and put in the fridge.

3.  In the evening pre heat the oven at 180°C.

 4. Line the microwave turn table with foil   make balls about the size of pedas ( I made 18 balls)

5. Decorate the cookie with cashew nut pieces. arrange on the turntable with the distance of about an inch

6. Bake them in the oven for 15 minutes or till golden brown.

I an sending this to Manjula's Kitchen or her Egg-less cookie contest.

  

Oats

Oats was always considered baby food or food when you are sick. So when Pappa brought a tin of oats I was quite upset, as I was sure no one would eat it as porridge, the only way I knew to cook oats. However Pappa told me was that I could add buttermilk. I was in no mood to experiment so I made porridge and some granola bars (the recipe of which I had modified) finished the tin.

The other day when I was shopping for my groceries hubby dear was with me and he brought a packet of oats and told me to make the granola bars again. Now coming from him this is very high praise I still have to make them. I will make it patience…………. patience.

On the packet there was the website address for more recipes. Curiosity, my middle name and I found the recipe for my no hassle breakfast. I have basically modified the recipe from this site

3 tblspn oats

1 cup water

¼ tsp salt

¾ soup bowl buttermilk/ or ½ cup curds

1 Green chilli (Adjust as per taste)

1/2 knuckle sized ginger (say ¼ Inch)

Green coriander

Asafoetida (optional)

Grated carrots, capsicum.

1. Boil the water with the salt.
2. Add the oats and cook. Cool.
3. In the meanwhile whip buttermilk or curds with the ginger and coriander in the blender to form a smooth paste. Mix with the oats.
4. Refrigerate.
5. Mix the carrots and capsicum and Serve.