White Sauce

This recipe is copied from Tarla Dalal's 'The Joys of Vegetarian Cooking'. It makes 2 tea cups of white sauce.

2 tblspn butter

2 tblspn flour

2 teacups milk

Salt and pepper to taste.

Method

1. Melt the butter, add the flour and cook for 2 minutes without browning, stir throughout.
2. Remove from heat and gradually add the milk .mix well until blended.
3. Return to heat and cook slowly, stirring throughout until the sauce thickens. Add salt and pepper to taste. Mix well.

Mulangi Chutney or Radish Chutney

This summer we were at Dharwad, Karnataka, my hometown for my brother's wedding. It was like the old times, where each aunt made something different, some new some old recipes.

Savita Mami, a cook par excellence made "Mulagi Chutney". The best part was none of the kids knew they were eating 'mulangi' or radish. They just gulped down the chutney. I knew this was one recipe that needs mention and try.

As Mami cooks in the same way as my mom a little this and a little that, it is a little difficult to get the right measures. I have tried approximation please feel free to adjust the ingredients.

The yield is about 2 ½ cups with these measures.

Ingredients:

The green leaves of 2 radish (you can use the stalk if tender), roughly chopped

1 cup grated radish

1 small bunch of coriander (optional)

1 cup freshly grated coconut

2 tblspn oil

1 tsp mustard

2 tsp urid dal

1 tsp chana dal

½ tsp fenugreek /methi

1 tsp asafoetida

2-3 springs curry leaves

4-5 green chillies

1tblspn til/ sesame seeds

1 marble sized ball of tamarind

1 tsp sugar

Salt

Method:

1. Heat oil, add the mustard. When it splutters add urid dal and chana dal. Fry till they change colour a bit.
2. Add the green chillies, curry leaves, asafoetida, til. When these are fried a bit add the methi. (Take care that the methi does not turn black for your entire dish will become bitter).
3. Add the radish leaves and stir till the leaves are tender but not cooked.
4. Mix the rest of the ingredients and cool.
5. Grind in the mixer with a little water (if required) and serve with roti, dosa, idli.

Tip: you can use lemon instead of tamarind but make sure you finish it up fast as tamarind is a preservative.

Spring Rolls

Ever since Seema showed me a packet of spring roll wraps, I have been itching to try them out. Since I have not as yet joined office I went hunting for a packet of the wraps. Once I got the wraps it was a small matter to get the necessary vegetables.

I read 2 recipes, but in the end as usual did it my own way, as I read the first one long after my vegetables were chopped and the second because my daughter suggested baking them.

So out of the 16 pieces I made 4 got fried and 12 got baked.
Since I liked the taste of the baked once I am going to bake the rest of them when I get down to it next.

Here are the ingredients

15-20 French beans, chopped very fine
4 small or 2 big carrots, chopped very fine (you may grate them)
3 florets of cauliflower, chopped very fine
¼ of a small cabbage, chopped very fine or grated
1 spring onion greens and onions chopped fine keep them separate
1 onion chopped very fine
4-5 cloves garlic
1 tblspn ginger grated
1 tsp sugar
½ tblspn chilli powder
2 tblspn tomato sauce
1tsp soya sauce
1tsp chilli sauce
½ tsp pepper
Salt to taste
1 tblspn oil

For sealing the spring rolls:

1 tblspn corn flour
1tblspn water

Method:
1. Blanch the French beans, carrots, cauliflower separately and drain them.
2. Heat oil. Add the garlic, ginger, onion both, the onion from the spring onion and the regular onion, on high flame for 2 minutes.
3. Add the rest of the ingredients and stir fry for 2 minutes on high flame.
4. Remove from fire and cool.
5. Thaw the spring roll wraps as per the instructions on the packet.
6. Wrap the thawed wraps in a damp kitchen napkin (it is easier to handle) and separate the sheets gently. My sheets were square.
7. Place the wrap on a plate. Put the filling in the centre of the roll; bring one corner of the wrap a little under the diagonal edge. You get a triangle.
8. Fold the two side corners towards the centre there tips overlapping.
9. Drizzle the cornflower sealant on the remaining corner then roll and seal.
10. Glaze the surface of the roll with oil if you are baking it.
11. Preheat the oven to 250ºC. arrange the roll in a borosil tray on the low rack cook on convection 250ºC for 20 minutes


P.S. You can use egg white for sealing the roll.

Vegetable Fish Curry

I am writing after a gap of more than one month. The last month we have spent getting my brother married and wedding food you know……..

Yesterday I cooked after a long welcome holiday, we would have loved fish curry and rice, the Goan staple, but since my FIL is home with us and he doesn't eat fish we had the veggie alternative. The taste was wonderful, 'awesome' as my younger kid put it.

I am sorry there are no photographs as I kept postponing the clicking and the stuff was all over.

I am however recording the process for my future reference.

1 potato, peeled cubed into 8 pieces

3 big florets of cauliflower cut

6 pieces of pumpkin

To grind:

1 ½ cup coconut freshly grated.

3 chillies (Adjust as per taste)

1/8 tsp coriander seeds

½ tsp turmeric

Lemon sized ball of tamarind

Grind the ingredients to a fine paste using little water.

In a pan boil potatoes with a little salt.

When they par boiled add the washed and drained cauliflower.

As the cauliflower is parboiled add the pumpkin and the ground mixture.

Adjust salt to taste.

P.S. I used these vegetables as these were all I had but radish, carrots, green peas etc can be used. Veggies like radish, carrots will need longer to cook so they need to go in first.