Raspberry Tart with Chocolate and walnuts

            After my strawberrymania it's time for raspberries. Unlike strawberries my hubby doesn't show much interest in raspberries. I have to pile it up for jam making if i fail to make any interesting desserts. Using up fresh raspberries in the form of tart is much simpler if the tart case is ready.

 Ingredients:
 Raspberries - a punnet
Milk Chocolate - Half a bar
Sponge Tart case - 1
Walnuts - 1 cup

 Pre-Requisites:
Wash and hull the rsapberries.Grind the walnuts into a fine powder

Preparation Method:

Melt the chocolate in a microwave safe bowl for 1 and a half minutes. Mix the powdered walnuts with the melted chocolate and make it into a smooth paste. Apply this paste to form a layer on the tart case. Alternatively you can use use coacoa powder and caster sugar.

If you like the crunchy bits of walnut , you can pulse it and break the nuts coarsely. Top it up with fresh raspberries to form the top layer.

The chocolate layer can also be topped up with raspberry puree followed by the fresh fruit layer.

As i'm a chocolate lover i've added only the chocolate and nuts.Refrigerate for 1 hour , slice and serve.

Paruppu Usli with French Beans

           We adore French beans as a family ! Yes, all of us love it and there's no limit to the number of recipes i tried with this beautiful vegetable. Ever since summer started i've been waiting for the flowers to turn into lovely beans so that i can make paruppu usli. Tender beans are the best for this recipe and nothing can beat the taste and tenderness of these home-grown beans.

I learnt this recipe from my family friend akka in Bangalore. Akka is an Iyengar and i can't ask any better person to learn this recipe. She is such a great cook. I still wonder how she makes a beautiful balance between her personal and professional life with all that cooking and working skills. Thank you very much akka for sharing this recipe!

I made it for the Aadi 18 festival and it was sitting in the draft long enough to be published..........

Ingredients:
French Beans  finely chopped - 2 cups
Gingelly oil - 1 tbsp
Mustard seeds - 1/2 tsp
Chopped Onions - 1 cup
Toor dhal - 1 cup
Dried red chillies - 1 or 2
Dried curry leaves - few leaves (Fresh Leaves adds better flavour)
Asafoetida - 1/2 tsp
Salt - 1/2 tsp

 Pre-Requisites:
Soak the urad dhal along with red chilli in  2 cups of water and drain it after an hour. Grind it fine with asafoetida and  quarter of tspsalt without adding water .

 Cooking Method:
       Success of this recipe involves 2 key stages. Stage 1 is to steam cook the ground paste. I use the idli cooker to steam cook alternatively a steamer can be used. Steam cook the ground mix just like idlis until the dhal is cooked. Cool down and crumble it with fingers.

 Stage 2  is to make the normal beans poriyal . Heat the tawa add 1 tbsp of gingelly oil , do the seasoning with mustard seeds. Saute the chopped onion with 1/2 a tsp of salt  and add curry leaf.I add salt stagewise for a better taste.  Finely chopped french beans should be added at this point. Stir well ,close the lid of the tawa and cook the beans by closing the lid. I know is should've done justice to this by clicking a better picture  but i was in such a hurry on a festival day making multiple dishes.

Introduce the dhal crumble to the cooked beans mix it evenly and cook for a minute to make the usli ready. With the soaking, grinding, steaming and cooking this is defintely a time-consuming recipe but it's worth all the effort as the taste is heavenly!

Kumro Phool Bhaja / Pumpkin Flower Fritters(Bengali Style)

                 Plenty of pumkin flowers are blooming at the moment in my backyard. There are two types of flowers in pumpkin male and the female flowers. The female flowers blooms with a tiny little  baby pumpkin at the base.If pollinated these turn into the big pumpkins we eat while male flowers just has the stalk.The flowering starts off with plenty of male flowers .Once it falls off from the stalk, we used to add it to our home compost but now these organic goodies goes into our tums with this Bengali recipe.The transition of plant to the plate is adorable.

Pre-Requisites:

    Gently wash the pumpkin flowers .Remove the calyx and the stalk by retaining just the petals.

  
Ingredients:
Crushed garlic  1 tsp
Gram Flour - 1 cup
Chilli powder - 1 tsp
Sunflower Oil - 1/2 cup
Pumkin Flowers - a dozen
Salt - 1/4 tsp

Cooking Method:

            Except the flower mix all the ingredients with the help of a spatula by adding required amount of water to bring it to a batter like consistency. Make sure there the batter is lump free and smooth.Heat 1/2 cup oil in a flat wide-bottomed non-stick pan .Dip the pumpkin flower in the batter by holding at the bottom and cook it in the oil for 3 minutes. Turn it over and cook for another couple of minutes.Make sure the flowers doesn't touch each other for better results.

 Serve it as a starter or a tea-time snack along with dips of your choice. We enjoyed this flowery one of 5-A-Day with yougurt and mint dip!

If you are a gardener , next time you know what to do with those pumkin flowers,don't you?

Vazhaipoo Murungaikeerai poriyal

Usually i use only vazhaipoo for the poriyal but there was a little murungai keerai from our garden and i thought of adding it to the poriyal to enhance the flavour.

Ingredients:

Vazhaipoo - 1

Murungakeerai - 1/4 a bunch

Red chillies - 2

Mustard seeds - 1 tsp

Urad dhal - 1/2 tsp

Onion(Chopped) - 1/2 cup

curry leaves - 1 strand

water - 1/2 cup

Olive oil - 1 tsp

Salt - 1/2 tsp

Cooking Method:

Do the seasoning with mustard seeds and urad dhal by heating 1 tsp of olive oil in a kadai. Fry the chopped onions until it turns golden brown add red chillies , water,chopped vazhaipoo and murungaikeerai and stir fry. Finally add salt as the vazhaippo cooks faster without salt.

Spring Onion Parata

Spring Onion Parata is a very healthy food packed with nutritional value.I used spring onions from my garden and my kitchen was filled with spring onion aroma for the whole day.

Ingredients:

Spring onions(finely chopped) - 1 cup

Wheat flour - 2 cups

Gram flour - 1/2 cup

Cummin seeds - 1/2 tsp

Chilli powder - 1 tsp

Turmeric powder - 1/2 tsp

Lukewarm water - 1 cup

Salt - 1/2 tsp

Dough Preparation :

Mix all the ingredients listed above and knead the dough well

Parata Preparation :

Roll the dough into small lemon sized balls and make the flat bread using a rolling pin.

Gongura Thokku

Gongura is very rich in iron and has a high fibre content. These fresh gonguras are from my garden.

 Ingredients:

Gongura - 2 bunches
Red chillies - 3
Mustard seeds - 1/4 tsp
Urad Dhal - 1/4 tsp
Shallots(Finely Chopped) - 1 cup
Salt - 1/2 tsp
Gingelly Oil - 1 tbsp

Cooking Method:

Heat oil in a pan and do the seasoning with mustard seeds,chillies and urad dhal. Add the shallots and fry it until golden brown, now add the remaining ingredients and keep stirring. Switch off the stove when it reaches gravy like consistency. Should not add water to this recipe as gongura has so much water content it. Gingelly oil is the best to try this recipe as other oils will change the original taste of it.

Blackberry Jam

Jam comes in handy when i feel lazy to cook. I always buy it from the stores and stock it.Never thought that i wud be able to do a homemade jam. Usually jam is made by adding lot of preservatives but i don't prefer to add any preservative. I had lot of blackberries from my garden. Literally had no idea of what to do with it and ended up making jam.

Ingredients :

Blackberries - 500 gms
Sugar - 1 kg
Lemon juice - 50 ml
Water - 50 ml

Jam making process:

Add water and blackberries into a heavy pan and boil it in medium heat for 10 mins. The fruits become softer, at this stage add the lemon juice and sugar and keep stirring until the fruit pulp turns into a jam like consistency. Make sure the jam is not watery. If you don't prefer to have the seeds, use a muslin cloth and filter the fruit pulp before adding sugar.