Bhakshanam

I just took a break from Man Vs. Food which I was watching in Discovery – Travel and Living channel.  It’s amazing to know that how a human being started his life with  primitive culture would just feed himself merely by making the food eatable.  Ages passed and now Man, eats and eats day by day but with so much of improvement in the taste and texture of food forms. Culinary experiments are so vast and valid; anybody can just come up with their own taste and make it popular in the world.

In India, the taste is so diversified. Every Indian should make a point to taste at least couple of food preparations from their neighboring states.  In fact, the inter state love marriages that happens in India are the ones which holds the country together.  Since the country is so much branched out in terms of tastes and culture, the people from different states after they tie nuptial knot with the other state,  are initially compelled to like the taste of their counter parts.  But gradually they get used to different food which becomes part of their life.  As myself being blessed with such a role, I am equipped with various recipes from both the states, which makes me easier to keep up the variety in everyday cooking, and have many options to cook.  Fortunately my DH is also OKAY with kannada food. Forgive me, I am not promoting love marriages here . I am making a small effort to focus on advantages and think out of the box for those who are against it.

Once in a while,  I get acquainted with a very weird although traditional or habitual style of taste, which I have never come across in my life .   One of such, my husband rarely, but adorably spoke about was kappi which is made in their ammumma’s hosue.  It was not just a synonym to coffee, but there is more to it.  It was kappi made of coffee powder, water and jaggery and relished by sprinkling freshly grated coconut topping and small dollop of ghee.  No milk used. And that’s the recipe of it.  Of course, kappi comes with loads of stories by ammumma, sitting and listening to it on  one of the rainy monsoon evening.

I had no clue until I discovered that Mace and nutmeg are two faces of a same coin. Not real variation in terms of aroma of both the spices though.

The spice trees are grown abundant in Kannur, although all spices are not predominantly used in their cuisines unlike north Indian dishes. Still people use some of the important spices in required quantities.

My father in law has special likings for the spices and medicinal plants as he often needs it for home remedies for which he is very popular in and around his place.  When we bought a plot to make a house in kannur , the plot had Nutmeg tree and which still stays there.  My FIL takes special care of it.  He says if it is not used for anything else at least it can give fresh medicinal air to breath. Similarly there is huge tree of cinnamon in our grandma’s house.

The basic appearance of the spice is very artistic.  The fruit resembles guava and spice lies inside when the fruit is cut into half.  As seen the seed part is the nutmeg and the red covering is the mace, which dried and made into spice. The complete one hand reliable information source on Nutmeg is available in Wikipedia or click here

There plenty of recipes and uses of nutmeg and mace available all over the Internet. I have never tried unless using the spice in little quantities in some of my recipes.  I also remember using it for my little baby from day three since he is born for almost 8 months.   My mother certainly not sure of the purpose of usage among babies but has been doing it since decades by her fore mothers.  The only reason she could reason out was it’s used in infants to avoid cold and cough and induce resistance for the same.

Oily kitchen and lots of fun is what I remember of my childhood Ugadi days. My father would insist on preparing only obbattu for all the Ugadi fest and he would never compromise on any other replacement for that. Of course once in a way our house used to be filled with guests and their choice of food. But obbattu was always there. It was never prepared again until next Ugadi. It always has a special place in the festive  menu. It was much more easier to make obbattu during family gathering as it would require a good working force.  Frying 40 odd obbattus at one time was quite tiresome for the older lots.  But younger hearts would just bother to eat and not a soul would go for help.  All the older members would gain energy from nowhere to make this sweet as delicious as it looks.  Probably the energy would come from one pinch of bevu – bella they would have in the morning to greet the New year.

The new year is celebrated in three states on the same day.  Andhrapradesh, karnataka and Maharashtra.  They make this obbattu also in almost similar way.

Obbattu comes with two parts, one is kanaka, made of maida is the outer layer.  Other is Hoorna, which made of lentils and jaggery, is the stuffing part.

Keep ready,

Plantain Leaf - 2 squarely cut without the middle partition.

To make Kanaka,

Maida – ½ Kg, Sieved

Chirotti Rava - 2Tbsp ( smaller than medium Rava)

Oil – 1 cup

Turmeric – ¼ tsp

Salt – 1Tsp

Water

To make Hoorna,

Toor dal(Yellow Lentils) - ½ Kg

Jaggery – ½ Kg, Broken into pieces

Fresh Coconut – 1 full, grated

Small Cardamom – 6, deseeded and powdered

To start with,

Mix Maida and Rava with water, along with Salt and turmeric until the consistency is softer than the chapathi dough. Hands gets sticky.  Add up oil little by little, and keep Kneading till the oil just blends with the dough. The more you knead the softer the obbattu. Try pulling little amount of dough, so that  it should not break and it should come out like elastic thread. Now the dough is soaked in generous amount of oil and kept aside.

Add Toor dal to the boiling water. Allow it to cook till it is just done. But the lentil should not be broken and completely mashed. It should be left slightly dry. Filter the lentils and keep aside the filtered dal water.

Boil little water and add up the the jaggery. Once it is melted filter the dust off. Combine Coconut and cooked Lentils, mix it with molten jaggery on a sim fire. Keep on stirring and frying lightly till the content becomes like Halwa, so that its mixed and blended well. Take out from the fire. When it is cold, make lime sized balls and keep aside.

Now take squarely cut plantain leaf, pat lime sized maida dough roughly your palm size with your fingers. It can not be done with rolling pin instead use the fingers and slowly spread towards side, so that it forms somewhat a round shape. Keep the Hoorna ball in the middle, wrap the same with Kanaka. Now the ball is stuffed inside kanaka. Pat the same, starting from the centre outwards. Make sure that you have applied generous oil on the plantain leaf as well as on your hand.

Place the plantain leaf on preheated Tava or griddle, so that the obbattu side is on the tava and slowly lift the plantain leaf with the help of a flat spatula. So that is done. Fry the Obbattu till it becomes golden brown on both sides.

You can reuse the the plantain leaf to make more Obbattus.

How to eat,

People love to eat Obbattu with hot Ghee and warm milk.

Palak  – Spinach

The information i had in my mind about Dhaba was completely different from what wikepedia could explain.  In Bangalore, when you are on  a casual one day trip to near by places you can find so called Dhabas on the way, although we never ventured into it.  So far i have just visited once when we from NIIT batch took a two day crash trip to Coorg.  I hardly remember the place, as it was night.  All remember was eating roti and Palak Paneer.

Myself is all open to taste different kinds of curries, but my family mostly comfortable with south indian stuffs.  So there is a wide range of punjabi food i have never got a chance to taste.

Coming to Palak recipe, I have a habit of rechecking known recipe from different resources when i cook something different from our regular routine food. The reason being i am not cooking that particular dish very often.  But the Palak dish, i managed to do it on my own without any help from any of regular references.  I never googled,  checked cookbooks or asked friends. And i am making this dish in my own way since so many years.  So its a dish i feel,  i have ‘invented’ and is close to my heart. BTW, it tastes good.  Everyone likes this in my family.

The Palak remains the same, Paneer can be replaced with potatoes, peas or cauliflower florets.

(4 servings)

Ingredients,

Spinach(Palak)  -  4 bunches (approximately 300 gms cleaned leaves)

Onions – 2 large, cut into bite size pieces

Tomatoes – 2 medium, blanched and pureed

Ginger – 1″ or 2″

Garlic – 1 small bulb( 15 small pods)

Chilli powder – 1/2 tsp

Green Chillies -4  long ones

OR

Chilli powder – 1Tsp

Green chillies -  2 long ones, slit

Everest Kitchen King masala – 1 tsp

Garam Masala powder  – 1 tsp

Oil – 2 tbsp

Garnishing,

Butter – 1 tbsp

Lemon – cut squarely

Onion – cut your way(rings or chopped)

Green chilli – 1 or 2 slit

Potatoes – 2 medium sized, cut into bite size

Salt

Keep – ready,

Boil enough water in a big vessel along with little salt.  When water starts boiling cut the flame and add cleaned and washed Palak into the boiled water and close with lid.  Keep aside for 10 minutes.  Meanwhile, grind onion, ginger and garlic into fine paste, keep aside.  Blanch the tomatoes to make thick puree.  Take out the Palak and immediately wash it with cold water to keep the green colour in it.

Start – cook,

Preferably use nonstick pan.  Heat the oil in the pan,  Add up Onion ginger garlic mixture.  Fry at medium flame till the mixture turns dry and lightly brown.  Add tomato puree to this.  Increse the flame and fry the ingredient till oil spearates.  Add Everest Kitchen King masla and chilli powder and little bit of turmeric.  Fry nicely.  Add  nicely ground spinach to it. Stir continuously so that Palak paste blends with the other ingredient.  Add 1/2 cup water.  Partially close the lid.  Keep the dish on sim for 10 minutes.  Add Garam masala powder and slit green chillies and mix well.

Shallow – fry,

Heat 2 tsp of ghee in a frying pan.  Add potatoes and keep sauteing till the potatoes are golder brown and cooked..  Add  potatoes into Palak gravy.

Garnishing,

Garnish with butter, green chilli and onions,

Take a bite with

Roti, naan, kucha, chapathis, poori or puttu.

Bringing home the new member of family who is so small, fragile and highly delicate is quite adventurous and confusing to the first time parents.  But six long months of fostering will boost a great deal of confidence in you as well as the child and one day you stand up in the corner gazing at the little one crawling and the whole scenario is changed.  After six months all babies are ready to feel and try the world.

With my little one all set to chew between his gums, his grandmother who is equally excited, decided start weaning with her best home food.  The one which her mother and and grand mother always trusted, which provided the best nutrition on which 6 month old can thrive on.  Millet cereal, which is one of the best home made food fed to babies after six months along with introduction of rice, vegetables, fruits and Milk.

In recent years, this heavenly food was replaced with easy making baby cereal that can be bought from store which became popular among urban moms and nuclear families, where making Millet cereal was a tedious process. Packed baby food also gave good number of options with regard to taste and texture.

Now that, mom and her advices are there for me at every step, while I am bringing up my second little one, its like a greatest treasure one can have. Of course, my first one happily grew up with tin foods and relishing wide range of cereal foods available in the market when she was six months old. I never tried any home made food as i was always under the misconception that only a grandmother can do this job.

To my surprise, the procedure of making baby food at home is not all that tedious.  Whether help is there or not in bringing up your little ones, always try variations in food and stick to something what they are comfortable whether it is homemade or out from the shop.  It is a biggest boon for a mother to be with her baby all the time and make best use of it.

Ingreidients (For 8-10 months olds)

Finger Millet powder -  2 tbsp

Water – 1/2 cup

Ghee  -  a dollop

sugar/jaggery – 1/2 tsp

Vegetable Puree- 2 Beans and 1/2 carrot -  boiled and pureed

Salt  – a pinch

Pepper  – a pinch

Method:

Make vegetable puree after boiling vegetable.  Heat water in a small aluminum vessel.  Add the puree to the boiling water. Add up ghee, salt, jaggery and pepper.  Bring it to boil. Mix Finger Millet powder with little water, pour it to boiling water simultaneously stirring.  Lower the flame. Keep stirring till porridge settles to required consistency.

Cool the porridge while stirring and keeping the vessel in cold water.  Feed the baby when it is warm. You can also keep it warm by keeping the serving bowl in warm water.