Bhakshanam

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.

The older Finger Millet recipe helps young adults to fulfill the nutritional requirement especially urbanized adults who survive on all those food which does not have any nutritional value.  Finger Millet is a pack of carbohydrate and good amount of protein.  Its much more healthier than rice in terms of fat and protein.  Because it is worth to be used in our daily diet, the babies also can get benefited from these grains by making Millet Cereal.

You will need:

Millet – 250gms  (preferably reddish brown)

Procedure:

Step 1:  Soak Millet  in water for 24 hours.

Step 2 :  Drain the water, take out excess water with a cloth and tie the  millet in a cotton muslin cloth. Keep aside in a warm and closed place.  Allow it to sprout for a day.

Step 3 : Take out excess moisture by drying the sprouted seeds in shade and covering the millet with a thin muslin cloth for a day.

Step 4 :  Lightly fry the seeds in a dry wok just for about a minute or two.

Step 5:  Coarsely powder the seeds.

Step 6:  Sieve the powder through a dry muslin cloth so that it gives fine white powder without husk.

Step 7:  Store the fine powder in air tight container.

Step 8:  Use it when required.

Note:  If Millet does not sprout, still the same procedure can be used to make the powder.  Sprouting makes the food more nutritious.

This powder can be used to make porridges for the elder ones and batter it to make Dosas.