This is my first blog and i am gonnaa write on the topic thats very close to my heart - its Cooking!!! Cooking was never a pleasure untill i stumbled upon the tiffin box of one of my class mates in my post graduation days, which contained Rava idli, decorated with cashew nut pieces alongside grated carrot beautifully strewn on the light yellow colored idli!! Until then i had not even tatsed(NEVER!) Rava idli the delicacy thats a trademark dish in Karnataka, since i stepped onto this piece of land from the neighbouring state 14 years ago :-)
Now, i simply love cooking any dish, especially the ones that involves a lot of colorful vegetables, cereals, pulses and carbohydrates for the main course and some spicy snacks which are more the invited by my family members especially during the winter evenings.......
Today, i prepared "Menthya bhath" a.k.a "Methi Rice" in my own style. The following recipe is "my own version" of Menthya bhath. You can customize it to be spicy according to your tolerance limit, by adding in some more red chillies.
Requirements:
1. Methi/fenugreek leaves - a bunch or 20-30 strands(from which only the leaves are picked)
2.Spanish onion -1
3. Garlic -3 cloves
4.Grated coconut - a couple of tea spoons
5.Ground nut - on an average 10 nuts
6. Methi/fenugreek powder or Menthya bhath powder (Try using ORKAY puliyogare mix as i did today!)
7. Lemon juice - around half a lemon extract
8. Turmeric
9. Salt to taste
10.Rice - 2 cups
For seasoning:
1. mustard seeds
2.cumin seeds(jeera)
3. black gram (urad dal)
4.curry leaves
5. red chillies
methodology:
Boil the rice. Using microwave for this purpose would keep the rice seperated as each morsel and not mashed. 1:2 is the ratio of rice:water in microwave. Spread the rice in a wide mouthed dish and cool it.
Chop the fenugreek leaves, spanish onion and garlic finely. Season the mustard, cumin seeds and black gram in 6-7 spoons of peanut oil, add ground nuts and curry leaves to it. Let it sizzle( i love to hear this noise, when cooking ;) ). Drop in the chillies and fry them until they are crisp. Now put in the chopped 3 items and fry until it turns slightly brown. then add a pinch of turmeric , salt and 2 spoons of ORKAY puliyogare mix as i did today or rather the usual methi powder. I used the ORKAY mix because i could smell a lot of fenugreek in it rather than tamarind flavour emanating from it. And believe me it never let me down in terms of taste. Don't fry it too much , otherwise you would end up charring the dish. Add the final touch - lemon juice and grated coconut. Time now to add the rice and mix well. Adding 2 spoons of ghee would prove to be worthy. Take it out of the fire and serve hot with Raita or plain yoghurt.
I am writing this after hogging the dish in my breakfast, and now was wondering how could i miss taking a snap of "my version"... blah blah blah....
Perhaps, the next time i would not repeat the mistake of a snapless recipe.
C ya soon with another recipe, ofcourse with its snapshot.
Until then,
TC,
N:astro
