Homemade Chicken Sandwich Spread

Goodbye to boring cheese spreads and jams!

Today I found out another good thing about experimental cooking; it really puts your brain to work, unlike the route dishes that come to you automatically. You have to check what is available, conceive an idea, execute it with improvisation and yeah, be totally contented at the result! And the best part, you get to name your project, you yourself evaluate it, approve it and then push it forward for more appreciation. Isn't that just wonderful!

Well, something like that created this chicken sandwich spread. I had a few pieces of chicken lying in the freezer (do not ask me for how many days it has been lying there, he alone knows) and was determined to use it up today before my dear hubby comes up with another grilled chicken plan. Apart from that, I had to cook something for dinner too and I had promised him a grilled sandwich and hence went ahead with this chicken spread plan. 

It is easy, you know what goes into it and that way perfectly safe and healthy way to munch your sandwich. You can leave it a bit watery and use it as a dip too! 

Ingredients

Boneless chicken - 3 medium pieces, cooked and shredded

Onions - 1 medium, chopped

Garlic - 10 cloves, chopped

Dried red chilies - 3-5, chopped

Cabbage - 5 tablespoon, shredded

Pepper - 2 tablespoon, ground

Coriander leaf - 3 springs

Fresh cream - 4 tablespoon (you can even use cheese spread or mayonnaise instead of this)

Milk - 4 tablespoon

Olive oil - 2 tablespoon

Preparation

1. In a mortar or blender, mix together onions, garlic and dried chilies into a coarse paste.

2. In a blender add the shredded chicken pieces, coriander leaves, fresh cream and milk and mix well. Fine chunks of chicken pieces can remain as that adds on to the beauty.

3. Heat up oil in a pan, add the ground onion, garlic and chilly mix and saute until oil separates.

4. Add pepper, the chicken mix and cook for a couple of minutes, stirring occasionally. Switch off stove.

5. Serve on bread or as a dip and enjoy!

 

Breadcrumb Crusted Grilled Veggies

Tasty yet nutritious wholesome meal for lunch or dinner!

The worst phase of unhealthy eating is when you had guests over and you end up with a good portion of leftovers. In my case, the leftovers are always in the form of soft drinks and store bought chips. Well, why I am mentioning this is because I am munching crispy kukure when writing this blog! I tried not to but I had to :-)

Since morning I have been walking around with this bag of Kurkure, I had it by my side when working, when having my lunch and now when writing this blog! I have had my share of junk for today and hence thought of eating something healthy for dinner. 

I have always imagined, what if the world suddenly turns vegetarian? All those delicious seafood (I really do not care about meat) recipes I have treasured would go waste! As a kid I never fancied vegetables, but as and when I grew up, I started liking them but not to the extend to opt out seafood. So to ensure that we get our dose of vegetables, I experiment and this dish is the outcome of such a trail and error method.

Ingredients

Cauliflower - 1 small (or 1/2 of a medium), cleaned and cut

Green beans - 1 bunch, cut in 1 inch pieces

Shrimps - 8-10, deveined and cooked (optional)

Onion - 1 small, chopped

Garlic - 6 cloves, chopped

Red chilies - 3, dried and chopped

Turmeric powder - 1 pinch

Garam masala - 2 tablespoon

Salt to taste

Olive oil - 2 tablespoon

Breadcrumb - 1/2 cup

Preparation

1. Crush together onions, garlic and chilies with no water. Keep it aside.

Cooking

2. Heat oil in a pan and roast the vegetables along with turmeric powder, salt and garam masala, until they are partially cooked. Take care to ensure the vegetables are still crunchy.

3. Mix in the cooked shrimps and saute for a couple of minutes.
3. Marinate the mix with crushed onion, garlic and chilly mix for about 15 min

3. Transfer the veggies and shrimp mix into a baking tray, top it with breadcrumbs and in medium grill, cook for about 14-15 min or until breadcrumbs is browned.

Serving

4. Serve hot as it is or as a side dish.

Vellayappam (Or Aappam)

Super soft and fluffy rice pancakes for breakfast!

So last Saturday was one of the most eventful days, I mean in the recent past. We had invited a few guests over (from Pradeep's work place); I had an elaborate all vegetarian menu ready and went on preparing one by one. I like experimenting and I love to do it for my guests; although not always. Saturday is mostly half day for my husband and I was expecting him to be back home around 2, and he had to buy a few ingredients too. I started with making mushroom filling for wontons, vegetable stew (to pair with appam), mix for kothu paratha, parboiled the potato wedges and cauliflower.  Everything was going well and good until around 12, I received a call from Pradeep saying he would be late, like around 4.30. I panicked, like I always do, because I hate to keep cooking or spend my break thinking that I am not done yet. Well, I didn't lose my cool. I went ahead and experimented with a small batch of dessert, and cooked the rice. At around 5.30, I received another call saying the families who were supposed to come may not be able to because there was one issue at work. I had no comments. At 6, I received another call saying that the guests can still manage to come just that they would be a bit late. I was happy because I didn't want the food to go waste. I took bath thinking that might help cooling me down and it did. Two of my friends dropped by and I gave them wontons to taste; things were back to normal. Now, at around 7, I receive another call from Pradeep saying that the guests will not be able to make it because the men have to stay on-board late. I know it was not our guests fault, neither my hubby's but the thought that my one day effort went waste, did pinch me worse than I imagined! Finally, we called our friends home, we had fun and they were kind enough to stay till 1 AM, cut my birthday cake and click a few snaps. That did mean a lot to me, in fact as they say, all is well that ends well :) So, the next few posts will be from the vegetarian menu that I prepared for my guests, and to start with, it is vellayappam or appam, which is one of the traditional Kerala breakfast dishes. 

So appams and idiyappams (string hoopers) are always in my menu when I call some non-keralites home. Most of them appreciate kerala food and so I keep one in my menu for them. Appams look good and feel tasty only if the batter is well fermented. I have had my own share of failed attempts before I could get this right.  These days we get the readymade powders which makes it quite an easy deal, but again, I have tried that too and nothing can beat the homemade batter. The feeling after seeing the nice little holes when you pour the fermented batter on to the tawa is just beyond words to describe!   Once the batter is made, the dish is pretty simple to make.

Ingredients

Rice - 2 cups

Urad dal (uzhunnu) - 1 tablespoon

Cooked rice - 3/4 cup

Coconut - 1 small, grated

Sugar - 5 to 6 tablespoons

Salt to taste

Yeast - 1 teaspoon

Coconut milk - 50 ml, thick

Preparation

1. Soak rice and urad dal for at least 4 hrs. Grind it along with cooked rice and grated coconut, with enough water to make moderately thick batter. Pour the batter into a big vessel, which has enough space for it to rise when fermented.

2. In about 25 ml lukewarm water, dissolve sugar and yeast. Leave it aside for 10-15 min. Add it to the batter. Cover the vessel and leave it to ferment overnight.

3. The batter will be well fermented by next day morning. About 2 hours before you make the appams, add salt and coconut milk and stir well to combine. 

Cooking

3. Heat the appam chatti (the one that is concave), pour a big spoonful of batter, swirl it around to spread, close with the lid and cook for about 2-3 min. Open the lid and remove the cooked appam to a casserole box. Repeat the process with the rest of the batter. It will make some 30-40 appams.

If you do not have appam chatti, you can make it in normal dosa pan, as you would make pancakes.

Serving

4. Serve with hot stew or sweet milk or coconut milk

I have some left still, which I will be having for today's dinner. Then I will click the picture and post it here.

Healthy Masala Oatmeal Upma

A great way to spice up your otherwise bland upma!

Having to get up in the morning to find your way into the kitchen and make your own cup of tea/coffee is such a boring way to start your day! To add on to that what if you have to get the breakfast ready before 7.30 AM. I so dislike this and for the same reason, mostly Pradeep leaves for office with just tea or tea with toast or a couple of fruits, although he prefers to start off the day with a healthy meal. Although I have, many times, displayed my unwillingness directly and indirectly to do that, some days you feel so lovey-dovey and wouldn't mind spending 30 min in the kitchen making a nice breakfast for him. So this recipe is the outcome of such a morning breakfast!

I had plans to cook suji upma, and started with spluttering the mustards. When I opened the kitchen cupboard to take suji, I saw some oatmeal in one of the containers, barely about 3/4th cup. There was a quick change of plan and thus I made oatmeal upma.

Ingredients

Quick cooking oatmeal - 3/4 cup

Onion - I medium, finely chopped

Carrots - 1/2 medium finely chopped

Olive oil - 2 tablespoon

Mustard seeds - a pinch

Urad dal - a pinch

Curry leaf - 1 spring

Turmeric powder - 1 pinch

Pepper - 1/2 teaspoon, freshly ground

Garam masala - 11/2 teaspoon

Lime - 1 juiced

Salt to taste

Sugar - 1 teaspoon

Water - enough to sprinkle to help cooking the oats

Coriander - to garnish

Preparation

Heal oil in a pan, splutter mustard seeds and add urad dal. Add the curry leaves, onions and carrots and cook for a couple of minutes, until onions are golden brown and carrots are almost cooked.

Add turmeric, pepper powder, garam masala and salt and fry until oil separates.

Add oatmeal and mix well to combine. Sprinkle water enough to wet the oatmeal (so that the upma is not too dry) and keep stirring for a couple of minutes. 

Add sugar and stir well. Switch off and squeeze the lime over the upma and mix well.

Garnish with coriander leaves and serve warm.

Oriental Green Beans Stir Fry

Very simple, but tasty, crispy and spicy accompaniment to rice!

In Singapore, food courts are a way of life. Most of the families there eat out and they find that to be a much cheaper option, well, may be, and food courts are where they frequent! You may be amazed to hear that some house owners are hesitant to rent their houses to Indian families there, because we cook and spoil the kitchen! (thankfully we never faced that issue) You will find a food court every other street, in malls and everywhere you can imagine. Some are classy, some are decent, but the best part is that whichever you choose, you will find one stall serving your favorite food. And believe me, all the shops make pretty decent food and some are just "out of the world". 

Of all the dishes I have tried, stir fried beans used to be  my favorite. I could eat it as it is or with plain steamed rice. They used to serve it sweet and spicy, and the beans used to look totally dark green (the fresh types) and crunchy enough. I have had many vain attempts to replicate the taste and the crunchiness in my home kitchen. 

Wondering why I am sharing the recipe then - because I feel this time I nailed it! (well, not 100% though) So here is my humble tribute to my then favorite dish. I believe you should be able to make it with any variety of beans.

Ingredients

Green beans - 1 bunch, (about 15-20), cut in to 2 inch size

Onion - 1 small, chopped

Garlic cloves - 5, chopped

Dried red chilies - 3 large

Olive oil - 1 tablespoon

Salt - to tate

Sugar - 1 teaspoon

Vinegar - 2 tablespoon

Preparation

Crush together onion, garlic and chilies in a blender without water.

Heat oil in a pan and stir fry the crushed mix for a couple of minutes.

Add the cut beans, stir well to combine. Add salt to taste. Do not cook for more than a couple of minutes as you want the bean to be cooked but retain its crunchiness. 

Sprinkle the sugar, and add vinegar. Stir well to mix and switch off the stove.

This is a wonderful side dish to go with rice or you can eat it as it is.

Vanilla Chocolate Chip Muffins

Gorgeous spotted beauties that were also rightly moist and extra spongy!

Ever since I started baking, I have always wanted to gift someone something home baked. Well, that dream came true yesterday and first ever attempt to bake something to gift someone actually turned out awesome! Whether or not my friends enjoyed it (I hope they must have), I am totally proud of these muffins :-)

Initially I had plans to bake brownies but then somehow bumped into this recipe and just gave it a try. You have to touch it and bite into it to see how spongy it can be :-) So, give a try and be amazed! I wouldn't say this is quick, but pretty easy; everything from preparing the batter, lazing around, baking and then clicking snaps would have taken me 1.25 hours.

Ingredients

Salted butter - 100 gm, softened

Sugar - 12 tablespoon

Egg whites - 4 large, lightly beaten

Yogurt - 10 tablespoon

Vanilla essence - 1/2 tablespoon

All purpose flour - 2 Cups (28 tablespoon)

Baking powder - 1 tablespoon

Baking soda - 1/2 tablespoon

Semi-sweet chocolate chips - 8 tablespoons and more for topping

Preparation

1. Line the muffin pan with paper cups.

Cooking

2. In a large bowl, using and electric mixer, mix together butter and sugar well, until pale.

3. Add the egg whites and beat in medium speed until it turns creamy with firm soft peaks.

4. Add vanilla essence and yogurt and beat in low speed for a couple of minutes until well combined.

5. Sift together flour, baking powder and baking soda and fold in gently to combine.

6. Add the chocolate chips and fold in to get a thick batter.

7. Pre-heat oven at 180 degree Celsius. Spoon in the batter in the muffin cups leaving space for the batter to rise. Sprinkle with chocolate chips.

8. Bake for 25-30 min or until a toothpick inserted comes out clean.

Serving

9. Serve as breakfast muffins or just as I did, pack it up as a gift!

Herbed Fusilli Pasta With Citrus Dressing

Very light yet filling dinner for two!

Happy new year everyone! May be this dish has a special place in this food blog; for being the last dish I cooked in the year 2012 and the first I posted in the year 2013. 

So this time December 31st passed by with no noisy deal; no new year ball or partying, but just us both with good movie, food and drinks. To say the least, it was kind of fun! 

Well I love pasta (fusilli being my favorite) and probably anything Italian. I prefer it with cream sauce and I can adjust those with dressings, but I cannot handle the ones served with tomato based sauce (I feel it spoils the fun). So, it has been a while since I cooked pasta at home and I thought yesterday was the right time. 

Initially I wanted to cook shepherd's pie, however as the "raw materials" reached late, I went ahead with my own pasta recipe, because this is quick, light and healthy! 

Ingredients

Wholewheat pasta - 2 1/2 Cups (I used fusilli, you may use any other type)

Chicken mince - 1 Cup (as I said the raw materials for the pie reached late but well in time to make paste)

Onion - 1 medium, coarsely chopped

Garlic - 1 medium bulb, coarsely chopped

Dried chilies - 3

Olive oil - 25 ml plus 50 ml for dressing

Lime - 1 large, juiced (or vinegar)

Salt - to taste (when cooking pasta)

Italian herb mix - 2 tablespoon

Preparation

1. Cook the pasta with double the water, 2 teaspoon salt and 1 tablespoon of oil. Drain and keep aside.

2. Heat up a sauce pan with some oil and cook the chicken mince, with some salt and turmeric. I even added garam masala to give it some flavor.

3. In a blender, coarsely crush together the onions, garlic and chilies. Keep aside.

Cooking

3. Heat oil in a sauce pan and add the crushed onions, garlic and chilies mix. Fry for a couple of minutes. 

4. Add cooked pasta and mix well to combine. Pour in the lime juice. Stir again.

5. Add the cooked chicken mince, mix to combine. Pour in the olive oil reserved for dressing. Toss to combine.

6. Top with Italian herb mix.

Serving

7. Pair it up with some red wine.