Tilapia with Indian Style Fried Rice

In my house we all love fish. During the summer season I prefer to make wild caught salmon because that's the time when U get it fresh but other times I try to make different kinds. One popular one among my family is Machi Tawa fry. It's basically very simple recipe and can be used with any kind of fish. So I'm not writing the recipe here again as it's same as this one except in that recipe I made rainbow trout but here I have made tilapia. Cooking time is almost same for both the fish, they don't take more than 7-9 minutes on pan depending upon how thick the fillet is. Cut each fillet into two or keep it full. One more difference is I've stopped using my non-stick pan from long time & I use my cast iron pan(lodge) to tawa-fry(pan-fry) the fish.

I served the fish with Indian style fried rice. I had some left over rice so basically made some tarka with veggies to make fried rice. Here's the recipe for very flavorful rice :

What U need :

• 1 cup cooked rice (preferably left over, if cooking fresh let them cool completely before adding them to tarka)
• around 3/4 cup of  veggies like carrots, green/red bell pepper, shelled peas, corn
• one medium size onion thinly sliced
• 2-3 green chillies chopped
• salt
• 1/2 tsp. black pepper
• 1/2 tsp. red chilli powder
• 1 tsp. cumin powder
• 1 tsp. mustard seeds
• few curry leaves(curry patta)
• 3-4 pieces laung(cloves)
• 3 tablespoon liquid : water/ chicken stock/ veg. stock
• 3-4 tsp. cooking oil

What U do :

• If peas are hard par-boil them or microwave them for 2-3 minutes. Chop carrots & bell pepper into small cubes.
• Heat oil in karahi(wok), add sliced onions & cook them till translucent.
• Using a slotted spoon move them to a side of the karahi. Now add mustard seeds & Laung/clove & curry leaves. Once they start to splutter add all the veggies. Sprinkle some salt & saute the veggies for 2-3 minutes.
• Add rest of the spices & chopped green chillies. If tarka/veggie mixture looks dry add  2-3 spoons liquid(water/veg. stock/ chicken stock), once it's hot add rice to this & mix them nicely so each & every grain get the coating of spices & flavors. Turn the gas off & cover the rice & let them sit for 5 minutes or so.
• Serve them with yogurt/dahi or any kind of meat/fish U like.

Notes : 1) don't add too much of liquid otherwise rice will become mushy.
2) make sure rice have no lumps before adding it to the tarka, break the lumps using your hands. Once rice is added to the tarka be gentle, otherwise rice grain will break into pieces.

3) I'm not using lot of oil which means rice can stick to the pan so be careful. I use my Iron karahi(wok), it works as non-stick, so if U want U can use non-stick pan or may be increase little bit of oil to avoid sticking problem.

Here's one close look.....

 

Sweet Saffron Rice and Awards

Sometime for no special reasons & without knowing we forget our traditions. Similar is the story with this dish, till this date I never made Sweet Saffron Rice, not that they are complicated or anything but somehow I never made it. Last week while talking to my Mom she told me that's it's Basant Panchami make sweet yellow rice, that's how we refer it in our family. Basant Panchami is a festival to celebrate the first day of spring(basant) and also celebrates the birthday of  Saraswati : Goddess of knowledge and arts. Yellow color of the energy giving Sun has a lot of importance in regard to this festival, the coming of Spring after a long and arduous winter, the mustard fields in bloom are a bright yellow, exuding the warmth of an imminent season of Basant or Spring. In north India people celebrate this special day with religious activities and also by wearing kesari(yellow/saffron color) clothes and making yellow color foods.

So, here you go Mom I did made sweet yellow rice on the basant panchami for the first time. And the sweet aroma of desi ghee, cardamons and saffron is really incomparable. My mom usually put thin slices of dry coconut(available at Indian grocery stores) for garnish, but I didn't used as I didn't had any.

What U need :

• 1/2 cup basmati rice soaked for around 20-25 minutes.
• 4 Tblsp. of sugar(add more if you like it really sweet).
• 2 green cardamons(elaichi), seeds taken out & crushed.
• 2 pinch of saffron(kesar) soaked in 2 Tblsp. of warm milk.
• handful of raisins(i used dry cranberries).
• handful of slivered almonds, toasted.
• 1 cup of water
• 1 Tblsp. of clarified butter(desi ghee)

What to do :

1. Drain rice.
2. Heat ghee in a heavy bottom pan, add cardamons and rice. Stir so that rice get coating of ghee.
3. Add raisins, sugar, saffron along with the milk and water.
4. Cover & cook the rice on medium, till all the water evaporates.
5. Garnish with toasted almonds & coconut(if using).

Note : If you don't have saffron, 2-3 drops of yellow food color can be used. Also once the rice are cooked, taste them for the sweetness, if needed add more sugar while they are still warm.

Time for Awards: My first regular visitor on this blog was SE of Denufood, she was the one who passed me my very first award and here are couple of more awards from her, Thanks dear for sharing them and being so nice and regularly not only visiting but taking time out to write few lines on each single post.

Rules for accepting the Kreative Blogger award :

1) Thank the person giving the award
2) Copy the award to your blog
3) Place a link to their blog
4) Name 7 things people don't know about you
5) Nominate 7 bloggers
6) Place a link to those bloggers
7) Leave a comment letting those bloggers know about the award

I would like to share these awards with :

1) Sidhhi of Cooked Dil Se....

2) Sowmya of Creative Saga

3) Sushma of Authentic Food Delights

4) Supriya of Redchillies

5) Sage of  SageCuisine

6) AshKuku  of Asra....Ashaon Ka.....

7) Gulmohar of Collaborative Curry

I just noticed my most of the blogger friends have name starting with "S" and now the list of 7 things people don't know about me :

1) Would love to have my own kitchen garden one day, till then I'm planting my herbs and veggies in the pots.

2) Can't watch T.V without reading some magazine or doing some crochet along with it.

3) Love fried foods, thanks to not properly ventilated kitchens here I don't fry often.

4) Love to start my day by taking all the veggies for the whole day, out of the fridge. Looking at the basket full of fresh veggies(though sometime they r in the fridge for almost a week) makes me happy.

5) Love to end my day doing some crochet/knitting even if it is for 10 minutes.

6) Not a health freak but believe everything in moderation is good.

7) I'm not an environmentalist but do my share in reducing, reusing and recycling. I try to use my own grocery bags but still end up with lot of produce bags as we mainly use fresh produce only. Below is the picture of plastic bag dispenser I made using used produce bags.

                          

Home Made Rice Crispy Treats

Happy New Year to all of you, may the year 2010 brings happiness everywhere.

First week of the year 2010 is already over, kids are back to school in fact dear daughter is going to have her first snow day(no school) of the year 2010 & I'm still not back to my routine. Winter vacations from the school for kids means getting up late in the morning & sleeping late in the night, which means no time for blogging for mom. I remember as a kid when we use to be home during holidays, my Mom would say she can never keep up with her routine work the days we are home and now I realize what she always meant.

Days when the DD is at home I hardly get to do anything on the Internet, in today's life that's what my daily routine is getting up in the morning......checking mail, reading some blogs, checking some news on the web, google some new recipe for the lunch, again google for help : for any queries which might come to mind.............check the mail............play with kids........oh, did I said check the mail, no...no...no..no.....not the postal mail, that only bring bills but the one which bring happiness : e-mail...........and one last thing before going to bed, yeah U got it by now, check the e-mail. And somewhere in between when ever U get some time cook breakfast, lunch, dinner & have some instant healthy options ready for snacks, play with kids, take care of baby, do the dishes, laundry, clean up, fool around.....blah.....blah.....I guess you got my point. Or in short I had relaxed time with no routines to follow & fun spending time with family.

For the first post of 2010 I decide on a cake but then DD suggested to post these home made rice crispy treats, I liked her suggestion, it's sweet, healthy as it's not only home made but uses gur as sweetener & best of all reminds me of my childhood. Near my parents house, a weekly market takes place on every Thursday. As a kid we use to go there regularly to buy some knick knacks, mom would buy fresh veggies & then we get to eat some tasty street food......moth(sprouted lentils), choole bhature, kari chawal to name few. It was like a weekly outing for us, even now also when I'm there at my mom's place & it's thursday I like to go there, not for any kind of shopping but for the food.......Now coming to today's recipe : Rice crispy treats or as we call it Marundas in Delhi, we use to buy these treats from one of the reri-wala bhaiya there, it's very simple thing but we never made it at home but we use to always look for him so that we can buy some. I don't remember exactly but I guess it use to be available starting the Diwali season, kind of a winter treat.

I don't have exact measurements for this recipe as it was more of eye-balling, and just in case if you don't get exact squares don't worry they will still taste yummy.

Ingredients :

• 1-2 tblsp. of water
• around half a cup of chopped jaggery(gur)
• around 4 cups of dry roasted puffed rice(Plain rice crisps/wheat puffs can be used)
• butter or ghee for greasing
  

Method :

Heat water in a heavy bottom pan add jaggery to it & let it melt, stir it. Once it melts let it cook for few seconds it gonna bubble up a bit, add 3 & 1/2 cup of rice puff & mix everything together so that they get coated with jaggery. If you feel there is still some liquid add some more puffed rice or let it cook for few more seconds. Turn the gas off & spread the mixture onto the greased baking sheet. Once cooled it will be hard, cut it into squares or desired shape. Store it in air-tight container, I kept it for around 5 days & I also used some plain wheat puffs in it. I specially love these as they don't contain any processed sugar & DD loves it because they are simply rice crispy treats. I'm sure many of you must have eaten these may be with different name, so whenever you guys have 5 minutes to spare do try these, it's sweet & healthy, to check more benefits of gur(jaggery) click here.

Last month or I should say last year Malar & Ashkuku passed me this wonderful award, thanks to both of you and at the same time I'm sorry I couldn't post it earlier but what could be better than starting the new year with an award. I would like to pass this award to all my blogger friends, please feel free to pick it up.

Before I end this post here's what we did on snow day off.......we crochet the dress & head scarf for the little dolly. Design by DD, crochet by me :

As I'm finishing this post, another snow day is already announced, so we might be adding few more accessories to miss dolly.

Chana Dal Pulav

This recipe came to life in my kitchen only after i saw it on SEDenufood. In one of my childhood memories i remember eating rice & chana dal pulav while sitting in a train going for vacation, one of my aunt made that. It was so simple but so vibrant at the same time....white basmati rice like they are smiling & yellow vibrant chana dal peaking from every where. I still remember that it tasted good and that picture is still there in my mind.So, on Monday when I saw it on SE's blog I told to myself i have to make it. Originally I was planning to make it white only but.......when I opened my cooler box to get something I saw the bottle of rasam paste..........(I know what you all must be thinking store bought rasam paste......who use that......well, we wanted to try it). Anyways, so plan changed a little bit, here's my version of this pulav.

Ingredient :

• 1 cup chana dal(bengal gram)(Soaked for 2 hr.)
• 2 cup basmati rice (soaked for 25-30 min.)
• 1 tsp. jeera(cumin)
• 1 tsp. mustard seeds
• 1 inch piece of cinnamon stick
• 3-4 cloves
• 2 dry red chillies
• 1 Onion thinly sliced
• 1 tsp. paprika
• 1 inch piece of ginger(thinly sliced lengthwise)
• 1 1/2 tablespoon of rasam paste(I used store bought)
• salt as per taste
• 2 tablespoon oil/ghee

Method :

1) In pressure cooker heat the oil then add jeera, cloves, cinnamon stick, mustard seeds & red chillies, when seeds start to splutter add sliced onion.

2) On med. high gas saute the onion till they become brown.

3) Now add rasam paste & 3-4 tblspn. of water to loosen up the paste.Add salt, paprika, rice & chana dal, stir everything together.Let everything get coated with the masala(spice & onion mixture)around two minutes.

4) Add 4 1/2 cups of water* and pressure cook it on med. high . After a whistle turn off the gas. If your stove is electric make sure you take the pressure cooker off the heated stove.after around 5 minutes open the cooker & using fork fluff up the rice.Serve it with plain yogurt/raita.

Note : *I use 1(rice) : 2(water) ratio while cooking rice in the cooker and I added 1/2 cup extra for chana dal.If you pressure cook rice, make sure not to let them sit for a long time in the pressure otherwise they will be overcooked & become mushy.