cookbypassion

Cookies are always loved by my family, whether it is plain cookie, butter cookie or chocolate. Even I grew up having cookies with warm milk  or coffee after school.  There are hundreds of varieties of cookies. But the one which am baking today is  Indian buttery cookies- Nankhatai. These eggless cookies are loved by all ages.   Many make these cookies with besan / gram flour or wheat flour or Maida. Each has it own taste.   For  week 4, day 2  of BM 36 am here with these Eggless Buttery cookies- Nankhatai. We need: Maida / All purpose flour 1 cup Unsalted Butter 4 oz / 1 stick  Baking powder 1/2 spoon Cardamom powder 1/2 spoon Powdered sugar 1/2 cup Salt 1/4 spoon Crushed pistachio 2 spoons Method: Let butter come to room temperature( nice and soft). Now add powdered sugar to butter and mix well with spatula till nice and creamy. Sieve maida, cardamom powder, baking powder in separate bowl. Now add this powder to butter cream little at a time and mix well. Transfer the flour to butter

Today's recipe is a baked version of Namak para.   Cooking with kids is always messy for us but  fun for them. Made these savory treats with kids today. My son loved to cut these namak para into diamond pieces. Usually these are deep fried in oil till nice and crisp. But today I baked instead of deep frying them. Tasted little bit different from the regular one but healthy version is always the best.  So for Week 4, day 3 of  BM 36   here I am wiith baked version of Namak Para.  We need: Maida / All purpose flour  1 cup Ajwai / carom seeds 1/2 spoon Salt to taste Butter / ghee 2spoons Water 1/4 cup Method: Sieve maida and salt together in a mixing bowl. Now add ajwai and mix together. Add melted butter or ghee and mix well. Now add enough water little at a time to make a stiff dough. Cover with lid and rest it for about 10 to 15 minutes. Now knead the dough for a minute and divide it into 2 portions. Using rolling pin make one portion of dough as chapati. Now cut the chapati into l

Looking for some healthy and quick snack for kids? Tired of making the regular snacks for kids after school? Here is a healthy, crunchy and quick snack recipe for kids and grownup's too .  Peanuts are rich in nutrients, providing over 30 essential nutrients. Peanuts can be used in many ways. They are eaten raw and  used in recipes and also in medicines. Many recipes can be made with these peanuts like peanut butter, peanut candy, peanut butter cookies, and also used in making snack bars. Not only as nuts, peanut oil is also used in cooking. For week 4, day 1 of BM 36, am here with  Oven baked - masala peanuts. Perfect for evening snack or after school snack. These crunchy peanuts are perfect for rainy day with some hot masala tea or to munch while watching a movie. Here goes the recipe.... We need: Peanuts  1 cup Gram flour 3/4 to 1 cup Haldi / Turmeric 1/4 spoon Chili powder 1 spoon Curry leaves 10 Salt to taste Oil 3 to 4 spoons Hing / Asafetida 1 pinch Water 1/4 cup approx.. Met

For the final post of week 3- BM 36, I am here with simple and healthy dish made with oats. Oats are used in many ways in preparing  foods. Like Oatmeals or ground into fine flour  and  used in making oatmeal cookies, oatcakes and bread. Also added in cereals and Granola bars. Today's post is about oats pongal . Here goes the recipe... We need: Oats 1 cup Moong dal 1/4 cup Black peppercorns 10 Curry leaves 4 Red chili 2 Black pepper powder 1/2 spoon Cumin / jeera 1/2 spoon Salt to taste Haldi 1/4 spoon Ghee  / Oil 3spoons Cashew nuts 10 Method: Heat oil / ghee in a pan and add  cumin seeds, curry leaves, black pepper, cashew nuts and red chili. Saute for few seconds and add oats and moong dal. Roast on low flames for 3 to 4 minutes. Now add Haldi, pepper powder and 2 1/2 cups water. Add salt to taste cover  and cook on medium to low flame till nice and soft. Serve hot. Check to see what my fellow bloggers are cooking for BM 36

Pongal is a popular rice   dish in all South Indian  states. Pongal is made in different ways, sweet pongal and hot pongal or Ven pongal. This spicy pongal is a famous breakfast dish in India. Spicy  Pongal is usually made with rice, moong dal and black pepper.This is a traditional south indian dish which is offered to god during festivals. One of my friend makes this hot pongal with rice, tuv dal and masoor dal with some spices. So for today's post I made  mixed dal pongal  to be served with coconut chutney and Lobia vada. We need: Rice 1 1/2  cup Tur dal 1/2  cup Masoor dal  1/2 cup Cumin seeds 1 spoon Cinnamon stick 1inch 1 Bay leaf 1 Black pepper corns  10 Cloves 4 Black pepper powder 1/2 spoon Salt to taste Green chili 2 Chopped cilantro 1/4 cup Chopped mint leaves 2 spoons Chopped ginger 1/2 spoon Curry leaves 6 Oil / ghee1/4  cup Water 7 cups Method: Mix rice, masoor dal and tur dal in a bowl and wash thoroughly. Soak for 10 to 15 minutes. Meanwhile heat presser cooker  and

January is a month of Pongal festival. Pongal is the Harvest  festival of South India. Rice is cooked  with milk in new pots  until they boil over.  Then we add some jaggery  or sugar for sweetness.  This is called Sweet Pongal.  This Pongal is offered to god as Naivedyam and distributed to family and friends. Today we are starting with 3rd week of BM 36. And my theme for this week is Pongal varieties. For day 1, I made Sweet pongal, it is  usually made with rice, milk and jaggery.  To try something new, I made it with Quinoa, rice and chana dal, with Khajur ka Gud. Khajur ka gud or jaggery is different from the regular jaggery with is made with sugarcane. Khajur ka gud is made with dates and is very soft. Its in dark brown in color, melts quickly  and has a very different  taste. This jaggery is mostly used in Bengali Cuisine. Here goes the Quinoa Sweet Pongal with Khajur ka gud....... We need: Quinoa 1 cup Raw rice 1/4 cup Chana dal 1/4 cup Khajur jaggery ( dates jaggery) 3/4  cup Gh

Today's recipe is one of the popular snack  of Andhra Pradesh.  Simple  to prepare and healthy too. Serve hot with ginger pickle or ginger chutney for better taste. Previously I have posted similar recipe of Lobia vada, but in that recipe I added all the ingredients while grinding.  But in the version am adding chopped onions, chilies  etc after grinding the peas for more crunchiness. My family and friends liked this version of vada than the previous one as these vada's. Here goes the recipe...... We need: Bobbarlu / Lobia  2 cups Chopped onion 1/2 cup Chopped green chili 2 spoons Chopped cilantro 1 cup Crushed  Ginger  1 spoon Salt to taste Oil for deep frying Method: Soak Black eye peas / lobia over night or for 6hrs. After 6 hrs wash thoroughly and grind it to rough paste. Do not add water while grinding. Now add chopped ginger, onion, green chili and cilantro. Also add salt to taste and mix well. Heat oil in deep frying pan. Once oil is hot, make small patties or fritters a

A Typical Andhra meal includes  pappu / dal, pickle / chutney, pulusu, curry , sambar, rasam, curd and rice. The best combination is  vankaya pulusu pachadi and Kandi pachadi. Brinjal chutney cooked with tamarind pulp and jaggery, and tuvr dal chutney. These two dishes are very simple to prepare.  Brinjal is roasted and mashed to combine with onion , tamarind pulp and jaggery with other ingredients to made a tasty pulusu pachadi.  Tuvr dal or red gram dal is roasted with other ingredients to make a spicy chutney which can be served with hot rice and ghee.  Made these 2 classic Andhra dishes for 3rd day of BM 36, under combo dishes. We  need: For vankaya pulusu pachadi: Large brinjal 1 Onion 1 small Green chili 2 Tamarind pulp 1 spoon Jaggery  grated 1 spoons Garlic cloves 2 Cumin seeds 1/2 spoon Mustard seeds 1/4 spoon Curry leaves 4 Red chili 1 Chopped cilantro 2spoons Haldi 1/4 spoon Salt to taste Oil 4 spoons For Kandi pachadi: Kandi pappu / tuvr dal  1 cup Cumin seeds 1 spoon Udad

 Made these yummy ,crisp and  hot Aloo tikki this weekend.  Perfect for any rainy day as evening snack or for small parties. Here goes the recipe...                                               We need: Potatoes 3 medium Green peas 1/4 cup Chat masala 1/2 spoon Cumin powder 1/4 spoon Salt to taste Chopped onion 2 spoons Chopped green chili 1 Chopped cilantro 3 spoons Lime juice 2spoons Corn flour 3spoons Bread crumbs  Oil for shallow frying Method: Boil potatoes and remove skin. Mash the potatoes and add chat masala, cumin powder, chopped onion, cilantro and chopped green chili. Add salt to taste and green peas.( Used frozen green peas) Also add corn flour, lime juice and salt to taste. Mix everything together and keep aside. Heat large skillet and add few drops of oil. Now make small patties with the potato mixture and dip each patti or tikki in bread crumbs. Now place these patties / Tikki in the skillet. Fry on low to medium flame till nice and crisp on both sides. Gently flip over

BM 36. Week 1. Day 2. Theme : Combo Dishes. Street food is one of my favorite food, let it be pani puri, pav bhaji, mirchi bajji or chole tikki. They have some special taste. Even after trying for 10 times at home  you won't get the same  taste of street food. These street foods taste even more delicious during monsoon and winters.  Today we had almost 7 to 8 inches of snow in New Jersey. School district declared holiday and even dear hubby was working from home. As everyone was home had plenty of time to something hot and spicy snack. So i came up with Tikki chole and we all loved it. My son loved to have just the tikki's with ketchup and daughter had just the chana from chole and few pieces of tikki. Me and dear hubby loved having this yummy combo dish with some tea.    Tikki Chole is one of the popular street food in North India. Tikki means patties or cutlets made with veggies or meat. Today I made these patties with boiled potato a nd some spices. These tikki's are ser

Today we are starting with 36th edition of Blogging Marathon. For week 1, I choose to cook " Combo Dishes ".  For day 1, am cooking Puri Halwa and Chole. This is one of the popular and traditional breakfast dish in Pakistan and India. It's a delicious combination of sweet, spicy chickpea curry and crispy puri's. We need: For Halwa: Sooji 1 cup Sugar 1 cup Butter / ghee 3 spoons Water 3 cups Raisins 10 Cashew 10 For Puri: Wheat flour 2 cups Water to make a dough Salt 1/4 spoon Oil for deep frying For Chole: Chick peas 1 cup Onion 1 small Tomato 1 small Green chili 2 Chana masala / chole masala 1/ 1/2 spoon Salt to taste Haldi 1/4spoon Oil 3 spoons Cilantro chopped  2 spoons Roasted cumin powder 1/2 spoon Method: Add salt to wheat flour  and mix well. Add enough water to make a dough. Dough should not be too soft  nor too hard. Cover with keep aside. Soak chana over night or for 6 to 7 hrs in water. Drain water and presser cook. Heat a cooking pan and add oil. Now add