Kitchen Khaleesi

Alternate Thursdays​ at our home, we have English type breakfast. Well almost..  Because we don't make black pudding and cook bacon strips neither. But this fluffy Mashed Potatoes are a mandatory staple along with pancakes, baked beans, sauteed mushrooms and grilled tomatoes. Not to forget the syrup. This mashed potatoes is also suitable for babies who are above 1 year old. Serve them with Spinach Purée and need not worry about their nutritional need for that day. Ingredients: Potatoes- 1/2 kg Milk- 3/4 cup Butter - 2tbsp Salt to taste Freshly ground black pepper- 1tsp Method: Peel the potatoes and cut into 2 inch thick dices. Put them in boiling water and it should take around 25 minutes. Or Alternatively in Pressure cooker upto 4 whistles. Or microwave for 13- 15mins with lid covered. Use a potato masher which has holes in it. Mash them well. Add butter while hot. Throw in salt and mix well.  Add the milk slowly and mix well. Heat up if necessary. Mix everythin

Both of my kids are Doraemon's fans. For some reason they like this lazy guy Nobita too! Even some times I wanted a kitty robot like Doraemon to help me with my kitchen works. LOL! So anyways my little one was nagging me for a long time to make these. And I found that many Dorayaki recipes swirling in internet were made with Nutella which didn't seem authentic. And found the main ingredient was this ADZUKI BEANS or ADUKI BEANS. These beans taste very much similar to that of our black eyed peas(kaaramani). This is available in Amazon in canned form(refer photo). They are precooked and pretty simple to make. Sweetened with sugar, and made into a paste with a hint of Vanilla and sandwiched between 2 classic Japanese pancakes. Perfect as a snack or Dessert! Ingredients: For ADUKI BEANS paste Epicure aduki beans- 1 can Sugar-200g Vanilla extract- few drops For pancakes Flour 1.5 cups Sugar-2 tbsp Baking powder 2 TSP Baking soda 1/4 TSP Salt a pinch Milk- 1.25 cups Me

PALAK has a very unique taste that pairs not only in gravy, but also soups, cutlets and of course here's our Biriyani!!! In school days my mum used to make pulao using a green called sukaangeerai. Similar to that I've made this. A good trick to make kids eat spinach. Ingredients: Palak -1 big bunch Onions - 2 thinly sliced Tomatoes - 3 med finely chopped Green chillies -2 slit Coriander leaves and mint leaves- each a fistful Oil- 2 tbsp Ghee 1 tbsp Ginger garlic paste - 2tsp Cardamom, cloves, cinnamon -2 each Bay leaf -1 big Curd- 1/2 cup Basmati rice 2 cups Salt Turmeric powder- 2 TSP heaped Chilli powder- 1 tsp Garam masala- 1 tsp Method: Wash thoroughly and finely chop the palak.  Heat oil in a kadai. Add oil and ghee. Splutter Bay leaf and other spices. Add onions, palak, coriander, mint and ginger garlic paste. Saute well until it's translucent. Add in tomatoes and cook well. Stir in the turmeric powder, chilli powder and garam masala.  Add

 This sweet little bonbons are made by my mother weekly once, as a neivethyam for ranganathar. also in sabarimala this is served as a main prasadham. Soft, delicious and mildly sweet with richness of clarified butter, and crunchy dried coconut flakes, Whenever she makes this at home, it disappears within seconds! Ingredients: Whole wheat flour-1 cup Maida- 1 cup Rice flour- 1cup Baking soda a pinch Powdered jaggery- 1.5 cups Dried coconut flakes( kopparai sillu) -1tbsp Ghee( clarified butter)- 1/2 cup Caradamom powder- 1 tsp Method: Dissolve jaggery in 1 cup of water. Boil and filter. Allow it to cool slightly. Add all the other ingredients, except ghee. Mix the jaggery and some more water, and make into a batter( med consistency).Make sure that there are no lumps. Heat the appampaatra/ kuzhipaniyaarakal. Add 1 tsp of ghee in each slot. Pour one small ladle of batter, it should be 3/4 of slot.Add 1 tsp of ghee on top of that. After frying one side, turn

This is different and healthy way to use your leftover idlis. You can buy Veppamboo either from shops or collect your own and dry them in sun. It comes very handy to make pachadi, thuvayal, rasam. But Using in Upma, you'll never notice the difference. Adding Veppamboo in some form, will reduce your daily blood sugar levels and kids will love it too, when served with any chutney. Ingredients Idlis-6-8 Gingelly oil- 2 tbsp Veppamboo( dried neem flowers)- 1.5 tbsp Mustard seeds-2 tsp Split urad Dhall- 1 tsp Dry red chillies- 2 Curry leaves Asafoetida- a pinch  Ground powder of pepper and cumin- 2 tsp Salt Method Coarsely mash the idlis. Sprinkle some water, so that it won't get dry while frying Heat oil in a Kadhai. Add oil, mustard seeds,chillies, dhall, curry leaves and asafoetida. Add Veppamboo and sauté well Now add the mashed idlis, pepper and cumin powder, salt. Mix thoroughly. Serve hot!

I've been researching for the past few weeks for an eggless waffle recipe, that doesn't show any difference between the egg and eggless. We can't deny the fact that eggs give a richer flavour to the waffles but you can't tell the difference when you have these. Any eggless desserts will have a sort of bland white colour, but not in this. The secret is to add custard powder, as it has cornflour, vanilla flavour and when cooked it gives you a beautiful golden brown colour and its crisp on the outside, fluffy on the inside, combined with buttery caramelised bananas, vanilla ice cream and chocolate sauce gives an ultimate indulgence!! INGREDIENTS: Waffle Batter All purpose flour- 3 cups Vanilla custard powder- 2tbsp heaped Melted butter- 1/3 cup Buttermilk-2 cups Water - 3/4 cup Vanilla extract- 2 tsp Sugar 1/3 cup Salt a pinch Baking powder -4 tsp Baking soda- 1tsp Caramelised Bananas Sugar-1/2 cup Butter -2tsp Bananas-4 med For Topping Va