Killing me softly……

K is really upset with me….he claims I have been feeding him to death!! And he’s serious when he says it…..with a writer in the house who’s lost in the characters of his book, his plot and philosophy…..the last thing on his mind is an answer to “what do you want to eat?” …sometimes I think he wants to hit me with the nearest object for asking him such a question and yet I persist with amazing doggedness…….after the last couple of stares I have got from him, I am now turning to amma to answer this question for me….she answers with (hasn’t yet been tortured by this question) enthusiasm and actually asks me to make some innovative stuff for her…..one such request a few days ago was “idiappam and stew” (ishtu…if any self respecting mallu will be quoted here…..but mallu I am not tho sometimes I pretend to be….) …..

this is something I was introduced to at my dear friend D’s house in cochin…..i was already in awe of many things in Kerala…the people, their lifestyles, the urban and rural merging….the terrain and the cuisine…..delicately flavoured on one hand and fiery at another…..so idiappam and stew remains one of my favourites….its so easy to put together and always is well appreciated (yes even K loves it)…..and also is light on the tummy……. We had this for dinner the other night….i made lots of it and we had quite a bit leftover…..idiappam with milk / coconut milk flavoured with elaichi and sugar makes a great breakfast too…..imagine my panic when I found the whole hot case empty the next morning when I checked it!! K was up writing all night and gave in to hunger pangs at 4 a.m!! So much for being accused of feeding him to death!! i guess i stand “guilty as charged!!”………..

Disclaimer: My mallu friends, please excuse me if the recipe I followed is far from authentic!!

Baking Escapade # 8: Whole wheat Spiced Apple Muffins

The shocked……….. “OMG!! Don’t tell me YOU!! (rolls eyes unbelievably, shakes head vigorously and continues) made this” expressions I have been getting from people I have been subjecting my baking to is too addictive to let up…..To keep the oven fires warm and going and also make sure all the baking (bragging…what’s the difference??) I have been doing isn’t just a flash in the (baking) pan, I have tentatively resolved to bake more often…like once a week……I don’t treat resolutions with the respect that they deserve…but hey this is food!! And some of it has got to be sugared….so I’m guessing I’ll have a lot more success than just normal resolutions

This picture to the left (which goes to the Show me your cookbook event hosted by Nags) is of this really fabulous book on baking i picked up a few months ago….flushed with my first real baking success….and predictably it sat on my bookshelf…..these days I prefer the world wide web for recipes….something to do with real pictures and tried and tested…anyways…this book has some really simple baking recipes, 50 in all and have a good variety of cakes, cookies, muffins and bread…..there’s a wonderful options for both savory and sweet selections…..its called Essential Cooking Series Comprehensive step by step cooking - Baking ….. published by Hinkler books pvt ltd. … each time I have tried my hand at baking the last few weeks, I have gone back and forth to this book and put it safely back on its shelf… So this week is Whole wheat Spiced Apple Muffins …….this recipe is fairly simple….calls for very few ingredients all of which are most likely available in the kitchen and the apples I reckon can be substituted with any other firm flesh fruit such as pears / pineapple etc

the recipe said 1 cup flour yields 9-10 muffins which wouldn’t be enough even for tasters here in my family and so I doubled all measures, landing up with 30 muffins….I guess I have the wrong cup!! Or the wrong muffin case!! The recipe is a keeper….the fact that the muffins were soft and moist not to mention fruity with the pieces of apple and made entirely out of whole wheat has totally swung it in its favor!!

Recycle Rani’s heir apparent and WBB#15 : Starring Pesarattu and Coconut Chutney

As children, my brother and I had nicknamed amma “recycle rani” ……….of course we didn’t appreciate the fact that she became a staunch practitioner of recycling everything much before it became fashionable and environmentally necessary….all this owing to the fact that she grew up at a time when everything from clothes to food wasn’t in such abundant supply and it was a government controlled market and hardly the consumerist society that it is today….she’d save mithai boxes to pack food for when we traveled by train…each one had their own meal packed in a box, complete with a paper napkin and cut fruit…….packing paper to reuse either for gift-wrapping or to line cupboard shelves, scraps of fabric for making baby clothes, market bags and other stuff, infact I still have a cover for the mixer –grinder made from such scraps of fabric…..and food…..she put the refrigerator to good use since she was a working woman, with portioned precooked food, boiled dal, gravies etc would be stocked in the freezer, and food was never thrown away if she could help it……if there was vegetable upma for breakfast, I could be pretty sure it was leftovers from the previous night’s dinner…..excess food cooked for festivals or other occasions would be frozen, given a makeover and one wouldn’t be the wiser as to its origins!!

So imagine my happiness when I realized that I hadn’t yet missed the deadline for Nandita’s event?? It’s a cause after my own heart and being the true claimant of my mother’s title, I couldn’t let this one pass up!! So here is a makeover that started off with 3 day old idly batter, quantity that’s not enough for a meal and yet too much to allow your conscience to throw it down the drain….and some Kobbari kaaram podi that wasn’t enough to go around…….they ended up as pesarattu and spicy chutney……my entry for WBB#15 the brainchild of Nandita

Baking Escapade # 7 - Bunning around…..(Savoury Whole Wheat Buns)

The monsoons have begun to retreat…which means mostly rains in the evenings in September for Hyderabad……I love the rains and it makes me all mushy and romantic and ready to try a few new things for dinner…..something steaming hot to warm you up and suddenly a very simple dinner gives you a “domestic goddess” avatar….with the traffic in hyderabad enough to send you to an asylum for attempting to drive in it…..K generally comes home and we sit down in thanksgiving for the sanity that life gives us and thankful for the warm comforting food, the warm, dry home and the love of family and friends…….see I told you the rains make me mushy!!

Anyways, continuing my escapades with baking and fully inspired by this wonderful lady and these two people…what I set off to actually do, was check if the dried yeast that I had sitting in the freezer was alive (advice I got from bee…when I lamented on the bricks I baked on an earlier encounter, she asked me to make sure my yeast was alive)…so I mixed it into a cup of warm water…..it frothed gloriously all the way over the brim and suddenly I was all excited…..i thought I’d try my hand at baking some buns…..it was Sunday afternoon and both K and Amma were respectfully resting…..it was all that I needed to try something and have the allowance of destroying the evidence if I ended up with bricks again…….. this is adapted a bit from Anita’s recipe of whole wheat bread….basically cut the proportions to a minimum so I could get rid of the evidence with that much less guilt if it flopped badly …and made the whole thing out of whole wheat flour…….but I didn’t have to fret as it was quite a success….I mixed the dough…….waited for it to rise and I was so excited when it did!! The result was 8 buns about 4 inches in diameter….firm and crusty on the outside and soft on the inside…..i tried glazing it with just water and it resulted in a cracked surface, this needs to be avoided the next time….there were two buns left and the next morning I was pleasantly surprised that they were still soft………..we had them with steaming hot tomato soup for dinner……this is my entry for MBP – bread, hosted by Coffee of the Spice Cafe

Baking Escapade # 6 - Jugalbandi’s Almond Chocolate brownie

I’m usually one of those people who drools over recipes, thinks of throwing a party to sufficiently showcase the labour that goes into actually trying it and after a while, the memory of whether or not i actually tried out the recipe is a blur…… this time it was different…i logged in this morning and did the usual trawling….i checked out jai and bee’s as usual…..pondered over the almond chocolate brownie…..fantasised some about serving it at a party and the oohs and aahs that would hopefully follow…(consider the fact that baking is always a hit and miss for me…..more misses actually….), bookmarked the recipe….couldn’t get it out of my mind…..wrote it down in my diary…..shut the book but couldn’t get it out of my mind…..for the first time i rushed to the kitchen hours after reading a recipe and boy o boy!! the result is fabulous….even if i say so myself….thankfully i had everything on hand……..by the time the batter was ready the power was off so waited impatiently for a while and when the power came on again i popped it in to bake……the top was firm and the insides moist and perfectly gooey…..my mom had a piece and paid me the best compliment ever…she’s asked me to bake her one to take back with herwhen she’s ready to go back to bangalore……

i followed jai and bee’s recipe to the T, of all the brownies i have made (and there are 3 already posted on this blog) this one was the easiest and easily my best !! pardon the bragging…i just cant get over it!! i only couldnt slice the almonds so simply split them down the middle, and they browned a bit after baking….. after i post this, i am having myself another piece for dessert.

salad days

Lots has happened since my last post….the best part is that amma came back with me from Bangalore…I guess she couldn’t bear the cribbing I was doing and the superlative guilt tripping that she didn’t want to spend time with me post the appearance of her grand daughter (my brother and SIL’s baby girl)….its been a week now and she’s bringing to my life the sunny disposition that is such a threatened part of my life right now…..she for one hasn’t changed one bit….why is it that mother’s are compelled to bulldoze their daughter’s out of the kitchen?? Her most favourite phrase to me? “just go and sit down, I’ll finish here and clear up…go and relax” yeah right!! Relaxing seems to be most of what I am doing anyways!!

Through mutual agreement we’ve decided that I do breakfast and dinner and she’ll do lunch…at least that’s how its been mostly…..one good thing about eating with amma is that there’s salad at lunch and dinner….something that i skip feigning laziness or tiredness whichever suits me…and something she always insisted on…..post diabetes, in her own words she’s been “eating salad like a goat”……sometimes it is a little fancy with a simple dressing, at other times it is just some chopped / sliced raw veggies with a twist of lemon juice….. this is a very simple salad I made for dinner a few nights ago….am not very proud of the pictures taken from the phone, but something to show atleast….the picture obviously doesn’t do justice to the lovely crunchy texture of the apple and the flavours of the veggies with pepper and olive oil…. We had this with rotis and a simple cabbage sabzi.

Impromptu Vacay

like fire at our feet and the devil on our tails K and i decided to surprise everyone in bangalore by getting  there unannounced!! the expression on my mother’s face was worth all of it!! i believe the best things in life are unexpected and on friday, the whole family, Amma, brother, SIL, baby, K and i, loaded a few clothes and a tonne of baby paraphenelia into the car and drove off to pondicherry!! we had a swell time and got back last night….back to hyderabad with amma in tow this evening….i have a tonne of catching up to do…but have yet to recover from the great time we had…….first family vacation in 20 years!!