Beetroot Rice

Beetroots were probably born when Mother Nature was a blushing bride. I wonder who she would have gotten married to. Hmm. 

Anyways, that's her life. In my life however, the story of the beet is a little different. Yes, I blushed too once upon a time but I did not even like beets then! These have become a favorite of mine recently. But, I always cook it one and only one way. A beetroot poriyal cooked with onions and garnished with coconuts.  

This time around, just like the many times I've done it before, I needed change. Something new with a favorite ingredient. Something that wakes up my taste buds and refreshes them. Something that was easy and also a one pot meal. It was a weekday, you see. Some weekdays I wish I was just like an old cat lady (without the old part, of course) who eats a raw store bought salad for a meal. But the south indian in me wants all the varied flavors of a nice home cooked meal after a little slogging in the kitchen. But then, once I sit down in front of my food - the next few mins is all worth it. Nothing beats home cooking. 

Here are the beets sitting on my beat out chopping board. Just a little tip - if you use a lot of beets, just keep a regular plastic white chopping board just for the beets. I have one that I use only when chopping beets and eggplants and some yams. They all leave terrible stains and even if most of them go after washing, you'll still see a dirty hue. 

Give them a good haircut and shave. Ah the life of a beet!

Chop into rough pieces.

Add the beets to a food processor while using a shredding blade. These are the days when I love my food processor. 10 mins of hand grating = 1 min in the processor. God bless the folks who designed this stuff.

I just love when this happens. Food Magic.

Here are the basic spices that go in first.

A stick of Cinnamon
A couple of bay leaves
A tbsp of red chilli flakes
About 5-6 pieces of whole cloves
About 1 tbsp of whole cumin

Make a quick coarse paste of 3G -

Green Chillies - 3-4
Garlic individual pods - 4-5
Ginger - about 2 tsp rough chopped

In a wide and deep pan, add 1 tbsp of oil. Add all the ingredients above to this and fry for a min.

Then, add about 1 cup of chopped onions to the oil. Add a pinch of salt to taste and fry for a couple of mins.

Add about 1/2 cup of peas. This is optional. But, if you are using frozen peas, microwave the peas in water in a glass bowl for about 3-4 mins. Drain and then add the cooked peas in here.

Add about 1/4 tsp pf turmeric powder and also 1/2 tsp of red chilli powder.

Throw in the shredded beets.

You can add some garam masala powder or other spices if you'd like at this stage.

Add 1 1/2 cups of washed basmati rice to the beets and mix well.

Pour 2 1/2 - 3 cups of water to the rice and beets. The water should be just enough to soak all the rice and then form a short layer on top.

Cover the pot with a lid and cook for about 15-20 mins in low-medium heat.

Open it up and let the steam hit your face. Aaah. the joy! Especially on a cold winter night!

And like I said - 

This was my new find for my kitchen. Loved it when I saw it and absolutely had to have it. I was so happy that I went out to eat to celebrate!

Sorry I don't have final serving pictures. We were all hungry and just decided to serve ourselves out of the pot! 

Serve hot with some cold raitha and some potato chips.

Enjoy. Peace out.

Nameless Rice Recipe

So, here’s the deal.

I made this tonight for dinner. But I have no clue what to call this. So, you can make up your own name for it. And if you can think of anything creative – let me know. It kind of belongs to the Pulav family.

Whatever we decide to call it, I can tell you that it was a very hearty tasty meal for all of us. There’s rice in here, then veggies, then some beans and some nuts and a whole lot of flavor. And it’s a one pot dish – which I love!

I really liked this combination of veggies I used for this dish. But I’m sure you can customize this to your taste and add your favorite veggies in there too.

Starting off with onions, I decided to use the pearl onions instead of the chopped big onions. You can try and talk me out of it if you really want to – but these pearl onions do have a ton of flavor that’s sometimes missing from the big mamma ones. Yes – it’s a pain to peel them, agreed. But they do taste better.

On the veggies front, I used red bell peppers, zucchini and tender green beans. And then for some protein, I added some black chickpea / kala channa. And for an extra crunch – some chopped almonds. What can go wrong with all these wonderful ingredients?

In a wide pan, add about 1 tsp oil. When hot, add about ½ tsp Jeera (Cumin seeds) and ½ tsp Sombu (fennel seeds). When they start to turn brown, add finely chopped ginger and green chilli. Then, add the pearl onions to this and fry for a min.

When that is done, add the rest of the veggies in here. You don’t have to cook them for a long time. Almost immediately, season them well and mix the rice. They will get cooked along with the rice.

Then, add the boiled black channa. Boil it just enough so that they can be squished between your fingers when pressed.

Next comes the seasoning part. I kept the seasoning part simple. Some turmeric for a colorful rice.

Some red chilli – as much spice as you can take. Ours is not much considering my little one also eats from this.

Salt – to taste. I love that my salt container has a whole write up on how to eat salt correctly and not eat too much of it which might lead to unnecessary health conditions. They conclude their speech with these words of wisdom - ‘Salt Responsibly’. How true.

And then some biriyani masala or your favorite pulav masala. I always use Ethnic Kitchens Nawabi Biriyani Masala – like the flavor of that thing!

This is not a required addition but for me it was more of cleaning my fridge and trying to use as much as I have in there. I had some blanched and peeled almonds sitting for a couple of days and decided to add them in here for a crunch. It sure was a great crunch for our almond loving family!

Well..I forgot to tell you to wash and soak about 2 cups of basmati rice before you start all this. Soak the rice in water for about 30 mins or so. Rinse the rice well and drain all the water and add it to the veggies in the pan.

Instead of adding regular water to cook the rice, I decided to use some veggie broth. I think this made all the difference between a regular pulav and a really flavorful one. I mean the flavor that lingers on your tongue after you take a bite and eat it all. That flavor. So, if you can don't skip this. Use a good veggie broth.

For 2 cups of basmati rice and all the veggies, I added about 4 cups of veggie broth. More broth will be added a little later. But this is good for now. Mix everything well together once. Add a little bit more salt to taste for the rice.

Close the pan with a lid and let this boil and cook for about 5 mins or until you see the rice soaking up all the broth.

Like this - this is still partially done rice. There is a little bit of stock left in the pot. At this stage, switch off the stove and move all of this rice to a baking dish.

Now add another half a cup of broth all over the rice.

You can do this step while the rice is cooking. Wash, peel and cut 3-4 potatoes into rounds.

Blanch for about 4-5 mins in hot water. Make sure the potatoes are not completely cooked - you should be able to cut them with a knife but not crush them with a finger..get it?

Cover the rice in the baking dish with the blanched potatoes and some circle cut onions.

Cover with foil and bake in a pre heated oven at 350F for about 20 mins.

After that, increase the temp to 425F and turn on broil and remove the foil and let the potatoes and onions get  broiled for about 5 mins or until you see them turn golden.

Like this.

These potatoes and onions were absolutely awesome to eat along with the rice.

There's some piping hot nameless rice.

I served with some of of my favorite "Tomato-Cucumber-Green Bell Pepper Raitha". And some fresh grilled mango. Just for a twist. I just cut long strips of fresh mango and placed it on a cookie rack right over a medium flame. Like this -

So, have you come up with a name yet?

Enjoy. Peace out!

Sweet Corn, Fresh Mint and Paneer Fried Rice

What a weekend it was! I met my wonderful friend back from college Kamakshi and she made the most delicious soft aappams for me. And I also took picutres of a dish she made for a future post - a Tapioca delicacy from Kerala.

And then, I finally got to meet a lot of new friends who I got to know through the blog. We got interacting on the blog's FB page and one thing led to another and slowly we all became good friends. I visited the bay area and got to meet all of them during the weekend. We had some wonderful conversations and great food! I'll post a few pictures later. Thank you to all 10 of you for a memorable weekend.

I ended my trip with watching Eat Pray Love with my sister. We should have maybe just gone out to eat and pray and chat with sisterly love! The movie was ok - but I felt it was a drag. Finally back to work and routine.

Now moving on to this post. This was an impromptu fried rice that was created in a jiffy. And it was all gone in a jiffy too!

There was left over paneer in my fridge. There was a whole bunch of mint leaves in my backyard that was just begging to be be eaten up! And there was this little kid in my house who wanted corn in some form in her next meal. And that is how people, this dish was born!

Before you start cooking this, keep about 2 cups basmati rice with 3 cups of water in a rice cooker or pressure cooker. Once the rice is done, cool it down. You can also add a tsp of oil to the rice and let it just sit - helps in separating the grains while cooling down.

Here's my favorite fresh backyard mint....I love the smell of my fingers when I pluck them out of the plant. Forget aromatherapy hand lotions - nothing to beat this!

Cut Paneer into small cubes and set aside so its ready to be sauteed.

In a wide pan, add about 1 tsp of ghee and fry some cashewnuts till they turn golden. Remove from pan and set aside.

Then, add the cut paneer pieces to the pan and turn the heat on medium and start sauteeing. You can add a tsp of oil or ghee also to fry the paneer pieces.

Add a pinch of turmeric and salt to taste just for the paneer. And yes..the paneer will stick when you fry it in a steel dish - but if you do it in medium, they just come off easy too. Once the paneer is done, remove it from the pan and set aside.

Now, add another tsp of oil and fry some whole jeera.

Then, add in chopped onions and some finely chopped green chillies and fry till translucent.

Then, add a spoon of ginger garlic paste to the onions and fry for a minute.

Now add about 1 cup of fresh or frozen corn to the onions and cook for a few mins. Add salt to taste and also a pinch of turmeric powder.

Then add the masalas - I added 1 tsp of pulav masala, some red chilli powder. You can also add fresh green chillies at the beginning for a spicier tasting pulav.

Now, add the freshly chopped mint to the corn and mix well. All of it will wilt in a min but your house will smell and feel like a pretty magaize cover page house!

Now add the cooked paneer to the rest of the ingredients. Cook together for a min.

Then, add the cooked rice to the veggies and paneer.

Mix gently without smashing up the rice too much. This is no place to take out all your energy! Cook like a ballet dancer. You could also dance alongside for some self-entertainment if you need to. I do it too as soon as I make sure no one's watching!

When all the rice is mixed up, add the roasted cashews on top and mix gently one more time.

Serve hot. Serve yourself. Sit back, relax and enjoy your plate of deliciousness!

Of course I had to give you all a close up shot! Coz my cashew loves the spotlight!

Before I go, here's something I've been wanting to talk about.

A few of us foodie bloggers from this part of the world - Los Angeles, Orange County and San Bernadino county have gotten together and decided to meet up soon in person! Just for the fun of it.

So, if you are blogger from around here or has a blogger friend who lives around here - please do visit this link and get the details - Foodie Bloggers Meet. Looking forward to meeting you soon!

Enjoy. Peace Out!