It has been an absolute pleasure to see a variety of recipes drop into my inbox specially made for Weekend Herb Blogging # 352 all through the week. Thanks to Haalo for the opportunity to host this week's edition..:-)
Let's dig into the entries (in no specific order). Shall we?
There are some recipes which make your mouth water just by the very mention and some which are considered as "comfort food" which pep you up on a not-so-good day. For me, Olive Garden's "Eggplant Parmagiana" fall into both the categories. This classic Italian-American dish is a lovely way to serve eggplant. The very combination of fried eggplant with tomata sauce, pasta, cheese and basil on the top is too good to resist. It is a scrumptious vegetable dish, perfect for any parties or potlucks.
Instead of baking in a casserole dish, I chose to assemble the fried eggplant individually on a bed of pasta & tomato sauce. Since its just two of us eating dinner most of the times, this works as I don't need to worry about left overs.
But, for a bigger group, to make things simple - in a shallow baking dish, arrange fried eggplant slices with cheese, pasta and tomato sauce as layers to form a stack and bake until cheese bubbles. Top with shredded basil leaves. Yum!
May Lord Ganesha shower his blessings and fulfill all our wishes. :-)
As promised in my yesterday's post, here I am with recipe of Dates and Sesame Poornalu. The traditional stuffing for such poornam boorelu is - (pressure cooked + mashed bengal gram (chana dal), jaggery, shredded coconut with a hint of cardamom powder). These are very commonly made in Andhra households during almost all festivals. The twist of (dates with sesame seed combo) is just as delicious as our classic version and will be a crowd pleaser. Do give them a try.
“To get the full value of joy you must have someone to divide it with.” ~ Mark Twain
Yesterday was one of most beautiful days of my life. A day filled with loads of joy, warmth and happy little smiles all around. For the occasion of Vinayaka Chaturdhi, folks from Roshini, an NGO based out of Hyderabad conducted a clay ganesh making workshop for Vaidehi Ashram girls. The excitement on their faces is something I will remember and cherish for years to come and am so happy to be a part of it.
Below are some pictures taken during the workshop to share with you all. They put up the best ones for sale and we got some home which made our festival extra special this year. :-)
an idol made by one of the girls. Isn't our Lord Ganesha beautiful.
After almost 3 yrs and 8 months i.e around 193 weeks of remarkable hosting of this super popular, ever illustrious event in blog-o-sphere, its my opportunity to guest host Weekend Herb Blogging, yet again. Much has changed with this blog since then. But WHB remained true to its roots of introducing a whole new gamut of recipes where plants/fruits/vegetables/herbs are the real star. Kudos to both Haalo of Cook (almost) Anything at Least Once and Kalyn, who originally conceptualized this event for doing such a wonderful job.
Please join me in cooking and celebrating the natural goodness a variety of seasonal produce all through this week.
1. Entries to Weekend Herb Blogging must be posts written specifically for Weekend Herb Blogging. This means they cannot be cross-posted in other events. Photos used in the posts however can be submitted to photo events like DMBLGIT.
2. Weekend Herb Blogging entries should have the goal of helping people learn about cooking with herbs or plant ingredients. Only two types of entries will be accepted:
* Recipe posts where a herb or plant ingredient is one of the primary ingredients in the recipe
* Informative posts that spotlight one herb or plant ingredient, particularly including information about how they are used in cooking. Naturally, posts can be a combination of both these criteria.
3. Posts must contain the phrase Weekend Herb Blogging with a link to this announcement post and Haalo's original WHB post.
5. Send in your entries to info (dot) siri (at) gmail (dot) com with subject "WHB" with following information. If you don't recieve an acknowledgement for 48 hrs of your submission, please feel free to ping me by commenting on this post as sometimes email communications get lost.
Your Name
Your Blog Name/URL
Your Post URL
Your Location
Attach a photo (any size)
6. I will accept entries posted from now to till September 23rd 2012. 11pm Sunday - Indian Standard Time/ 3pm Sunday - Utah Time/ 10pm Sunday - London Time/ 9am Monday - Melbourne (Aus) adjusted for daylight savings time. You can use this converter to find out the corresponding time in your location. No late or previously published entries please. Roundup will be published by Monday, September 24th midnight (IST).
Happy Cooking and I will be eagerly awaiting for your beautiful creations,
Its raining cats and dogs since past few days here in Hyderabad and the weather in general is not-so-good for any physical activity. I just want to curl up into bed and sleep for long hours without anybody reminding me of the never-ending to-do-list. Well, that's just a dream distant now, but one thing I can definitely do is pester my mom to make something delicious and just relax. At least I don't have to worry about some good food getting on to the plate. Isn't it.
Our dinner last night were these subtly spiced Paneer and Spinach Parathas and Oh my, these taste so so good. I just couldn't take off my hands as these parathas were flying off the griddle. But, there was a job (to photograph them) at hand. So, I quickly clicked a few and quietly enjoyed my meal. I was in food-heaven you see! :-)
Now it your turn to make these and Enjoy!
Paneer and Spinach Parathas with fried green chillies to give it a dhaba-like feel.
{Recipe} Paneer and Spinach (Palak) Parathas
Makes around 10-12 parathas Ingredients:
For the dough:
3 cups Whole wheat flour (atta)
1 bunch or 1 cup tightly packed of spinach leaves, roughly chopped
1 tsp lemon juice
1 tsp salt
4 tbsp olive oil (or ghee or any oil)
For the stuffing:
250 gms of paneer/indian cottage cheese, grated
2 small bunches of coriander or cilantro leaves, finely chopped
1 tbsp cumin powder
1 tbsp coriander powder
1 tsp amchur /dry mango powder
1 tsp red chilli powder
salt - to taste
1/2 tsp finely grated fresh ginger
To serve as accompaniments - Fried green chillies, Yogurt, Pickle
Preparation:
1. Gently mix all ingredients listed under "For the stuffing". Keep aside.
grated Paneer Stuffing
2. Blend together spinach, lemon juice and 1/4 cup water until smooth. In a mixing bowl, add flour, salt, olive oil and spinach paste. Mix and knead until smooth dough by adding enough water. Make into lemon-sized portions.
3. Roll out each portion of the dough.
4. Place a tbsp of stuffing in the middle.
5. Seal all edges like you do for a dumpling.
6. Do the same for rest of the dough portions as well. It is important to not to roll out these stuffed dumplings immediately. Rest them for 5-10 mins.
7. Place sealed side down and gently roll out into a paratha.
8. Heat a griddle and cook both sides of the paratha with some oil or ghee. Repeat with rest of the parathas as well.
Fry some green chillies until charred and serve them as accompaniment to these parathas along with yogurt and pickle. Truly dhaba-style! :-)
