Jhatpat Shahi Paneer (Simple & Quick)

Very Quick and ultimately delicious recipe.

I prepared this dish just in a matter of 8-9 minutes and after tasting the final outcome, it was hard for me to wait for the chapati to be cooked and served.

The aroma of this sabji is so tempting and flavorful, that when my kiddo returned from school, she wanted to have the lunch right away, without wasting another moment!

This preparation tastes exactly like the restaurant style shahi paneer or I should say.. even better!!

Serves - 3-4

Ingredients:

Tomatoes - 4
Cashew nuts (broken into small pieces) - 2 tbsp
Melon Seeds - 1 tsp
Ghee - 1 tsp
Green Elaichi Powder - 1/4 tsp
Shahi Paneer Masala - 1/2 tsp
Chana Masala - 1/2 tsp
Sugar - 2 tsp
Degi Mirch Powder - 1/2 tsp
Kasuri Methi - 1/2 tsp
Fresh Malai - 2 tbsp
Milk - 1/2 cup
Water - 1/2 cup
Salt - to taste
Paneer (cut into cubes) - 150 gms

Procedure :

1. Make a very fine paste of tomatoes, cashew nuts and melon seeds.
2. Heat ghee in a non-stick pan. Add the prepared tomato-cashew mixture.
3. While the tomato-cashew mixture is being cooked, start adding all the spices - Elaichi powder, Shahi paneer masala, Chana Masala, Sugar, Degi Mirch Powder, Kasuri Methi, Salt.
4. Cook on medium-high flame till the mixture leaves oil on the sides of the pan.
5. Add water to bring the gravy to the desired consistency. Add paneer cubes. Cook for a minute on high flame. Switch off the flame.
5. Slightly whisk the fresh malai to dissolve any lumps. Add malai and milk to the prepared sabji. Mix and cover the wok with a lid till the serving time.


Best Accompaniment - Lacha Paratha, Butter Naan

Strawberry Trifle

Things required :

1 stem glass
Leftover vanilla sponge cake
Whipped Cream
Fresh Strawberry chunks (hulled and chopped)

Procedure :

1. Cut the sponge into 1 inch cubes and place a few of them at the bottom of the glass.
2. Pipe out a generous amount of whipping cream over it to form a layer.
3. Layer the chunks of fresh strawberry over it.
4. Pipe out whipping cream to make a new layer.
5. Place the cake cubes carefully to make a new layer.
6. Again pipe out whipping cream to form a layer.
7. Lastly place the fresh strawberry chunks to make the top-most layer.
8. Chill it for atleast 2 hours before serving.

Tips : You can use a readymade sponge cake to keep the procedure simpler.

Variation :   Orange Trifle. For the recipe, please click here.

Thousand Island Veggie Hot Dog (Low Calorie)

A lip smacking dish you can serve as a tea-time snacks, as an accompaniment to hot soup, as a starter or as a Sunday brunch.

Beginners can make it without any hassle.

This dish can also be prepared using cheese, to view that, please click here.

Makes: 6 hot dogs

Ingredients :

Cabbage (shredded) - 3 cups
Onions (finely chopped) - 2
Tomato (finely chopped) - 2
Fresh Corriander (finely chopped) - 2 tbsp
Dry Rosemary (crushed) - 1/2 tsp
Dry Parsley - 1/2 tsp
Chili flakes - 1/4 tsp (optional)
Salt - to taste
Thousand Island Dressing - 3 tbsp
Hot Dog Breads - 6
Melted low fat butter - for greasing hot dogs
Tomato Ketcup

Procedure :

1. In a big bowl, mix cabbage, onion, tomato, corriander, rosemary herb, dry parsley, chili flakes, salt and thousand island dressing. Chili flakes is optional because thousand island dressing is already very spicy, so if want to make your salad more spicy, you can add chili flakes, otherwise skip it.
(This salad is complete in itself and can be served as an accompaniment to lunch and dinner.)

Thousand Island salad

2. Using a knife, Cut the hot dog breads horizontally into half (but the two pieces should remain  attached to each other at the back of the hot dog bread) so that you can open it and put the stuffing.

slit the hot dog

3. Apply tomato ketchup on both the inner sides of the slit hot dog breads.

spread pizza topping

4. Divide the prepared salad into six portions and fill each portion into the hot dog breads.

fill the salad into hot dog breads

5. Brush melted low fat butter all over the outer surface of hot dog breads and bake it for 4 minutes at 250 degrees in a preheated oven on a low rack. The bread should turn red and crispy.

6. Garnish the baked hot dogs with tomato ketchup in a zigzag pattern using a squeezy bottle and serve them immedietly.

Lachcha Paratha

Ingredients : Whole wheat flour, Salt and water.

Preapare a regular dough as you would prepare for chapati.

You can also use maida for this recipe. Lachcha Parathas made with maida are much more soft and crisp than whole wheat flour. But whole wheat lachcha parathas are a healthy deal :)

Procedure :

Take the dough slightly bigger than the size of regular chapati.

Using a rolling pin, roll the ball shaped dough into a chapati.

Pour a few drops of refined oil/ghee over it.

Spread it all over.

Fold the chapati like a fan.

From one end start rolling it to make a circle.

Go on...

The final result should be this. Press the ends.

Dust it with flour.

Other side too.

Start rolling it with the rolling pin

Roll it till u make it to the size of chapati.

Now heat a non-stick tawa/griddle, cook it as we cook a regular paratha.

Serve immediately.

Tastes best with pineapple raita + paneer sabji/navratan korma/ methi matar malai and other such party recipes.

Chocolate Ganache/Truffle Cake

My husband loves chococlate, so for the midnight cake on his bday I decided to do the ganache cake to delight him. He was amazed.  He loved it!

To start with, first prepare the sponge in a heart shape microwave safe dish and set it aside to cool down on a wire rack.

For the recipe of the cake/sponge please click here.

Slice the cake horizontally into 3 layers.

Then I prepared my Ganache using : 1 tetra pack (200 ml) Amul low fat cream, 400 gm cooking chocolate.

Seperate the watery liquid from the cream and use only the thick cream. Cut the cooking chocolate slab into small chunks, put them in the cream and microwave it on 80% power till chocolate melts and yields a smooth shiny paste. This is ganache!

Now pour some soaking syrup on the bottom layer of the sponge and spread one-fourth of the ganache, then carefully place the middle layer, pour some soaking syrup and apply the ganache and then the top layer, pour the soaking syrup and apply ganache on the top and all the sides of the cake.

 Garnish the cake with grated chocolate and sprinklers. 

Tadaa... 

Tip : Microwave the cake wedge just before serving for 10 seconds, enhances the taste and texture many folds.

                         

Palak Pyaz Bhajia / Spinach Onion Fritters

Makes : 30 fritters
Preparation Time : 15 min
Cooking Time : 20 min

Ingredients :

Spinach (roughly chopped) - 4 cups
Onion (thinly sliced) - 1.25 cups
Salt - 3/4 tsp
Chat Masala - 1 tsp
Corriander powder (dhania powder) - 1.5 tsp
Carom Seeds (Ajwain) - 1/2 tsp
Chilli Powder - 1/4 tsp or 1 green chilli finely chopped
Gram Flour (Besan) - 3/4 cup

Procedure :

1. Wash spinach, onion and put in a colander/sieve to drain excess water.
2. Put them in a flat dish and mix all the remaining ingredients. No need to add any water if you wash the veggies just before adding the seasoning and besan, if you have washed it beforehand, then you may need to add 1-2 tsp of water, but make sure the mixture is wet, lumpy and thick. It should not be runny at all. It will look like this :

3. Divide the mixture into 30 equal portions and roll each portion into a round ball.
4. In a flat bottom kadai/wok, heat oil and deep fry these balls on medium flame, till they turn golden brown from all the sides. The deep-frying procedure should take a little longer then deep frying potato cutlets, otherwise you will find them uncooked from inside, so make sure the oil is medium hot and NOT very hot.

5. Palak kanda bhajji is ready to serve. Serve immediately with tomato ketchup or any chutney of your choice :)

Best Accompaniment : Hot Masala Tea

Tip :  You can add 1 tsp anardana (dry pomegranate seeds) in step 2 to enhance the flavour and taste.

Paneer Mushroom Curry (low calorie)

A very tasty and a healthy combo of paneer and mushroom.

Mushroom is the only source of Vitamin D for vegetarians and Vitamin D is the most significant nutrient for the proper absorption of calcium in our body. Here, I would like to highlight the fact that the body can not absorb calcium at all without some vitamin D. So, its good if we put some mushroom pieces in paneer (good source of calcium) sabji or paneer cubes in a mushroom prepartion.

Serves : 4
Preparation time : 12-15 min.
Cooking time : 12-15 min

Ingredients :

Onion  (cut into cubes) - 3 medium
Tomato (blended into puree) - 2 medium
Tomato (cut into cubes) - 1 medium
Capsicum  (cut into cubes) - 1 medium
Button Mushrooms (quartered) - 100 gm
Low Fat Paneer (cut into cubes) - 100 gm
Oil - 1 tsp
Salt - to taste
Red chilli powder - 1/4 tsp
Turmeric Powder - 1/4 tsp
Ginger Paste - 1/2 tsp
Corriander Powder - 1/2 tsp
Sugar - 1 tsp (optional)
Water - 1/2 cup

Procedure : 

1. Heat oil in a non-stick pan. Saute onion cubes till translucent pink.
2. Add pureed tomato, turmeric powder, red chili powder, salt, coriander powder, ginger paste, sugar.
3. Cook for 2 minutes. Add water, capsicum, mushroom and paneer cubes. Mix.
4. Cook on high flame for 1 minute, then cover the pan with lid and lower down the flame to sim.
5. Cook till capsicum gets tender.
6. Switch off the flame and add tomato cubes.
7. Serve it hot with freshly made chapatis, parathas or naan.

Tip :
1. If you plan it for a party, you can add 2 tbsp fresh cream.
2. Sugar is added to balance the tanginess of tomato in sabji. If you dont like, you can skip it.

Bharwan Sabjiyon Ka Masala

This is a tried and tested recipe for more than hundreds of times and it always comes right!
This proportion of spices goes with almost all the bharwa/stuff veggies, be it bharwan baingan, bharwa karela, bharwa tinda, bharwa aloo to name a few.

I learnt this recipe from my respected mom-in-law 
I could never find out by myself the right porportion of spice-mix for bharwan subji, unless one day i asked my mom-in-law the way she prepares the bharwan sabjis. That day i chalked down the proportion and blindly follow it for all the stuff veggies and needless to say, it is the best recipe!

I've seen many people buying those expensive readymade spice-mix for bharwan sabjis because they don't know the right proportion of spices. This recipe is to help such people and let everybody know the right measurements.

So, here goes the proportion :

Saunf (Aniseed/Fennelseed) Powder -  3 tsp
Dhaniya (Corriander) Powder -  5 tsp
Lal Mirch (Red Chilli) Powder - 1 tsp
Khatai/Amchur (Raw Mango) Powder - 2 tsp
Salt - 3 tsp
Haldi (Turmeric) Powder - 2 tsp

This is the ratio for the spices but quantity of spices that goes into the recipe depends on the size of the vegetable, amount of the vegetable and your taste (i.e. too spicy/mildly spicy/ less spicy).

Tip : Whatever size of spoon you use to measure the spices, use the same spoon throughout the recipe.