Fish in exotic coconut sauce with lemon-herb rice

I had tried my hands in chicken, but never in fish before. Finally I was able to move on and got my hand fishy. So cooked fish fillets in rich, thick, creamy coconut sauce

Here is my journey for the same. I have used basa fillets for this recipe
1. I had them already
2. It has nice firm flesh and no smell at all.
3. It melts in your mouth :)


Ingredients for sauce:
1 medium size onion (finely chopped)
1 carrot finely chopped
1 tsp ginger paste
1 tsp garlic paste
2 tsp herb mix (Oregano, basil ,thyme)
1 tsp red chilly flakes
1 tsp all purpose flour
2 cup coconut milk (medium thickness)
4-5 Fish fillets chunks (you may season it with salt and pepper or whatever you like)
salt and white wine to taste

Ingredients

Method:
- Heat oil in pan and saute onions until they turn pink
- Add carrots and saute them til they are tender
- Add ginger, garlic paste with flour and saute for minute or two
- Add in 1-2 tsp of white wine and let it all evaporate.
- Add fish fillets to pan, and saute them for 2 minutes each side
- Add in coconut milk, and give a nice stir.
- Bring it to boil and add herb mix with chilly flakes.
- Give a nice stir and then cook through for about 10-15 minutes on low heat.
- Its ready to serve with rice

Fish in coconut sauce

Herb-Lemon rice

Ingredients:
1 cup raw long grain rice
1/2 tsp lemon zest
2 tsp herb mix
lemon food color

Method:
- Soak rice for about 20-30 minutes.
- In a pot start boiling water, add in salt, herb mix and lemon zest
- On a roaring boil add in rice (be careful)
- cook till 90% done
- Drain and cover with muslin cloth for about 10 mins, this will allow rice to cook through in its own steam

Herb-Lemon Rice

Serve fish with rice, its a excellent flavorful meal :)

Served.

Enjoy.

Chicken chettinad

Honestly people, I have never ever tested chicken chettinad before, but have seen its images and from them I could tell this must be very tasty and juicy stuff. So I decided to prepare in home.

This recipe does not belong to me, I thanks for many contributors from Internet for sharing their own recipes. I have referenced few recipes and have come up with my own.

So here it is Chicken Chettinad, we are going to use custom spice mix than store bought spice mix, a fresh spice mix always brings out best flavors.

Marination:
1/2 kg chicken (with Bone)
2 tsp sambhar masala
1 tsp garam masala
1 tsp lime juice
1 tsp salt
1 tsp oil

Marinated chicken

Mix both masalas, salt with lime juice and apply this marinade to chicken. Make sure chicken is coated nicely in marinade. Next add oil and just coat chicken, this will help marinade to stick to chicken.


Spice mix:
1 tsp coriander seeds
1 tsp cumin seeds
1/2 tsp fennel seeds
2 Red whole chilly
1" cinnamon stick
2 green cardamom
3-4 cloves
1 tsp black pepper
1/2 cup grated coconut
1 bay leaf
1 piece of star anise

Spice mix 

Roast all above spices till aromatic, ground them in fine powder.
Next grind grated coconut along with spices and keep aside.


For chicken gravy:
I preferred thick gravy over thin gravy, but one can add more water as needed to make thin/runny gravy as well.

2 medium size onions (finely chopped)
2 medium size tomatoes (finely chopped)
chopped coriander
10-15 curry leaves

For gravy

Final showdown:
- Add little oil in frying pan, and once its hot sear off chicken over high heat from both sides (2-3 mins each side) and set aside, keep juices as is in pan

Seared off chicken 

- Now saute onions till they are cooked and then add spice mix that we had made earlier, saute well.
- Add in tomatoes and saute till everything has been cooked.
- At this point add in chicken and saute for 3-4 minutes.
- Add a cup of water, mix well and bring it to boil.
- Put lid on and let it on simmer for about 15-20 minutes.
- chicken should be done by now, if you prefer thick gravy, turn on high heat and let water get evaporated.
- If thin gravy is preferred then just check for doneness and turn off heat.
- Garnish with coriander and lime wedge

1 Chicken chettinad served :)

Enjoy :)

Swiss roll

I had attempted making swiss roll once before, however I had failed miserably. So I tried again and atleast sponge wise I got successful. Since my oven is small I was not able to make beautiful long cake, ended up, cutting perfect square cake in rectangular shape and then divide in 2 sheets LOL :D.

So it appear bit mess but it was perfect sponge and delicious. Yeh I admit pattern is mediocre, but given I was very afraid of trying it again, I used my lucky charm, yeah my daughter's name :) I know there are lot expert bakers out there who can mend this recipe more perfectly.

Enough talking here is what I followed:

For pattern:
1 egg white
30 gms granulated sugar, need little more if using powdered sugar
40 gms all purpose flour
20 gms butter

- Mix sugar in egg white with wire whisk or spoon, till its nicely glazed.
- Add in butter and mix well, here you can add any food color.
- Mix in flour to make smooth batter.
- Fill it in piping bag, and make pattern over parchment paper
(If you are choosing some writing as I did, then make sure your writing should be mirror imaged.)
- You can get pattern templates online as well, so you can put them below parchment paper and then simply trace them over parchment paper, make sure parchment paper is greased a bit, this avoid pattern stick less on paper while baking.
- Put tray/paper in freezer for atleast hour before baking. So that pattern shall become hard.

Cake with pattern

For Swiss roll:
5 eggs yolks
5 eggs whites
2/3 cup granulated sugar (Divided in 2 equal portions (i.e. 1/3rd )
1 tsp - orange juice (lemon juice can be substituted)
1 tsp - orange zest (lemon zest can also be used) (If you don't have orange flavor put more zest)
2/3rd cup flour
1 tsp baking soda
3 tbsp melted butter
1/4 tsp salt


- Whisk egg yolks with orange juice and zest, add sugar slowly and whisk until nice and fluffy.
- Whisk egg whites till soft peaks are formed. At this point start adding sugar slowly and continue whisking till hard peaks are formed. At this point whipped mixture shall not fall even if bowl is inverted :D
- Now fold in yolks to egg whites, make sure to fold it gently so that egg whites are not much deflated. Fold in melted butter at this stage.
- Fold in half of flour at a time, till all flour is folded in.
- Bake on flat tray for almost 10-12 minutes on 375 F or 190 C.
- Once baking is done, slowly flip the cake, and take out parchment paper very very slowly, so that pattern shall separate from paper.
- Again flip the cake and let cake cool down a bit, once its cooled down. Put any stuffing you want, I used simple whipped cream, you may use butter frosting or cream cheese etc. and roll cake sheet nice and tight, from the opposite end of pattern, so once you are finished pattern will be on top.

Rolled cake with whipped cream filling 

Enjoy your cake and be creative in patterns :)

Mushroom cream sauce

Mushroom cream sauce is on of my most favorite and easy preparation. Here is how i do it.

Ingredients:

1 cup sliced mushrooms (use any mushroom of your choice)

1 cup cream

dash of white wine

1/4th cup mixture of finely chopped onion, celery and carrots 

1 tbsp butter

1 tsp basil, oregano, rosemary each

salt and pepper for taste

Method:

Saute onion, celery and carrots on butter along with mushrooms till they are cooked.

Add dash of white wine and cook through till it evaporates, this will infuse wine's flavor in all mixture. 

Add cream and mix well, add in herbs, salt and pepper and mix well.

Bring to boil and let it become bit thicker. 

Your sauce is ready, enjoy with your favorite dish or with some meat preparation. 

Enjoy :)

chicken meat loaf

I had watched some recipe for meatloaf on TLC channel, so I wanted to try out something similar but with chicken. So here is my try for the same

Ingredients for meatloaf:
500 gms of boneless chicken / minced chicken.
1 egg
1/2 cup bread crumb
1/2 cup diced cheese cubes
1/4th cup cream
1/4th cup spring onion finely chopped
1/4th cup finely chopped carrots
1/4th cup finely chopped celery (optional)
1/4th cup finely chopped tomatoes
1 tsp ginger paste
1 tsp garlic paste
1 tsp red chilly powder
1 green chilly in 4-5 small pieces
salt and pepper for seasoning, feel free to add

Method:
- Saute together onions, carrots, celery, tomatoes with ginger garlic paste and rest of ingredients, till they are cooked.
- let it come to room temperature and then make fine paste of it in grinder.
- Mince chicken along with cooked paste.
- Add diced cheese cubes (Once baked cheese just oozes out and taste delicious :) )
- Add egg along with cream to mixture and knead well
- Start adding breadcrumbs to this mixture, here mixture shall start to become thick. Add enough breadcrumb so entire mixture gets bread dough kind of consistency.
- preheat oven to 180 degree Celsius or 350 degree F, grease up loaf pan with little oil
- Put mixture in loaf pan and make sure to spread mixture evenly.
- Bake for about 30-45 minutes until its done, check for internal temperature of 160 F or 70 degree Celsius.
- Meat loaf is done. Cut thin slices and serve with garlic bread and mushroom cream sauce or any other sauce.

Here is my version or how I served it:
Meat loaf slices with mashroom cream sauce with garlic toast and sangria and fruity leafy salad.

Tip:
For a moist meatloaf, put loaf pan in water bath while baking.
If you don't have breadcrumbs, use all purpose flour or corn flour.

Enjoy :)

Sangria cocktail

I tested Sangria first time during a visit to Hyatt regency for a lunch party, and I fell deeply for it.
Here is my version to recreate it.

What you need:
90 ml red wine
15 ml brandy
15 ml orange juice
1 tsp powdered sugar
1 cup small pieces of apple, pear and orange.

How to conjure this tasty potion:
Cut small pieces of apple, pear and orange (with peels) .
Mix all ingredients with fruit pieces and give it a nice stir.
Let is seat in your fridge covered for 12 hours (for best results).
serve with in glass and keep some fruit pieces as is.

Enjoy fruity sangria.

Don't drink and drive though :)

Chicken Biryani

If someone asks me what is your most favorite food in non-veg, I'll always reply a perfect aromatic chicken biryani. Its a beautiful food with nice aromatic spices, spicy ofcourse, soft and wonderful chicken and magnificent basamati rice. Its a dish full of joy and no one can stop eating major portion of it if its made perfectly. After numerous failures and somewhat successful tries I was finely able to prepare a perfect aromatic chicken biryani that I always crave for :) Here is joy same perils for you all.

Ingredients for biryani masala (dry):
Using fresh masalas everytime can definitely produce good results, I used shan chicken biryani mix masala, but I found it very similar to what I prefer.

1 tsp shah jira
1 black cardamom (badi ilaichi)
2 green cardamoms  (ilaichi)
2 inch cinnamon stick  (dalchini)
8-10 black pepper seeds (kali mirch ke dane)
2-4 cloves (laung)
1 bayleaf (tejpatta)
2 star annise
1 mace
1 tsp coriander seed powder
1 tbps red chilly powder
1 tsp salt

Grind them to fine powder and keep in airtight container for a while. We are going to use it as marination.


Fried onions:

Fried onions

Take a medium size onion and cut in julienne style  (vertical thin strips) and separate every strip, sprinkle some all purpose flour on them. Meanwhile heat up oil and fry onions untill they start changing color, immediately take them out once u see color change, or else they might get burned. This shall make crisp fried onions. Make 2 portions, reserve one for rice and add other in chicken marinade.  Keep oil as is and use same oil for rest of biryani for additional flavor.

Ingredients for chicken:
500 gms chicken with bones.
1 tsp ginger paste/garlic powder
1 tsp garlic paste
Biryani masala 2 tbsp (We have already prepared it or use any store bought masala mix)
1 tbsp mint powder or crushed mint leaves
2 tbsp fried onion
1 tsp red chilly powder
1 tsp salt
2 tbsp oil (any vegetable oil)

Marinated chicken

Mix all above ingredients with chicken and make sure all chicken pieces are nicely coated with marinade. Keep it covered overnight for best results.

Rice preparation:
2 cup rice (long grained) soak for no more than half hour.
1 bayleaf
1 star anise
1 mace
4-5 black pepper seeds
2 cloves
1 inch cinnamon stick
1 tsp salt

Take a sizable pot and add about 4 cups of water in it, then add all above spices and let it simmer for a while. Once it simmers add in soaked rice and cook until its half done. We need a sieve here to take out rice and put in layers for biryani. Read putting it together for final procedure.

Saffron milk:
Take half a cup milk, and heat it up but don't boil it. Add in saffron strands (8-10) and keep it aside, stir occasionally so color is properly mixed. If you don't have saffron strands, then u can use artificial flavor,
and use saffron color. I used strands plus some color for extra rich color.

Saffron milk

Put it all together:
Now its time to put everything together.

All layers in place

- Add 1 tbsp oil in thick bottom pan (I used pressure cooker), and keep it on high heat, add in marinated chicken along with its juices and saute for 2-3 minutes each side.
- Add half a cup of water and saute for another 2-3 minutes each side till very little water is left.
- Lower the flame and start straining rice from water and put down layers on chicken till all rice along with spices has been layered.
- Sprinkle fried onions and roughly chopped coriander leafs on top
- Add roasted almonds, cashews (optional) on top
- Pour saffron milk in center or drizzle over rice
- Put lid on and seal it. Pressure cooker comes very handy here, make sure you keep whistle on.
- Cook biryani for about 30 minutes on low flame (putting biryani pot on tava helps prevent burning of biryani)
- After 30 minutes open up lid and sprinkle/drizzle either kevda water or simply saffron flavored water (I added 5 ml saffron flavor in 2 tbsp water ) and put lid on. Serve after 5 minutes.

Delicious and aromatic biryani is ready to serve :) Enjoy and let me know how it turns out for you.

Chicken Biryani ready to satisfy you

Jelly candies

I always liked/loved Jelly cubes/candies also known as Jujubs.

While surfing on my favorite group on facebook I came across this recipe from Teji Singh. And here goes my try.

Ingredients..

25 gms gelatin

115 ml water

35 ml lime juice

250 gms sugar 

Colors: As per your choice

Essence: As per your choice

Castor sugar and cornflour for coating (2:1 ratio)

Method

1. Take water is a bowl and sprinkle gelatine on top of it, let it bloom for about 10 minutes. Gelatine will bloom as soak up all water but don't worry it, once we heat up this water it shall dissolve w/o any problem.

(Push it down gently with fingers if required to cover it properly with water)

2. Using a double boiler method , melt the gelatin by gently stirring till it melts, now water should appear bit thick and mushy in color, turn off heat and set aside.

3. Take a thick bottomed pan, mix the lime juice and sugar. Put it on low heat, stir till it starts melting or bubbles start appearing on sides. 

4. Add gelatine water in this mixture while stirring gently on low flame.

5. Keep stirring until all sugar is dissolved (please makes sure flame is on low all the time)

6. Once sugar is dissolved, turn up heat to medium and bring mixture to a boil (temperature shall read about 215 F)

7. Set aside for a while, meanwhile prepare molds with gently greasing them.

8. Here we add essence and color and mix well. Pour into molds and set aside for about 10 hrs at room temperature.

9. Remove any scum or froth after 5 minutes or so and then let molds set undisturbed at room temperature.

Coating:

After 10 hrs we ready to make cubes/stripes or whatever shape u want.

1. Prepare coating mixture from castor sugar and cornflour in 2:1 ratio. I used about 4 tbsp sugar and 2 tbsp corn flour for above ingredients.

2. Spread this mixture on parchment/butter paper.

3. Heat up some water in bigger bowl and gently put mold in water say about 30 secs and flip mold on parchment paper.

4. After 2-3 minutes coat remaining surface with same mixture and make cuts with sharp knife. I find using heated knife gives best results.

5.Store it in air tight container. 

6.Since it does not have any added preservative except lime juice and sugar, consume within a week (if kept in fridge).

Enjoy. This recipe shall yield about 20-30 candies.

I don't own this recipe. I have followed this recipe from Teji Singh, link to her blog is => http://tejiskitchen.blogspot.com/2014/07/jujubesjelly-candies.html

Thanks Teji :)

Burmese Khow Suey

Burmese Khow Suey, a beautiful creamy and tasty soup which I had in a fine dining restaurant at Pune.
I became crazy with its creamy delicious taste and beautiful aroma, I couldn't stopped myself for having more than 1 servings and neglecting chicken and fish fingers altogether. Its served with variety of toppings and that's makes it more delicious, just add a dash of fresh lemon juice and that taste gets you. So I decided to replicate this at home. After referring 1-2 recipes from Internet here is my version for the same.

Ingredients:
2 cups of thick coconut milk
1 onion finely chopped
1 tsp ginger paste
1 tsp garlic paste
1 tsp turmeric
4-5 curry leafs
1 tsp coriander powder
1 tsp cumin seed powder
2 tsp oil
1 tsp Indian yellow lentil (chana daal) powder
1 root of lemon grass finely chopped


Method:
Add 1 tsp oil in woke and saute onion first till they become pink in color
Add in ginger and garlic pastes and saute a while.
Add in turmeric powder, curry leafs, coriander powder, cumin seed powder, chopped lemon grass and saute for while.
Let this mixture cool down, then add in yellow lentil powder and blend to make a fine paste, you can add little water just to make sure no lumps are left in paste.
Add in 1 tsp oil and saute this paste for a while, season with salt and red chilly powder (if you wish to make it bit hot)
Stir in coconut milk and now you should start getting aromas of all the spices, simmer for while.
You can add little water if mixture become too thick, just simmer for a while if water is added.
Thats it "Khow Suey" is ready.

This is how it should look

How to serve it:
Serving this soup is an art altogether which determines final taste of your soup.
Generally these toppings are used:
- roasted unsalted peanust
- red chilies cut in thin strips (de-seeded)
- finely chopped fresh coriander leaves
- fried noodles
- finely chopped fried garlic cloves
- lime wedges
- boiled rice noodles
- sprouts

All toppings added

 I served by adding little fried noodles, roasted peanuts, red chilly stripes, coriander leaves, garlic and dash of fresh lime juice, and topped with soup. Trust me it looks and taste delicious.

Final product 

Orange butter cookies

I do not own this recipe, This recipe belongs to Stephanie from joyofbaking.com, I have modified original recipe to use oranges instead of lemon. This recipe does not use any sort of flavoring agent and completely organic substances. Thanks Stephanie for this lovely buttery treat.

All credit goes to Stephanie for this wonderful buttery cookies.

Ingredients:

2/3 cup (135 grams) granulated white sugar

1 tablespoon (6 grams) freshly grated Orange zest (outer orange skin of Orange) (about 2 Oranges)

14 tablespoons (200 grams) unsalted butter, at room temperature (used Low fat butter)

2 large egg yolks (35 grams), at room temperature

2 cups (260 grams) all purpose flour

Orange Glaze:

1/2 cup (55 grams) confectioners sugar (powdered or icing sugar), sifted

1-2 tablespoons of freshly squeezed orange juice.

How to do it:

In a small bowl mix the sugar with the orange zest.

In the a separate bowl beat the butter and sugar until creamy smooth (1 - 2 minutes).  

Beat in the egg yolks. Scrape down the sides of your bowl as needed.

Add the flour mixture to the batter and beat just until the mixture starts to form large clumps. 

Make nice smooth round of dough, divide the batter in half and shape each half into a log that is about 6 inches (15 cm) long and 2 inches (5 cm) wide. 

Wrap each log in plastic wrap and place in the refrigerator until firm (at least four hours or up to three days). (Can freeze the unbaked logs for up to two months.)

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees F (180 degrees C). Line a baking sheet with parchment paper. 

Once the logs have become firm, with a sharp knife, slice each log into 1/4 inch (.5 mm) thick cookies. 

Place the cookies on your baking sheet, spacing about 2 inches (5 cm) apart. Bake for about 15 - 18 minutes, or until the edges of the cookies are golden brown. 

Remove from oven and let them cool

Orange Glaze (Optional)

Place the confectioners sugar in a small bowl. 

Add enough Orange juice to make a mixture that flows slowly from your spoon. Drizzle the tops of the cookies with the glaze. Let dry for about 1-2 hours before placing in an airtight container.

Variations from my side:

1. I used Nutrilite/Amul lite butter (low fat contents)

2. Since butter already has some salt I didn't used any salt with flour.

3. Cookie dough became little bit soggy, so I added 2 Tbsp flour and 1 Tbsp powdered sugar 

to make sure dough does not become sticky and holds its shape.

4. you can cut them in any size/shape. I used rectangular shape, since my daughter loved rectangular cookies more :)

Hainanese chicken rice

Hainanese chicken rice or simply chicken rice as called in Singapore. One of the easiest and yet super awesome food I ever tried in Singapore. Here is my try to replicate same. Thanks to many blogs and videos on youtube for this recipe.

Its a very simple dish, they serve boiled chicken at room temperature along with dipping sauce and hot steamed rice cooked in chicken broth. Simple isn't it. Actual or I may say authentic recipe demands full chicken with skin, however I had some leftover un-skinned chicken breasts to go with. So I used them instead.



What we need:
2 chicken breast pieces (Or any chicken part with bone ideally)
2-3 small slices of ginger
1-2 strands of spring onion (preferably one with small onion bulbs)
Salt
sliced medium red onion (optional)
1 tsp Minced ginger-garlic paste (homemade-optional)
Raw Rice of your choice

Well this is 2 step process. In first step we will boil chicken and then in second step cook rice in chicken broth.

Cooking chicken

Prepare chicken:
First of all air dry your chicken or make it dry by using paper towels. Rub salt all over chicken from inside and outside, this will get rid of dead skin or any other gucks etc from chicken.
Rinse out chicken thoroughly and then again let it become dry in open air or use paper towels.
Now again use salt and rub all over chicken for seasoning.
Stuff chicken with slices of ginger and chopped spring onion strands.
Take a heavy bottom pan and put chicken in it. Pour in room temperature water till chicken is completely submerged in water.
Bring water to boil over high heat, then reduce heat to low flame and cook chicken covered for about 20-30 minutes (depending upon size of chicken) on low flame. Here you can remove some leftover impurities from water.
If you are using chicken pieces, just put slices of ginger and spring onion into water and it should work too.
Turn off the heat take chicken out and put chicken in ice water. This shall stop cooking immediately and tightens the skin (most important).
Take it out from ICE water and let it air dry. Our chicken is ready now, keep it aside. Don't throw away that broth as we want it to cook rice in it.
Authentic recipe needs to brush chicken with sesame oil before serving.

Prepare dipping sauce:
Dipping sauce is pretty much simple. I mixed 1 tsp red chilly paste in 2 tbsp chicken broth, along with 1/2 tsp soy sauce and 1 tsp lime juice. You can be creative here to make dipping sauce as per your taste.

Sieved broth 

Prepare rice:
We need to use leftover chicken broth from boiling for cooking rice, so get broth sieved to different pan and let it come to room temperature.
This is optional step but you can have saute onions with minced ginger-garlic paste until they are browned. We shall add this just before rice is almost cooked. This is a real flavor enhancer by the way :)  
Measure desired rice and add appropriate amount of broth. If broth is less then add water, in this case you may also want to drop in 1-2 slice of ginger and stand of spring onion (make sure to remove them at end of cooking procedure).
Our rice is ready to serve, plate it along with chicken and dipping sauce, you may serve salad vegetable along with it as per your choice.

Enjoy your rice.