Hungry Enough To Eat A Horse Gram Pancake?

Recently, some nutritional advice saw me adding to my ever-creaking pantry. I was advised to eat dosas made of sprouted ragi (finger millet) and red rice flours so I have two tins full of those now. As I feared, the 3/4 cup:1 cup proportion of ragi to red rice flour did not work and I was left with a sticky, wet pancake that felt like a cold fish.

Even as I was mulling, well, not mulling, strictly speaking, but stressing out about how to use up the abovementioned flours, I got some further advice on supplementing nutrition with pancakes made with whole grains and millets of various kinds. Well, there is already a millet (ragi) in my pantry, and I wasn't about to buy more till I had lessened the load on those shelves a little bit, so I bought some horse gram and combined it with dals, flax seed and some of the ragi to make an adai of sorts. Adai is something like an unfermented dosa, made of a mixture of dals and rice, and always leaves me feeling like I've eaten something uncooked - it doesn't go down my throat smoothly and has always been a disappointment to me whenever and wherever I've eaten it. I've finished with keeping an open mind about it.

But I digress. This creation was much better than any adai I've come across and I think it's a keeper of a recipe. I already feel full of sunshine, vitamins, trace elements and folic acid. (You know I exaggerate.) Here's how you can get some yourselves.

List 1

Horse gram/Ulavalu: 1/2 cup
Bengal gram/chana dal: 1/4 cup
Whole masoor dal: 1/4 cup
Flax seed: A fistful

-----

Sprouted ragi flour: 1 tbsp
Water
Oil

-----

Green chillies, roughly chopped: 2
Ginger: 2-inch piece, peeled, roughly chopped

------

Coriander & curry leaves: 3 tbsp, washed, chopped

Salt

Soak all the items under List 1 in plenty of water overnight or for 8 hours.

Drain the water, wash once or twice and blitz in the mixer with the ginger and green chillies. Add splashes of water only enough to ensure that the mixer's motor runs smoothly.

Once it becomes a fairly fine paste, add the sprouted ragi flour. Mix it really well or operate the mixer on 'pulse'.

Add another splash of water if you need to achieve a 'spreadable' batter. Add the salt. Fold in the chopped coriander and curry leaves.

(Note: In my experience, this doesn't spread as smoothly as dosa batter. I can make perfect dosas, but these, they are 'maps of the world'.)

Take a ladle of batter, put it on an oiled, heated tawa/griddle, and spread it as carefully as you can. At some point or the other, it might threaten to come off along with the ladle you're spreading it with, but just pat it gently, leave it alone and simply go to another portion of it and smooth it there.

With the flame on medium, add some oil around the edges - 1/2 a tsp should do. Once the bottom feels cooked (you should be able to lift it off without bits sticking to the tawa), flip it over and cook all the uncooked parts.

I ate it with ginger pickle.

This goes off to Preeti at W'rite' Food who is hosting Susan's My Legume Love Affair.

My Legume Love Affair Horse gram Vegetarian

Muddapappu For MLLA - A Guest Post

Friend, shoulder and guide. Literally, she's all three of them - never fails to listen when I rant and whine and took me on a day-long walking tour of New York city in 2009. When Susan of The Well-Seasoned Cook invited me to write for her special anniversary event to commemorate MLLA which is entering Year 4 this month, I was only too happy to say yes.

I'd initially thought of posting this for various events but it somehow seems fitting that I never got around to doing it all these years - maybe it deserved a better effort and a bigger showcase and I'm glad to say it's finally here!

MLLA My Legume Love Affair Guest blogging Lentils/Dal Telugu Andhra food

Unfried Green Tomatoes

I like my tomato pappu (dal) as red as a tomato. The yellow of the dal adds its own hue so ultimately it's like a burst of orange-yellow sunshine in a child's drawing.

(Okay, this picture is less sunshiney than I want, but do as I say, not as I show.)

Take two fistfuls of tur dal (red gram/pigeon peas), add a disproportionate amount of tomatoes to it, at least five, if not more, and boil away the excess water and it's ready.

When I saw some green tomatoes at the store a couple of weeks ago, I had to grab them. Of course, I had no clue whatsoever what I was going to do with them, but I had to have them. Looking at several recipes several days later on the Net didn't help either - I wanted to use them up quick and not have to buy extra ingredients to be able to use them up so I decided I would look for recipes for kootu - it would be like the dal I'm used to yet not quite, I told myself, and it would be a healthy and easy balance between my impatience to get on with using something and not wasting it and my desire to experience a new and unfamiliar taste.

But kootu recipes usually mean the tiresome processing of a coconut, which is the rarest of rare commodities in my home. I decided to tilt the balance in favour of the familiar - do away with the coconut, with the dal of choice (green gram) and use tur dal, with pepper and fennel to impart the novelty.

As the cooking hour progressed, I took a look at the pestle and it felt incredibly heavy. Never mind, the peppercorns will split when I splutter them in oil, I told myself, and got on with it. All they did was spit. And get shiny.The fennel didn't make any difference; I should have reached for that pestle, after all! I didn't add too much turmeric because I wanted the dal to look green, and added two or three round red chillies to add some contrast to the dal.

Here's how I think I made it:

In a pressure cooker (or pan),
- take half a cup of washed toor dal (pre-soaking will help it cook faster and softer in a shorter time)
- 6-7 quartered green tomatoes
- water
- a small onion, chopped up (optional)
- 1 or 2 green chillies, slit (optional)
- a pinch of turmeric

Make sure the dal is well covered by the water but not overwhelmed by it.

Let the pressure cooker whistle 2-3 times and then cook it on simmer for another 5 minutes. (Or just cook it till mushy in a pan)

Let the pressure drop on its own and mash it as much as you can.

Add the salt and some red chilli powder, if you like, at this stage.

If it's too watery, thicken it down by cooking it some more on medium heat, uncovered.

In a spoon of oil, pop 1/2 tsp each of mustard, cumin, peppercorns and fennel. A bit of asafoetida, if you like, or garlic. And 4-5 curry leaves and a couple of curry leaves. Chop up some coriander and garnish.

I'm sending this dal to Desi Soccer Mom who's hosting My Legume Love Affair, created by Susan.

My Legume Love Affair Tomato Dal/lentils Vegetarian Humour

Plk Mngdi

Technology, specifically, the cell phone, has brought my friend V and I, who go a long way back, closer. Almost every night, we SMS (text message) each other quite a lot. The Spouse begins to feel the day is incomplete if he doesn't hear my mobile phone ping and wonders why she or I haven't begun yet. Sometimes I've to tell him it's because she knows I'm staying back late at work, or that maybe our fingers are too knotted up from all the texting. And sometimes I text her just to quell his restlessness, that V's in my cell and all's right with the world. (Sorry, Mr Browning!)

Neither of us use the 'predictive text' feature - I find it too troublesome to bother with, I don't know why she doesn't, but we have our own SMS lingo which we seem to follow rather well, skilled at it over a few years of practice and the rather common tactic of doing away with the vowels. But a couple of days ago, I was rather foxed with this: "Don't rmbr td dint hve ful rec then ggld." Er ... Okay, she "didn't remember", "then Googled", i got dat, but who or what was 'td' and what wasn't there, in between? She was telling me about the Ker Sangri we got during our recent trip to Rajasthan and which she'd finally attempted, and I was asking her which recipe she followed. So I texted her back - "ur sms lngo 2 hrd 4 me 2 get" (Your SMS lingo too hard for me to get). Then she texted back properly to say she tried Tarla Dalal's site but it didn't have the full recipe so she Googled it and found it somewhere else and she doesn't remember the source. Whew!

Then it struck me I had to use up my stash too. But I remembered that the grocer who sold it to us in Jaisalmer told us it would turn out well if soaked overnight and well, overnight was over the previous night. But the golden yellow mangodis glinted from the dark corner of the shelf, and I had a bunch of Rs 15-spinach (ordinarily Rs 6, have you been reading about the horribly expensive time we're having, vegetably speaking) so I made the Palak Mangodi instead. Palak is spinach and Mangodi are bits of sundried moong dal (green gram) or urad dal (black gram) paste, usually used as an accompaniment to various curries in Rajasthan, from what I gather.

This is from TD's book on Rajasthani cooking but I halved the recipe as I had only one bunch of spinach - and added a tomato. I was also careless and added the original amount of onion prescribed.

1 bunch spinach/palak
1/2 cup mangodi, crushed (some info here)
1 tsp cumin seed/jeera
1/2 cup finely chopped onion
1 tsp ginger-green chilli paste
1/2 tsp garam masala
a pinch turmeric
1/2 tsp chilli powder
1-1/2 tsp oil
salt to taste

Cook the spinach briefly in hot water, dunk in cold water and drain completely.

Then puree the spinach and tomato. Keep aside.

Add a cup of water to the mangodi and pressure cook for 3 whistles. Drain, keep aside.

Heat the oil and add the cumin seeds. Once they splutter, add the onions and saute till pink.

Add the ginger-green chilli paste and saute for a few seconds.

Add the rest of the spices and the puree. Let it cook for a while.

Now add the cooked mangodis and salt and simmer for five minutes. We ate it with rice, roti and by itself, nice all three ways.

I'm sending this off to Priya who's hosting Susan's MLLA this month.

MLLA Spinach Mangodi Vegetarian Humour

Of Parties & Peanuts

As inadequate as pop quizzes are, they are fun to do. Often, there are questions where none of the choice of answers apply; heck, even the question doesn't apply.

Like this question, for instance:

What's your usual pick-up strategy?

• Dress in something revealing, then go to a bar or dance club and mope at the counter with a martini until someone notices me.
• All I have to do is walk out my front door, it seems. I get a lot of people - both guys and girls (regardless of which i am) hitt (sic)
• People notice me I make sure of that. If I can beat 'em at arm wrestling, or show off my hot dance moves, I pretty much have 'em
• Just be there for them, get to know them. People trust me and are attracted to me because they know I don't play head games
• Uh ... tell them I like them?
• I 'get' whoever I damn well want however I damn well want. Nobody says no to me.
• Impress them with my intellect. Poetry doesn't hurt, either.

(Taken from the Internet)
This time, though, I think I do know what my party personality is. It’s ‘wallflower’ or ‘group wallflower’. Let me tell you why.

Last year, I attended something called an ‘offsite’ as part of work, the evenings of which included much entertainment, food, drink and dancing. Many polite hands were proffered, and all declined - I can’t and don’t dance. At the end of the day, the hosts said they wouldn’t let me escape the next day. Indeed, someone dragged me on to the dance floor but I clapped rhythmically and as long as some part of me was moving, I figured, there would be no pressure. Then the dancing picked up pace, everyone forgot about me, and I began taking a step back, and then one, and then one more, till I was back on terra firma.

Then

Last week, I attended a party thrown in honour of some folks visiting here from abroad. They were from The Spouse’s side and I had never met them before.

I didn’t meet them at the party either.

(Well, technically, I met one of them, the wife, who smiled and nodded as part of a perfunctory, fleeting wordless introduction that was all nods and waves with heads, hands and teeth. )

I spent the next few minutes clinging to a few aunts, then chatting with someone who looked equally lost and then being introduced formally to another. (I had seen her quite a few times earlier but we had had to ignore each other as we hadn‘t been introduced.) Another lost soul disengaged herself from a chair, hovered around us tentatively, and was immediately included into our little group.

“Relative or friend?” we asked each other, and identity being established, settled into our chairs and looked out on to the lawn where a huge screen was showing Brazil going going gone Dutch. And thus we remained, snacking on short eats that are typically served in clubs, till one of us received a text message from Mom somewhere in that long, narrow hall that dinner was, finally, being served upstairs. (Oh, in between, I ran into someone I actually knew a bit and amused myself teasing her that I would put the picture of her in her very fashion-forward, very plunging blouse on my photo blog. She threatened to slap me, of course, but when I told her I would morph it and jazz it up even more, she relented and asked me to send her too a copy.)


But back to the party - here’s one snack that’s super easy to make. It’s relatively quick too, though I’d call it super-quick only if it materialized out of thin air and presented itself all ready on my table.

What you need to do is mix

A big handful of dry-roasted peanuts/groundnuts, skinned
Half an onion - chopped
Half a green chilli - minced
Lime - one, juiced
Salt, to taste
Oil - a few drops

And you can have a party all your own!

This goes to My Legume Love Affair, brainchild of Susan and hosted this month by Siri.

I’m hosting Of Chalks and Chopsticks this month, so please put on your thinking caps, write those stories and send them to me. You have until the 28th of this month to do so!

My Legume Love Affair Peanuts Vegan

Quinoa - A Love Story

It was late evening and Sri, who had just come back from work, was washing the quinoa thoroughly. That involved quite a bit of dexterity, the way She would have it. It had been almost a year since she brought it back with her from her vacation abroad, and life had begun to take form, little black creepy-crawlies making their way among those pale brown grains. She had almost lost it when she saw him squeezing the quinoa well under water. "Sri!", she had screamed, "You're going to squish all the insects, just run water over it several times till they all float up and pour it away, then maybe you can wash it vigorously. Call yourself a most intelligent guy but I have to instruct you in the most common of sense!" she said, her face all twisted in irritation.

Sri opened his mouth to yell back but closed it as a tidal wave of dejection washed over him. Why why why had he said yes to this girl? What had possessed him? He should have read the warning signs. At what was supposed to be a romantic evening on the beach soon after they got engaged, she told him she couldn't and wouldn't cook breakfast and other meals as per convention. Well, it must have been romantic, because all caution and instincts of self-preservation deserted him and he leapt to the occasion and told her, "Why bother about all that, I can cook and I'm not particular about traditional breakfasts."

But she had tried, that one year that she couldn't work because of the shift - mango milkshake, just mango, something or the other ... and he had rejected a series of whatever she offered - cereal, upma, cornflakes ... And then she had begun working and life had been fine as they had had a cook for most part. Then they moved again and decided a cook was a luxury ...

But they had had fun, hadn't they? Even though there were times when she wasn't suitably appreciative ... "All you've done is dunk paneer and peas in a pack of tomato puree and heat it up," she would cry; at other times, he was "the most thoughtful spouse ever, thank God you aren't like my friends' husbands!" They had kneaded flour, experimented with yeast, made naans and sheermals, grilled paneer, fried breaded chicken, laid out five-course meals for friends and family. Where had all that gone?

They had gotten older and busier. More world-weary. And while food wasn't the last thing on their minds, and they had learnt a lot more about it, its preparation at the end of the day was a chore. It was past 9 p.m. Why couldn't they just go out to dinner? When would this quinoa boil, when would the entire salad be put together and when, finally, would they have dinner and would he be able to play Hearts on the computer?

"Sri!"

Her voice interrupted his reverie and he hurriedly filled the bowl of quinoa with some more water to give it another rinse. "You're still at it, Sri? Just finish with it and spread it out in a plate to dry."

"What do you mean? This has to dry before we make the salad?"

"Well, of course!"

"So when will we have dinner?"

"Whenever you want!"

"What about the kinowa?"

"It's keenwah. Keen-wah. Get it? I told you that twice already."

"Alright, keenwah. What about the darn salad?"

"The darn salad is for the darn blog. It's for tomorrow. Finish up and come soon - I've brought fried chicken and chocolate mousse and ice-cream, they're waiting."

Healthy and hurry don't go together. She understands!

It was hard to tell which came first - the rush of joy at the mention of that unabashedly unwholesome menu or the sigh of relief that the salad could be put off! Or was it neither of these but a surge of love, coupled with the reassurance that he had chosen right, after all?

This piece of fiction goes to Bong Mom, who's hosting Of Chalks and Chopsticks, Aqua's idea.



The original recipe came from here.

1 cup quinoa
2 cups water
2 cups frozen shelled peas, thawed
1 tablespoon freshly grated lemon zest
2 tablespoons lemon juice
2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
2 tablespoons chopped coriander
1/2 teaspoon salt
Red peppers or de-seeded red chillies - I used pickled red chillies but washed them clean before I used them.
1/4 cup toasted sunflower seeds

Toast quinoa in a pan over medium heat, stirring often, until it begins to pop, about five minutes. Transfer to a fine sieve and rinse thoroughly.

Boil the water in a medium saucepan over high heat. Add the quinoa and return to a boil. Cover, reduce heat to a simmer and cook for eight minutes. Remove the lid and, without disturbing the quinoa, add the peas. Cook another 7-8 minutes, until the peas and quinoa are tender. Drain any remaining water.

Whisk lemon zest and juice, oil, coriander and salt in a large bowl. Add the chillies and the quinoa mixture. Toss to combine. Top with toasted sunflower seeds.

As it contains a substantial amount of legumes, I'm also sending it to My Legume Love Affair 23

MLLA Of Chalks and Chopsticks Humour Story Humour Quinoa Vegan

When My Soup Didn't Come Alive

Recently, I failed at making chaaru.

Like I had failed with this staple many times in the past, even with ready-to-cook packets and powders that ensured I didn't have to do anything much.

I don't even attempt the varieties made back home, except for tomato chaaru (rasam), and that's mostly only when the several shrivelling tomatoes inside the fridge loudly call out to be pressure-cooked into rasam. Now, tomato chaaru, that sure gets me drooling - it was what I ate as a nine-year-old recovering from jaundice, mixed with rice and some minced lamb on the side, and if I remember right now, that was my staple diet for the next few days. But more on that later, perhaps.

I am fond of the rasam that has some daal in it - the black-brown, plain rasam of the tamarind alone doesn't enthuse me. So when we recently had guests for two days and I had to churn out some decent and tried-and-tested stuff to eat, I attempted chaaru because I thought they would expect it. To satisfy my own self, I decided to add some daal to it.

I asked the lady who helps me at home to instruct me and first off, she told me that the tamarind extract I had was just too much.

What I needed, she said, was to soak a lime-sized ball of tamarind in about half a cup of water, and dilute that with a litre of water.

Then, she said, coarsely grind some pepper, cumin and a couple of red chillis and add it to the mix.

Add a few curry leaves and some coriander.

Squash a tomato, throw it in.

Add about a ladle of cooked-to-a-mush toor daal (split pigeon peas).

Set to boil and turn off the fire the moment it comes to a rolling boil, she said.
Oh, and some salt and turmeric.

So I did (but not without taking pictures of it for this. I never imagined it would make it to this blog, much less to an event.) Switched it off, and it tasted raw. It's not all right, I said. No, switch it off and cover it, she said, threatening bitterness. I did so, thinking that probably it would cook some more in its own heat and the flavours would meld.

Come lunchtime and I had every single eater reassuring me that the rasam was fine.

All I needed to do was add some more salt.

All I needed to do was boil it a little more.

All I needed to do was add some more daal.

But it's nice, they said.

Come dinnertime, I rescued it by adding two more ladles of daal and some more salt.

It was much improved, good, even.

Much better now, the diners said.

All I had needed to do was add some more salt.

All I had needed to do was boil it a little more.

All I had needed to do was add some more daal.

But it had been nice, they said.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

But wasn't a tempering needed? I didn't remember that until now, when I wrote this post, so considering it was so nice, finally, probably it wasn't.

I fail at making quite a few staples - rice cooked to such softness that you can't discern the grains, so good with rasam and pickle and curds; sambar, idlis and chapatis(I do not know how nor will I learn to grind or knead) and rasam (well, hopefully I've got it right now).

What are the ordinary, everyday dishes that defy you?

This post is off to EC who is hosting MLLA for Susan this month.

MLLA Rasam/Chaaru Vegan Tamarind

My Legume Love Affair-17 - The Round-Up

A good feast takes days to prepare. Savour this.

If you hit any sour notes, you know where to appeal to me.

Thanks for participating. Bon appetit!

(PS: This is being re-posted.)

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------


"I remember finishing 3 cups/katoris full; had no space in my tummy for dinner that night. I got the complicated recipe from him and tweaked it a tad to make it simpler."


"Yes, I cooked exactly a year ago when I found those fresh cranberries. I cooked with dhal, clicked, downloaded in my hard drive and saved carefully under “unblogged” file. And forgot forever until I saw some fresh berries."


"We had ours with some steamed brown rice. This may be served over noodles too."


"As far as I'm concerned, a sunny afternoon in my conservatory sipping on some chilled white wine and shelling a bag of peas is an afternoon well-spent."


"With this post I commemorate a recipe that has become a favorite in the last year or two. It just came together one day when I needed a quick and satisfying solo meal."


"The estimate serves two or one depending on your greed ;).Oh, ok, a little part also goes to MLLA #17."


"Though I get loads of varieties at the farmers market and the fact that it is very inexpensive,I wanted to make them at home for a change."


"Each time I go there,I can see the lady at the tofu stand look at me. Sometimes I think she is just looking at me as I am the only 'foreigner lady' in that locality, sometimes I would feel she is looking at me amused ..."


"A long time back, I used to be a part of Indian food discussion forum, then called forumhub. One of the active members there had a recipe called 'Methiwale kabuli chole - Rajasthani style'..."


"I used brown rice tortilla which is gluten-free and whole grain, and used kidney bean, onions, green pepper and some firm tomatoes. This is just not a snack, but is a very kid-friendly lunch box dish."

"Enjoy this guilt free snack any time of the day!"

"I'm sending off a big helping of this delicious sausage and beans to ..."


"Ever since I read the recipe three weeks ago, I have been tweaking it and trying it out every few days. What I have not done is stop eating them."


"These are so popular there that in Bangalore a place where these are sold abundantly is called 'Avarekalu square'. You can see many women sitting there separating the beans from the pods and selling them on the roadside.


"I harvested many of them - using gauntlets - and I used them for these fritters."



"Paired with some mildly sweet Gujarati Khadi and potato chips, this made for an amazing dinner."



"Masoor dal is know for its quick cooking, whereas turai for its slow cooking ... and a combo of these two will be perfect to relish..."


"When we were at granny’s place during winter vacation, hot and spicy food used to top the menu card for the days. ... Simple, creamy and delectable medley of dal with onion and ginger-garlic paste gives an aromatic flavour to the recipe."


"I really liked it a lot, it can be served as a main entrance or as a salad. Pay attention to cooking time, very fast to keep vegetables fresh and crispy."


"As I chatted with mom on the phone about the recipe she informed that my Nani would add a little yoghurt while cooking and I could imagine how that would be good. Who knows what else she omitted to tell me!"


"Cook pre-soaked Navy Beans in water with three or four smashed garlic cloves, a bay leaf and salt, until tender. Drain off any water and cool ..."


Winter squash soups are a healthy and economical way to comfort and nourish the body and soul during the long cold months ahead. Serve with a whole grain for a complete and wholesome vegetarian meal.


"I know, greens when deep fried lose all their good qualities but forgive me for this occasional indulgence."


"There is such a variety of dishes in the book. I have made a few recipes and every time loved it. And this is one of those recipes from the book."


"This curry 'misal' is very famous in Maharashtra. It is 'layman's' food."


"The nutty beans and the soft squash, you have to experience it. The trick though is not to overcook the beans. But that is never a problem with cow peas."


"She is a very happy person when we get her a bag of fresh peanuts. She enjoys eating them even now, 'coz it's her childhood days she cherishes every time she pops one."



"Do not buy shelled mochai from vegetable market as it may not be fresh; buy mochai pods and shell it at home even if it takes some time to do it."



"Mysore bonda is famous in the recipe list of Karnataka special dishes, especially of Mysore. The traditional recipe uses a blend of split black lentils and spices."


"This chutney is heavily influenced by Maharashtrian cuisine and it uses peanuts as its main ingredient instead of coconut."


"In the past I have tried different varieties trying to come out with the perfect masala for the curry and finally I have come to realise that the best masala is the store-bought."


"I believe my Maa makes the best one in this world. She always gets it perfectly boiled … soft but every grain separate from each other."


"If someone were to roam in the busy streets of Bhendi Bazaar in Bombay, they are sure to find several small stalls selling chana bateta."


"Every bite of this tasty curry made me wish my parents were here with us to share this simple yet absolutely and delightfully tasty curry."


"I love chickpeas. When I saw Sarah Naveen’s kadala curry, I was tempted to try it and my family finished it up for dinner yesterday. I made a few changes according to my family's tastebuds."


"This is a famous tiffin in Andhra Pradesh. A crispy thick pancake ... These rottis don't need any fermentation."


"Three types of lentils: puy, brown and green lentils in soak with garlic and bay leaf. The lentils look quite pretty like polished pebbles."


"This bhaath asks for cooking the vegetable (palya) separately first with extra oil, masala and salt and then mixing it with the rice."


"Her curries used to be hot and had that rustic taste. She would make me stand next to her and ask me to watch while she made the masala. When I decided to make these broad beans, I was reminded of how Alka used to make the masala."


"The only place for those spring onions was the bin and the beans weren't enough to cook as one dish."


The yellow coloured moongdal is the skinned and split moong bean. It's one of the quickest-cooking beans and needs no pre-soaking or a pressure cooker."


"Not sure what directed my thoughts towards lenticchie while considering solutions for my day-after dilemma, but once that happened, I did not stop until the pairing of the little legumes with my leftovers was a reality held in a bowl."


"I rarely muster courage to ask for the recipe. The one time I do, all I get is the most vague response ..."



"People who loves oats or hate coconut in their gravies can try out this combination for making kootus or curries."


"After a month of Indian daals, spinach soup and tofu salad, I had to find innovative new ways to cook these for my food lust."


"Quick laddoos with simple ingredients which taste fantastic for snacks or for festivals ...I enjoyed preparing these delicious laddoos."


"I wanted to try making kebabs and started out with the ingredients needed for a veggie-nut-kebab. Then it struck me that I didn't have the iron kebab skewers and that we ran out of bamboo skewers also ..."


"Two months back, I froze some white channa, rajma,black-eyed peas, black beans,double beans,kala channa,dry green peas, ... cutlets with raw banana"


"Like malt vinegar, mushy peas remind me of fish and chips. When my friend made this Mushy Fava (Broad) Beans dish, fish and chips just came to mind."


"Smoked hocks are my favourite, simmered in stews to impart a sensuously deep and lingering kiss."


"I fast on Tuesdays and it's one meal in the evening. So whatever I cook on Tuesday evenings for prasad/naivedya has to be sattvic food."


"This recipe is from a recent issue of Vegetarian Times. Here's how I made it ..."


"With pleasant weather and an urge to make one among the many of my comfort foods, I set about doing just that ..."


"One hot, humid day, I forgot to grind my soaked moong dal rice mix and it sat on the counter the whole day. The next day I found my whole moong was sprouting tiny buds."


"This soup is deceptively hearty. It looks and even tastes a little like a butternut squash bisque."


"These are to be finished fast after they are cooked as they turn very chewy otherwise."


"Go to any traditional celebration like a wedding or an upanayanam in Chennai - you are bound to be greeted by the famous paruppusili, staring at you from the vaazha yelai (banana leaf)."


"If you're looking for something that'll wake up your taste buds and give your gastric juices a kick, then this is what you need."


"I’ve been keeping Mac ‘n Cheese with Chili a secret from you for some time. Mainly because it’s so so simple that I was embarrassed to share it with you. And it involves a box and a can."


"Cholar Dal is the dal with uber arrogance. It is a bit of a snob, not the kind you would like to come home to every day but the kind you would like to glamorize your dining table with when you have company."


"It is called Kadala Curry, meaning Lentil Curry, which is a big misnomer."


"I stumbled upon one lone packet of shelled peas while marketing for Thanksgiving produce. Among the rutabagas, yams, and green beans, they looked like foundlings in need of a good home. So I adopted them."


"Fall is my favorite season of the year. One reason is that the colder temperatures make me want to make a lot of soups and stews."


"Now add the chenna dhal, salt and a cup of water and bring it to a boil."


And finally, my post - Lendills, here.

The winner is Muskaan of A2ZVegetarian Cuisine. Congratulations! I used an online random integer generator - screenshot below.



Srivalli is hosting MLLA-18 for December.

MLLA 17 My Legume Love Affair Round-up