Allam Pachadi

Ah, that quintessential Telugu pachadi, that makes everyone's mouth water. I cannot eat Pesarattu without Allam Pachadi, and I know many others in the family who love it to bits.

 

How to make healthy Bisibele-Bath with Poha

Bisibele-bath is almost a staple in South-Indian households, especially Kannada kitchens, I feel. There is something about this sambar-rice that we all love, and the fact that it is healthy also, adds to the allure.

For a while now, I’ve been experimenting with poha, how to make various South Indian main course items with this lighter version, so that I still get to eat the comfort food, but with less carbs.

Huliogare, Mangalore style

Or Pulihora/Chitrannam, as Telugus like to call it. No, there is no equivalent for this in Hindi, because this is a South Indian main course dish, served as one of the items in a large meal at weddings or at festivals. However, this recipe is for the Mangalorean version of Pulihora/Huliogare.

Avarekalu Usli

Avarekalu or Hyacinth beans is not very often found in Andhra Pradesh, but is almost a staple during its season in Karnataka.

Tumkur is the home to Avarekalu, Hyacinth beans or so am told. Growing up, we used to spend a couple of days in Tumkur, and gorge on this curry and other dishes made especially when these beans are in season. Such delight those deep-fried snacks made with these beans were...

Tales of pickles…

I've arrived. Yes, with this pickle! :-D

 

Am not a pickle person. Not at all. Its strange considering I grew up in Andhra, the pickle and red-chilli-capital of India. Its stranger considering I spent my entire childhood in Kurnool in Rayalaseema, a region considered to eat the spiciest of pickles. Yes, Guntur produces the hottest of chillies but all of it is consumed by the simple folk of Rayalaseema, I bet.

Gasi Laddu, from Mom’s kitchen

How apt that I should start this year with a dessert recipe, that too, something straight off Mom's kitchen. With absolutely no updates/modifications/replacements to her recipe! :) This recipe was born out of one of the zillion techniques adopted by yesteryears' housewives to use every part of a commodity in their kitchen.

As I mentioned before, ever since I started getting full cream milk at home, cream-butter management has become an activity in itself. Once we collect enough cream, I churn out butter from it. So far, I've been giving away the butter to friends and family, but this one time, I wanted to do what Mom does... make ghee out of butter. A first for me, I guess this might be because of that little girl in me who wants to be like Mommy :-)

Biskoot, as we call it…

As mentioned in my previous post, Mom and Maami were visiting us earlier this month.
My Maami is this super-awesome-homemaker-cook-woman who is like the encyclopedia for anything related to Udupi Brahmin cooking. All our cooking prowess can be directly or indirectly attributed to her, and we still refer to her when in doubt for anything related to Tulu cooking. So when she was visiting, I had a list ready - a list of all the things I'd ask her to make for me , stuff that I've been craving for a zillion years. Mom ensured that we had the raw material (some of the stuff isn't readily available in Hyderabad and they got it all from Hidingala, our hometown), and together they cooked them all for me.

This is one of such awesome but simple dishes only my Maami can make. Yes, its not a traditional Udupi dish (yeah, her repertoire of dishes is vast, as I discovered recently), but we literally grew up on these biscuits(pronounced Biskoot, just for the Tulu touch :) ). The recipe has been handed down from generations of housewives, I believe, and is one of the simplest methods to bake a biscuit or a cookie, in this case.

Lemony Lentil Soup

Or just Nimbekai Saaru , for us Mangaloreans. Before I go further , these are the mugs Siri gave away for her Blog-o-anniversary. Cute, no? :-)

Now to this soup…

A spoonful of Curry powder…

Will go a long way in any Indian curry.

The preparations of these curry powders changes for every 100 KM you travel in India, and highly depends on where you want to use them – in a dry curry or a gravy curry. Also, the ingredients and method of making the curry powder is heavily influenced from the local staple of a given location. Like for example, peanuts are an important ingredient in most Telugu curries, whereas its Coconut if you go to the Konkan area. Well, I can talk with authority about these two regions , thanks to Mother-in-law and Mom respectively! :-)

Thotakoora Pachadi

Or Amaranth Greens Chutney.

What do you do when you have a lot of greens and you’d hate to not waste them? Well, South Indian housewives have been innovative in using seasonal greens in effective, healthy methods of cooking, one of which is Pachadi, which is what we call Chutney in Telugu.