Mutton Stew

The very best combination of Appam is stew of any kind. May it be vegetable or meat. Here is the recipe of meat stew.

Ingredients:

½ kg Mutton/chicken/beef
2 1/2 cups Onions - Finely chopped
2 -4 Green chillies cut slit open length-wise
2 tsp / 4 large cloves-Garlic grated
2 tsp Freshly grated Ginger
1 cup - Thick coconut milk
1 cup - Thin coconut milk
2 medium Tomatoes
8-10 cashew nuts
2 small pieces Cinnamon sticks
2 Cloves
3 cardamoms
Coriander leaves - 1/4 cup
Oil - 2-3 tbs

Preparation:

1. Soak cashewnuts in water for about half an hour.
2. Heat oil in a pan and add cinnamon sticks, cloves, and cardamoms.When the aroma of the spices starts coming off, Add onions and green chillies and stir till onion turns pink.
3. Add ginger and garlic and stir until the raw smell goes and onion starts to turn golden brown.
4. Add the meat pieces and tomatoes and stir further until tomatoes are cooked and soft.
5. Add the thin coconut milk and salt. Cover and cook until the meat is tender.If it's mutton, pressure cooking will be easier so that the meat gets cooked quickly.
6. Grind cashews well along with thick milk.
7. When the meat is cooked and water is almost dried up, add the thick milk of coconut with cashew and just boil for a minute. Dont boil for long time because the coconut milk will get curdled.
8.Add garam masala and stir well and close lid to infuse the flavor in.
serve hot with Appam.

Plantain cake (serves 6-8)

If you got leftover or very ripe plantains, dont throw them away. Just bake them into plantain cakes. This is another easy recipe made with plantains. It's a flourless cake and is usually made for evening snacks and during Ramadan. Since this cake is so moist, it has a pudding kind of texture and so no icing or cream topping is necessary. It is best to store in refrigerator if not finishing on the same day. It doesnt stay out long. I got this recipe from my mom who bakes this cake in a non-stick sauce pan with lid,kept on a low flame- medium flame. Infact she bakes all her cakes so! And it always turned perfect! For the same reason, I baked this cake on the hob-top, in a non-stick saucepan with lid, rather than using oven. I think this cake could be baked in oven too at medium temperature. But never dared to do so. Next time I should try that way!

The recipe for plantain cake: This time I Made a bigger cake using the double amount of ingredients i normaly use since I had lot of plantains leftover. If you want a smaller one, just use exact half amount of ingredients.

Ingredients:

4 Ripe plantains

8 extra large eggs/ 10 medium eggs

14 tbs sugar

4 cardamom/1/2 tsp cardamom powder

Preparation:

1.In a blender add eggs, sugar and cardamom and blend well until sugar dissolves (1 minute).

2. When done, Add the peeled plantains and again blend for few seconds until you get a smooth batter.

3. Set the flame to low-medium. Dont set the flame to high, else the cake will get charred very soon. Grease a nonstick sauce pan with ghee (clarified butter/butter fat) and add the batter. Close the lid tightly, making sure that no steam escapes. I cover the lid using foil and cover the sauce pan so that the lid stays intact.

4. Check if the cake is done, by inserting a knife or tooth pick. If they come out clean with no batter sticking to it, Then the cake is done. It took me 45 minutes to cook. I used a heavy base sausepan of 30 cm diameter with lid.

N.B: The upper part of the cake wont be browned, But it will be cooked from steam inside. If you want upper side to be browned, You can turn the cake over, once it is completely cooked. I normaly dont go for this hassle just for the color.

Appam (vellayappam)

I was quite surprised to read in a travel magazine that Vellayappam and Stew is one of the best 15 breakfasts in the world. Appam was one of the dishes that I started making since the very beginning of my cooking. These are pancakes with thin laced edges and thick fluffy centre It is very light, airy and goes well with stew and many other curries. The recipe is my mother's and this is something that always came excellent for me. But again I use all fresh ingredients rather than powders and canned stuff so it myt take a bit of your time. Eventhough it takes time,its worth a try. And But again, the taste of Appam will vary depending on many factors like the fermentation of the batter and the weather. The colder the weather, the longer it will take to ferment. So always keep the batter in a warm place to rise. I usually keep the batter near the radiator and I leave it there for about 6-8 hours and thats perfect. By that time, the batter would rise very well and be fermented enough for making the perfect crisp and light Appams. If leaving it in a colder place it should take even more time.

Apart from that, vellappam is made in a special dish called"Appacchatti". I think its a miniature version of a wok with lid and its very important to have this "appacchatti" .This gives Appam or Vellapam a round shape having thin edges and sponge like centre. In flat frying pans, you may be able to do, but u will never get that texture and crispiness that you get in a appacchatti.

My Appacchatti

Ingredients:

1/2 cup Cooked rice
2 cups Long grain rice/basmati rice

1 cup grated coconut

salt- as required

water-as required to make a thick batter

1/2 tsp dry active yeast

Preparation:

1. Soak basmati rice in water for about 2-4 hours.

2. Drain water and put it blender along with little water and cooked rice and blend well until you get a thick and smooth batter of dropping consistency without rice grains. At this stage, add grated coconut and blend well again for few seconds until coconut is well ground . Add more water if you find difficulty to grind them. Dont make the batter too thin by adding lot of water.

3. Add yeast at the end and just pulse once till yeast is well incorporated. Add salt and mix well.

4. Pour the batter into a large vessel and keep it covered in a warm place for about 6-8 hours. Once the batter is fermented, you can see that the batter is risen well and has bubbles on top and there is a strong, pungent smell.

Batter - before fermentingBatter-after fermenting

5. At this stage, stir the batter well.

6. Place the appacchatti on medium-high flame.

7.Using a ladle pour a some batter into the centre of the pan. My ladle holds 1/2 cup of batter . See the figure.

Pour batter in the centre

8. Hold the handles of the appachatti and swirl the chatti once inorder to spread the batter all around the chatti. Excess batter should accumalate in the centre to get that spongy centre of appams.

Swirl the pan around to spread the batter to the side of the pan

9. Close the lid and cook for around 3 minutes or until the batter is completely cooked. By this time appam will come off the chatti easily if it is a non-stick chatti.

10. Serve hot with vegetable stew,mutton stew, sweet stew or any other curry. I will be posting them soon. Many curries very well goes with Appam.

Chilli Prawns

I got this fabulous and yummy recipe from Maria of Mariasmenu and followed the recipe as such according to the amount of the prawns used. It always came out delicious and we loved it! It can be used as a side dish with fried rice,noodles etc.

Pasta with Mustard Sauce and Stir-fried Chicken

Ingredients:

250-300 grams- Pasta (Any kind)
2 large or 500 grams - Chicken fillet
3 tbs Soya sauce
6 large cloves of garlic
½ cup Spring onions (green part)
1 tsp black pepper powder
2 tbs olive oil
Salt – as required

For the mustard sauce:

1 tsp mustard paste
2 tbs butter + a dash of oil
2 tbs flour
2 cups or 1/2 litre milk
1 chicken stock cube
½ tsp black pepper powder

Preparation :

1. Cut garlic into thin round slices. Cut chicken fillet into thin strips. Marinate chicken with the sliced garlic, soya sauce, 1 tsp pepper powder and salt if necessary. Keep it in fridge for half an hour.

2. Prepare pasta as per packet instructions. After draining the water, add 2 tsp of olive oil and toss it so that the pasta doesn’t stick to each other. Cut the spring onions into medium thick round slices.Keep them aside.

3. Add 2 tbs of olive oil in pan and add the marinated chicken to it. Stir fry until the chicken is well cooked and all the water dries up. Keep it aside

For preparing white sauce:

Heat a pan and add 2 tbs of butter with a dash of oil. When the butter is melted, Add 2 tbs of plain flour and cook it for a minute stirring continuously. Remove it from flame and add milk slowly by stirring constantly with a whisk to avoid any forming lumps. Keep the milk mixture back in fire and add chicken cube and mustard paste and keep stirring until u get a semi thick mixture (as that of condensed milk). Don’t make it too thick; because, once this mixture cools down, it will get thickened even more. Add pepper to season and salt if necessary. Always add salt after adding chicken cube, else the sauce will turn out too salty.

To serve pasta:

Layer the pasta in a pasta dish or any other dish. Spread the stir fried chicken all over. Then sprinkle spring onion on top. And pour the white mustard sauce all over. Garnish with spring onion if necessary.

N.B: If you don’t have mustard paste, or you don’t like the taste of it, you can make the white sauce without using it. It’s equally good.

Chicken Cobbler

Chicken cobbler - I dont know how this dish got its name and dont know which country this dish belongs to!. Anyway, I was very much attracted by its name and its appealing look. I came across this very unsual recipe quite sometime back and I make this when I feel like eating something different from the usual spiced up Indian dishes. Chicken cobbler has creamy chicken and vegetable gravy lightly seasoned with salt,pepper and mustard paste and topped with flaky and golden scones or cobbler.

Ingredients:

1 medium onion, 1 medium potato,1 medium carrot
2 leek
2 chicken fillets cut into strips
6-8 Spring onion
1 tsp - Mustard paste
150 mls Cream
1 cup Chicken stock
1 tsp + ½ tsp - Black pepper
Salt as required
2 cup Plain flour + 1 tbs
1 tbs Baking powder
2 tbs + 5 tbs Butter (cold)
1 cup grated cheddar cheese

Preparation :
To make sauce:
1. Cut carrot and potatoes into small cubes. In 2 tbs of butter, sauté carrot and potato until they are almost cooked .Take them out and keep them aside.
2. In the same pan, add thinly chopped onion and sauté until pink. (Add a dash of oil if needed.) At this stage, add chicken strips and sauté until half done. Add leeks chopped thickly to the chicken and cook until the chicken is golden brown in color. Add one tbs of plain flour and sauté for a minute. Add the sauted carrots and potatoes back to the pan containing chicken.Now add 1 cup of chicken stock and mustard paste and cook for some more time. Add cream and spring onion and cook for 2 more minutes. Add 1 tsp pepper and salt to season. Mix well.

To make cobbler:

1. Sieve flour. Add salt and baking powder to it and mix well until well combined.
2. To this add 4 tbs of butter and mix well until they look like breadcrumbs. Add cheese and pepper and mix well again. Add enough water to make dough that’s quite soft (as that of chapatti dough). You should be able to roll it out and cut shapes out of it.
3. Take half of the dough and roll it into a thickness of about 1.5 cm and cut out several round shapes out of it
4. Take a baking dish and pour the chicken sauce. Level it using the spoon. Now arrange the round shaped cut dough in a way that each circle overlaps the next one. Continue repeating the process until the whole sauce is covered with the cobbler.See the picture below..

5. Bake it in a preheated oven at 190°C for about 25-30 minutes or until the cobbler (the top) is golden brown colour. Serve it hot with steamed broccoli or any other vegetables.