About Peanut Chikki Chikki is a traditional Indian sweet candy like brittle made with jaggery, nuts and seeds. Various roasted crunchy ingredients like peanuts, almonds, cashews, sesame seeds, puffed rice, roasted chana dal and dried coconut are used to make a chikki. There are many varieties of chikki made and every variety is named after the ingredient used. Peanut chikki is made by stirring crunchy roasted & skinned peanuts in a hot viscous jaggery solution....

Peanut masala goes great as a evening snack with some masala chai and some times I end up making a chaat. These peanuts can be deep fried, baked or microwaved, using the same recipe. If baked, they make a guilt free healthy snack and can even be consumed regularly. You can add some raw chopped onions, tomatoes, coriander leaves and make an instant chaat too. The amount of flours mentioned in the recipe, gives a good coating to the peanut....

About Potato Sandwich Potato Sandwich also known as Aloo sandwich is an Indian sandwich variety with a spiced potato filling. There are numerous ways to make them. Some use green chutney while some use tomato ketchup as a sandwich spread. You get to see tons of variations in the Indian cafes and canteens. To make these, all you need is some boiled potatoes, spices, herbs and bread of your choice. Within a jiffy these are ready for a treat....

For me, it’s not about wanting the most expensive, trendy or what matches my kitchen decor. It’s foremost about what will last, what’s practical, what has multiple uses and of course what lets me cook/chop/stir faster (mostly because I’m always in a rush – every spare second counts!!) So you will find almost nothing “cool” on this list, not even anything cute and pretty! That might disappoint some of you looking for gift ideas....

And now, it has become a well-loved snack across India and abroad where you’ll find ethnic restaurants and food stalls featuring it on their menu. An explosion of flavors hits you with every bite you take. No wonder that even fine-dine restaurants and marriage caterers offer sev puri and other chaats at the buffet table. But what exactly goes into this dish that makes it such a popular and well-loved street food?...

I had a few requests to share some soup recipes, So sharing this one which I make it often for the family for a weekend breakfast. I have used moth bean known as matki, it can be replaced with sprouted green gram, chana or even mixed sprouts can be used. Spices or other ingredients for flavoring can be used to suit the season or your body condition. During winter fresh ginger or dry ginger powder and black pepper powder are a good choice....

The concept of Ayurveda taught our ancestors that our everyday food should contain 6 basic tastes to balance & promote our health. These tastes include – sour, sweet, salty, bitter, pungent and astringent. So rasam was developed as a medicinal, healing and health-giving food that had all of those tastes. Traditionally rasam was made only with tamarind and no tomatoes were used. With the passage of time, our lives have changed a lot and some of the ingredients used in the traditional rasam got replaced with others....

What is Turmeric Tea? Turmeric tea is exactly as the name implies, a tea made by boiling fresh or dried and powdered turmeric root with plain water. It can sometimes include other ingredients, such as spices like ginger, black pepper, cinnamon, cloves & sweeteners like honey, or citrus. Turmeric is the rhizome of the Curcuma longa plant, a relative of the equally famous ginger (which is also known for the medicinal and culinary uses of its rhizomes)....

Vinayaka Chavithi Everywhere else, the same is celebrated as Ganesh Chaturthi. This 10-day festival is rejoiced with immense devotion and grandeur not only in the Households but also in the Community places. Lord Ganesha, the God of wisdom, prosperity, the remover of obstacles and sorrows is welcomed with much devotion every year on the day of Chavithi/ chaturthi, which falls in the Month of Bhadrapadam. Though this festival is celebrated in many states, customs, traditions and foods offered to the Lord during the Chavithi puja are much different....

Greek yogurt also known as Hung curd in the Indian English is nothing but strained yogurt. In other words, it is simply homemade yogurt that has been strained off the whey to get a thick and creamy product. Yogurt is a great substitute for Mayonnaise, Sour Cream & Cream Cheese. So it can be used in so many ways like in salad dressings, sandwich fillings, dips etc. About Yogurt Sandwich Yogurt Sandwich is more commonly known as Dahi Sandwich or Curd Sandwich in India and is one of the widely made....

Aloo Masala Even more, serve it as a stuffing inside wraps, rolls and sandwiches. It tastes absolutely delicious with just anything! Masala dosa gets its name from the aloo masala that is served with it. This flavorsome potato masala is the heart and life of the masala dosa, without that we call it a sada dosa meaning a plain dosa. Actually it is this aloo masala that makes you crave for the masala dosas every time....

The right creamy melt in the mouth texture comes from pounding the mix in an appropriate stone pestle. Though there are many cut short methods to make these, they don’t yield good results. This is a recipe I got from my elders in the family which has been followed for more than 2 decades and are prepared during weddings and other auspicious occasions. If you follow the recipe exactly, you will have Bandar laddus that just melt up in the mouth, with the best smooth creamy texture and a great aroma of ghee and cardamom powder....

You can serve these without any dip, sauce or chutney as they are flavored well and mildly spiced. This is one of those recipes which I have made many times for my kids and it has never disappointed them. In this post, I have shown deep frying the cheese balls but I usually bake them in the oven and sometimes even pan fry them. I have shared more instructions in the recipe card below....

Most of us love the chicken fried rice from Chinese restaurants & take outs. This detailed post will help you make the best chicken fried rice that is full of flavors & deliciousness. It is highly impossible to replicate the flavors of Chinese foods made in restaurants as they use a Chinese wok. Using a carbon steel wok on a large burner would typically emit a smoky aroma to the fried rice....

If you are seriously trying to maintain a steady healthy weight or lose weight, try replacing white rice with foxtail millet. I made this foxtail millet pulao for myself and my 4 year old sometime back for lunch. He enjoys millets and loves trying different varieties likeMillet upmaLemon milletpongalmillet sweet pongalMillet khichdi and payasam. Foxtail millet pulao is so simple to prepare, call it a biryani or a pulao and can easily make changes to suit your taste....

Fried Onions (Birista) Biryani without crisp fried onions is incomplete and it sure lacks the flavor. You may have noticed that a lot of time goes into making fried onions every time you make a biryani or korma. Making these ahead is a one-time task but they will last very long in your freezer without getting rancid or the flavors being diminished. Having a pack of these birista ready in your freezer makes you want to make biryani and kormas more often....

Instant Pot Dal In the recent years, many of us are switching over to Instant pot from the traditional cookers due to ease of use and cleaning. If you are a beginner learning to cook Indian food in Instant pot, this detailed post is something to start with. A Dal recipe can be made in so many ways and each region has their own way of tempering the dal and spicing it up....

About Khoya Khoya is nothing but milk solids obtained by simmering and reducing full fat milk until all the liquid evaporates. It is also known as Mawa or koa. You’ll find both sweetened and unsweetened mawa in the market. The unsweetened version is used to make both sweets like burfi, kalakand, ladoos, karanji/ gujiya (fried dumplings) mawa cake, kachori and savory foods like koftas. Traditional vs Instant mawa Traditionally mawa is made by boiling full fat milk and then slow cooking it on a low flame to almost 20% of its volume....

Since lemon chicken is a fusion food it pairs well with Indo chinese foods like veg fried rice, schezwan fried rice, veg noodles, egg fried rice, egg noodles or hakka noodles. It can also be served with any rice dishes like jeera rice, peas pulao, or with plain rice and rasam. I haven’t used lemon zest since i did not have. If you like the flavor you can add a pinch of the powdered zest towards the end....

They are eaten with a chutney, pickle or curd for breakfast or a meal. We personally love these with a raita or just eat plain with some lassi on the side. Fenugreek leaves apart from being nutritious, are also believed to help in the control of blood sugars and get rid of constipation. So it is ideal to include them in our diet regularly. In Indian cuisine we make plenty of dishes using these leaves like methi rice, methi pulao, aloo methi and methi thepla....