Tag: toor dhal

Kid Friendly Recipes. · Rice Varieties.

Quick Cook Khichdi – Heart Warming Comfort Foods.

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Steaming hot Khichdi with Channa.
Steaming hot Khichdi with Channa.

Weekends are always a time to sit back and laze, read  your favourite books, watch your favourite tv shows, listen to the music you`ve always wanted to, eat simple delicious home cooked food and enjoy a lazy siesta…I never prefer to spend a lot of time in the kitchen over the weekends as this would essentially take time away from my family. Weekends are, therefore Khichdi times…I would prepare easy khichdi and some subzi on the side to go with it. As one item is essentially easy and the process of cooking is done inside my pressure cooker, the subzi gets done along with the khichdi.

Sometimes, when its cold, and I want to have comfort food, Khichdi it is. My daughter loves it, as she helps me in the preparation. I dollop an extra spoon of ghee on her serving, so she is thrilled. It was this one time when she was three, and we had been to the Saravana Bhavan Gujarati Restaurant in T.Nagar. Chennai. They serve this amazing simple thali, and the main course would be some pulav and this khichdi. He would bring it steaming hot, in one of those heavy silver pots, and serve huge ladlefulls on our plate and top it generously with ghee. The taste is simply heavenly and combined with the fact that its piping hot – It was sweet heaven. Since then, this dish has been a regular in my weekend cooking.

Your kids and family would definitely love this mushy khichdi so, go ahead and try it out this weekend

INGREDIENTS:

1 cup raw rice.

1/2 cup toor dhal.

1/2 cup moong dhal.

Seasoning:

2-3 pods of garlic.

1 inch piece of ginger

5-6 green chillis

Curry Leaves.

2 spoons of jeera

3-4 spoons of ghee.

PREPARATION:

  • In a pressure cooker, add 1 cup of water and switch on the flame. Measure out the rice and the dhals together in a container. Wash the rice and dhals and add water in the ratio: 1 : 3 1/2. This means for the 2 cups ( 1 cup rice + One cup Dhals) we need to totally add about 7 cups of water. Add adequate salt.
  • Allow 3-4 whistles in the cooker and switch off.
  • Take the mortar and pestle and crush the ginger, garlic and chillis together to form a coarse mix. We don`t grind it in the mixer, as this would overpower the taste of the khichdi.
  • In the meantime, take a seasoning kadai and add 3 spoons of ghee. When the ghee begins to get hot, add jeera, the garlic-ginger-chillies mix, and the curry leaves.
Seasonings in ghee.
Seasonings in ghee.
  • Allow a few seconds for the seasonings to get fried in the ghee and then pop it over the cooked khichdi. Mix well. I
  • If you feel that the consistency is not “mushy” , you could add 1/2 cup of milk.
  • Serve Hot with a spoon of ghee and a side of Channa and Mango Thokku.

Sending steaming hot bowls of Khichdi and Pickle to Recipes for the rest of Us – Dinner, the brainchild of Ramki of One Page Cookbooks , and hosted by Siri of Siri`s Corner.

Khichdi, Channa and Mango Thokku.
Khichdi, Channa and Mango Thokku.
Snacks & Tiffin Items

Healthy Adai with oats and flax.

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“Adai” is one of the most nutritious tiffin items loaded with nutrition and health. Traditionally, in our homes, adai is an come-home-after-school evening snack. But many days, its a filling dinner. Adai is a thick crepe like entree, serves with Avial in tamil nadu and other times with Idly Podi or tomato thokku. Its basically made with rice, bengal gram and toor dhal, but in the process of making it more healthier, I also add oats, flax, spinach, cabbage etc, to boost on the fibre intake. Many times, when I take stock of the daily food intake, what I miss at the most, is Fibre.

Fibre rich foods keeps the digestive system in good working order helps prevent a lot of lifestyle driven dieseases, and is packed with protiens and minerals. Its also important that one gradually increases the fibre intake and should be followed by a substantial increase in fluid intake, in order to assist the body to assimilate the fibre consumed.

Adai can be rehashed to include onions, or minus onions to include cabbage, or for those who find the aroma of cooked cabbage unagreeable, corriander and spinach, brocolli and collards etc. I also add two spoons of flax powder, which acts as a catalyst in increasing the fibre, but does not alter the taste even a wee bit.

This is a version with Oats, flax and onions.

Onion,Oats and flax Adai with Tomato Thokku.
Onion,Oats and flax Adai with Tomato Thokku.

INGREDIENTS:

Idli Rice/Boiled Rice          – 1 cup.

Bengal Gram                           – 1/2 cup.

Toor Dhal                                 – 1/2 cup.

Red Chillis                                 – 6 or 7.

Curry Leaves                           – 6 or 7.

Oats Old fashioned                – 1/2 cup

Flax Seed Powder                   – 2 tsp.

Salt                                                – 1 and 1/2 tsp – 2tsp accd to taste

Corriander                                  – 1/4 cup.

Hing                                               – A pinch.

Onions chopped                       – 1.

PREPARATION:

  • Soak the boiled rice,  and the dhals seperately and to this add the seven red chillis; Allow to soak for 3 hours. Add the oats to soak for ten minutes only.
  • Grind the rice, dhals, oats,red chillis, salt, hing, curry leaves and corriander to a coarse batter. The batter should be almost 80% ground, but not to a smooth paste. Do not make the batter watery – grind the batter with around 1/2 cup of water.
  • Keep the batter ready and add some  more chopped curry leaves for added flavour.
  • If the batter is a little too thick, feel free to add a little water to make it in to a consistency easy to make in to a dosa form.
  • Keep the tava on the stove and when hot, grease with gingely oil.
  • Pour the batter on the tava, and circle to form a thick dosa. Make a little hole in the middle of the adai, with your dosa turner and pour some oil to allow uniform cooking. We do this, as the adai is packed with pulses, which needs to be cooked well.
  • Immediately add the chopped onion pieces.
  • When done on one side, turn over to cook on the other. Keep the stove on a medium flame.
  • Serve HOT with Avial or Tomato Thokku.

HINT:

  • Vary the taste of the adai to include onions when you grind to get a light flavourful onion adai.
  • Cook the adai with chopped cabbage for a healthy alternative.
  • You can also soak soya beans, green gram dhals etc to vary the nutrition and taste.

Sending piping hot adais to Meetha`s Monthly Mingle – Ravishing Rice.