Christmas Cookies

Christmas is the best time of the year as we can sit and enjoy the cold weather with your family. And its fun to make and bake cookies for Santa. This year my son also joined me and he created his own version of cookies. Its lots of fun and family time.

 

I got this version of cookie from HowtoCookThat.com. I used orange food color instead of red and skipped the sprinkles part. I used reduced butter and less sugar. While baking I got the idea of candy canes and the kids liked it so much. Here comes the recipe.

Ingredients:

All purpose flour - 4 cups
Sugar - 1 1/2 cup
Softened Butter - 1/2 stick
2 eggs
vanilla extract - 1 tbsp.
Food color
Sprinkles - I skipped this

Method:

1. Cream butter and sugar in a mixing bowl.
2. To this add the eggs and mix very well.
3. Sieve the flour in another big bowl and add the sugar, egg mixture to this. Mix this well and knead it to a nice dough
4. Cut the dough into two halves.

5. Add the food color to one part keeping the other aside. Mix the food color thoroughly and make sure that all the dough is evenly colored

6. Now cut the white dough and red dough into three parts. Now you'll be having 3 parts of white dough and 3 parts red dough.


Spiral cookies:

1. Take one part of the white dough and roll it flat on a parchment paper to 1/2 inch size. Cut the corners to make it as a rectangle.
2. Same way roll the red dough to a rectangle of the same size as the white one.
3. Gently take the flattened red dough and place it on top of white one.

4. Roll both the rectangles together from one end to the other end. Try to roll it tightly so we won't get any holes in the middle.

5. You could see the spirals on the ends. Place this in a butter/parchment paper and freeze for 30 mins

6. Take the dough from the freezer and cut into 1/2 inch size circles. Adjust the shape to make perfect circles. Arrange them in a butter sprayed baking tray refrigerate for few minutes.
7. After 5 minutes bake them in 350F oven for 12 minutes or until the corners turn light brown.
8. Cool them and enjoy.

Flower cookies:

1. Take one part of the white dough and red dough and roll them as logs of same size. Keep this covered in a butter/parchment paper and freeze them for 30 mins
2. After 30 mins, take the white dough and cut the log into half lengthwise. Cut each half into four quarters of equal size, lengthwise. I didn't got this right and so my cookies doesn't actually look like flowers.
3. Do the same way for the red dough. Now you have 8 sticks of white dough and 8 of red dough

4. Now alternate the red and white dough to make a log of mixed colors. You'll be using 4 white and 4 red. Try to align the centers while arranging . If your sticks are cut properly, then they'll touch the center. Gently press the log well to make sure that there are no gaps in between. Roll this in a butter/parchment paper and freeze for 30 mins

5. Do the same way for the other 8 sticks and freeze them

6. Take the dough from the freezer and cut into 1/2 inch size circles. Adjust the shape to make perfect circles. Arrange them in a butter sprayed baking tray refrigerate for few minutes.
7. After 5 minutes bake them in 350F oven for 12 minutes or until the corners turn light brown.
8. Cool them and enjoy.

Candy cane cookies:

1. Take one small ball of the white dough and roll it to a thin straw and about half the size of a straw.
2. Make a similar one with the red dough of the same size

3. Keep the red and white together and gently roll them. Then twist them and shape like candy canes
4. Arrange them in a butter sprayed baking tray refrigerate for few minutes.

5. After 5 minutes bake them in 350F oven for 12 minutes or until the corners turn light brown.
6. Cool them and enjoy.

If you have any dough left out, make your own creation like how my family did. Merry Christmas!!!

Valentine's Day cookies

These simple sugar cookies are sure to steal the heart of your loved ones............

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Ingredients:
 

All purpose flour - 1 1/2 cups

Granulated sugar - 1/2 cup

Salt - 1/4 tsp

Baking powder - 1/2 tsp

Vanilla extract - 1 tsp

Butter - 2 tbsp.

Food color - optional



 

 

Method:

 

In a separate bowl whisk together the flour, salt, and baking soda. Set aside.

In the bowl of your electric mixer (or with a hand mixer), beat the butter and sugar until light and fluffy (about 3 to 4 minutes). Add the vanilla extract and beat until combined. Add the flour mixture and beat until you have a smooth dough.

 

Wrap the dough in plastic wrap and refrigerate for about one hour (or overnight) or until firm enough to roll.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (177 degrees C) and place rack in the center of the oven. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper. 

Remove the chilled dough from the refrigerator and, on a lightly floured surface, roll out the dough to a thickness of 1/4 inch. (Keep turning the dough as you roll, making sure the dough does not stick to the counter.) Cut out shapes using a lightly floured cookie cutter and transfer cookies to the prepared baking sheet. Place the baking sheets with the unbaked cookies in the refrigerator for 10 to 15 minutes to chill the dough which prevents the cookies from spreading and losing their shape while baking

 

Bake them for 12 - 15 minutes. Timings will vary for the oven. So always keep an eye as it will burn out easily. I decorated one batch of my cookies with food coloring. (I simply mixed sugar and food color and kept on top of the cookies). There are so many frostings available on market. You may try some of those to make your cookies more colorful..



Tutti Frutti Cookies

Christmas time is the perfect time for cookies as kids are waiting for Santa and his gifts. This year we made these eggless tutti frutti cookies for Santa. A simple and perfect recipe got from Sharmispassions.

Ingredients:

All purpose flour - 1 cup
Unsalted Butter (room temperature) - 4 tbsp.
Powdered sugar - 1/2 cup (or even less)
Tutti Frutti - 1/3 cup (can be substituted with any dried fruit)
Milk - 1 to 2 tbsp.

Method:

In a mixing bowl add powdered sugar and butter. Cream butter and sugar until light and fluffy - I used my whisk for this. Add maida, tutti frutti and mix well.

Add milk to form a soft sticky dough. Lay a butter paper and roll the dough and form a log(dust flour if needed).

Freeze the logs for 40mins(Put it up in the freezer to make the dough firm). Take the log out, and slice the dough with a sharp knife. Slice into slightly thicker slices. Preheat the oven at 350ºdeg /160 deg C for 10mins.

Place the cookies on the lined butter paper leaving space between each cookie. Bake it at 160 deg C for 10 to 12 minutes or until the edges are slightly golden brown on the corners. It took 13 minutes for me. Check yours accordingly. Bake a little more if you want crispier cookies.

Transfer carefully in a rack and cool it. Store in airtight container.

Happy New Year!!!

 

Mini Samosa

Samosas are deep fried triangle shaped starters filled with vegetables. There could be no one without knowing this famous appetizer. Mini Samosas are the one in miniature versions. And these will be more crispier than the regular ones. These are mostly filled with onions. And the taste of onions inside these fried samosas - OMG!! - its utterly delicious. I recently saw a cookery show in youtube and got this recipe. Its very simple to make and you will get amazing response. I tried this with store bought samosa sheets. But if you prefer you could make your own sheets too.

 

Ingredients:

Samosa sheets
Thinly sliced Onions - 1 cup
Thinly sliced Cabbage - 1 cup
grated ginger - 1 tsp
sliced green chilly - 2 ( I replaced this with red chilly powder)
salt

Glue paste
Mix a tsp of all purpose flour in water to a semi running paste.

Method

Mix the sliced onions and cabbage with 1/2 ttsp salt and mix well. Keep this aside for half hour. After half hour the onions will leave water. Now squeeze all those water from the onion mix. You should really squeeze well as it helps to make crispy samosas. If you don't squeeze well, then the samosas will be soggy. So squeeze it really well

After squeezing, add other ingredients and little more salt (remember we added some salt earlier. though we squeezed some will still be there)

Take the samosa sheets. Mine was a square one. so I sliced it lengthwise into 4 rectangles.

Take a spoon of the onion mix and keep it one corner. Then tightly roll it as triangles throughout the length of the sheet. Make sure that you don't have any open corners as the mix might drop out. At the end apply the glue paste and stick it well. In the same way roll all the samosas.

Heat oil in a pan to deep fry these samosas. The oil should not be too hot. I kept it in a low flame. Slowly drop one batch of these mini samosas. And let them cook slowly till they get the nice even golden coloring. Then turn and cook on the other side. This takes around 7 - 10 minutes for each set.

Drain the oil well and place them on tissue papers. These stay crisp even for hours later. Enjoy these crispy snacks on a holiday evening.

Note:
Make sure to squeeze well the onion and cabbage mix
Fry the samosas in really low flame to have the crispy texture.

 

 



 

Popcorn chicken

I made this as a special treat for my kid who is fond of chicken. And this turned out to be a hit as even my hubby liked it. I saved some boneless breast pieces and made this crunchy snack. Next time I will try to bake it and make it a healthier version. Here goes the recipe.

 

Recipe source: vahrehvah

 

 

 

Ingredients :

 

Boneless chicken - 250 gms

Eggs - 1

Corn flour - 1/2 cup

All purpose flour - 1/2 cup

Red chilly powder - 1 tsp

Black pepper powder - 1 tsp

Chaat masala - 1 tsp

Salt

Oil- for deep frying

Parmesan cheese - to sprinkle

 

 

Method:

 

Wash chicken and cut into small pieces. Put them in a bowl and season with salt, red chilli powder, black pepper powder, lemon juice and mix well. Marinate in the fridge for few hours.

In a dish, take ½ cup corn flour, ½ all-purpose flour (maida), and combine them together. Add little salt and red chilli powder, mix and keep aside.

Whisk 1 or 2 eggs in a bowl and keep aside.

In another tray, add all-purpose flour and put in the chicken pieces and coat well with the maida flour (this helps in absorbing the excess moisture).

Take the coated chicken pieces and drop them in the egg mixture and coat them well.

Take pieces of chicken and coat them with the spiced flours, remove and shift them into a colander and toss them to remove the excess flour. (you can refrigerate this for 30 mts)

Heat oil in a pan on medium heat and when the oil gets hot, add the chicken pieces and deep fry till they get nice and crispy. The chicken pieces should get slight golden in color. Remove, drain oil.

In a bowl, add some chaat masala, parmesan cheese (optional), marjoram spice(I skipped this), and mix the ingredients well. Sprinkle some of the masala powder over the chicken, toss and serve

 

 

Vegetable Sevai

Sevai is a traditional south indian rice noodles. This is usually made with steamed rice flour using idiyappam press. But I got some instant rice noodles from a chinese store and it tastes the same as sevai and its easy to prepare too (just have to soak it in warm water for 10 mts). This time I added some vegetables to this and made a nice breakfast. This is great for evening snack too.

Ingredients:

Instant Rice noodles - 2 cups
Finely chopped onions - 1 tbsp
Chopped vegetables (carrot, beans, peas) - 1/4 cup
Red/Green chilli - 1
Mustard seeds - 1/2 tsp
Urad dal - 1 tsp
Oil - 1 tsp
Curry and Coriander leaves
Salt

Method

1. Cook and keep the instant noodles ready as per the instructions in the packet. Or you can use homemade sevai

2. Heat oil in a pan and add mustard seeds, urad dal, chilli and curry leaves.

3. To this add onions and saute till light pink. To this add chopped vegeables and saute on a low flame till half cooked. Add salt and mix well.

4. To this add the cooked sevai/noodles and mix gently and thoroughly. Garnish with coriander leaves and serve warm.

Oven roasted Chana Dal

Chana dal that is deep fried was a great snack for me when I was little. That too the added spice and garlic flavor really enticed me. I wanted to try that recipe for a ling time but was hesitant to deep fry. Luckily I got this recipe of oven roasting the dal which is a healthy alternative to that. And believe me you still get the crunchy and crispy texture of deep fried ones. As this greatly impressed me, I'm planing to oven roast some soy nuts too for a healthy protein rich snack. Now on to the recipe.

Ingredients:

Chana Dal - 1 cup
Olive oil - 1tbsp
Chili Powder - 1 tsp
Salt
Turmeric powder - 1/4 tsp
Garlic cloves - 2-3

Preparation:

• Wash the dal and soak it for at least 4 hours.
• Drain the water and transfer the dal to a sauce pan. Fill the pan with water, about ½ – 1” above the dal. Cook it on high for 3 minutes. You will see foam forming on the top. We don’t want to cook the dal for too long. Turn of the heat, drain it and run the dal under cold water to bring it back to room temperature. 
• Transfer dal to a paper towels or a kitchen towel and pat dry it. Leave it on the towel to dry, for about 5 minutes until the oven is preheated.
• Preheat the oven to 350F. 
• Line a baking tray or cookie sheet with aluminum foil.
• Transfer chana dal to bowl and mix it well with oil, ½ tsp. salt, ½ tsp. chili powder & turmeric. You can also do this directly on the lined baking sheet.
• Spread seasoned chana dal on the baking sheet and bake it for 10 minutes in a preheated oven.
• Remove from the over, shake the tray properly or with a spoon mix the dal and spread it evenly on the tray. Put it back in the oven and bake for 5 minutes. Pull it out and repeat the above step. Bake for another 5 minutes or until chana dal turns brown. The total bake time is 20 minutes. However, I felt I should have pulled it out of the oven a minute earlier. Do keep an eye on the dal after 18 minutes into baking.
• Crush together garlic, ¼ tsp. salt & 1 tsp. of chili powder. Sprinkle it on the baked dal and mix it well. Add the garlic immediately after removing the dal from the over. 
• Once the dal is cooled, store in an air tight container

 

Lemon sevai

I always had been making sevai with idiyappam mix. My friends have told about the instant rice noodles but somehow I missed to try it for a long time. Finally I got these instant rice noodles from a chinese super market and made lemon sevai. To my surprise it tasted same soft as the regular idiyappam sevai and even more separate. Since rice noodles cook very quick, this can be made very fast. This can be eaten as breakfast or even as a snack or tiffin, no waiting around time to cook! I used to even make this for my hubby lunch box, since it is quick to cook in the morning.

Ingredients:
1 cup rice noodles
1 tbsp peanuts
1/2 tsp chana dal
1/4 tsp urad dal
1/4 tsp mustard seeds1 Green chilli
1/2 tsp grated ginger
Few curry leaves
1 tbsp oilsalt to taste
1/4 tsp turmeric powder
1/4 cup lemon juice (to taste)

Method:
Cook the rice noodles according to package OR Boil water in a pot, Add salt. Add the noodles and cover for only 3-4 minutes. Drain and keep aside.
Add oil in a pan and heat it up.
Add the peanuts and saute for about 30 seconds.
Add the chana dal, urad dal, mustard seeds and jeera.
Add the curry leaves, green chili and ginger. Add the turmeric powder.
Add the drained rice noodles and saute along with some salt. (remember you added some salt before)
Add the lemon juice, little by little, so that it doesn't become too sour.At this point taste to see if you have to add more salt or lemon juice.
Serve hot with chutney or pickle.
Enjoy!!!

Spicy Maida Biscuits

This is a simple savory biscuits made of All purpose flour. Its simple to make and can be made for any occasions. Though its called as biscuits, its not baked but instead deep fried in oil. Traditionally this is made as sweets and sometimes chilli powder is added to prepare the spiced versions. This time I made the spiced version and every time I make this it disappears while I fry them. Its so melting on the mouth and very tempting too. I saw some versions of these biscuits with the addition of ginger garlic paste, but I've never tried it and will do it next time.

 

Ingredients:

Maida / All purpose flour - 2 cups
Chilli powder - 2 tsp
Salt - as required
melted butter / hot oil - 2 tbsp
water - as needed
Oil - to deep fry

Procedure:

Mix the dry ingredients one bye one and add melted butter/oil to it. Slowly add water and knead it well as a soft chapati dough.

Now make small balls of this dough and roll them as thin as possible.

Now using knife / pizza cutter to cut them to desired shapes. Usually its made as diamond or square shapes. Now keep the cut pieces separately so that they don't get sticked together.

After you have finished cutting them all you can deep fry them. (u can deep fry parallely too if you get a helping hand to roll and cut the biscuits).

Fry them in medium hot oil until it turns nice golden brown color. Drain the oil well and cool it.

Store them in airtight containers and serve it during tea-time.


Variations:

Add sugar instead of salt and chilli powder to get the sweet version

Ginger garlic paste, coriander leaves or mint leaves can be added to get different flavors of the spiced version

Wheat flour/rava (Sooji) can also added in same proportion as maida to get a different taste.

Am sending this recipe for the Navartri - Diwali event happening at Simply food and Festive food at Cuisine Delights.

 

Home-made Vatrals/ Vathals (fryums)

Vatahals/Vatrals come as instant saviors when we are running a little low on side dish for rice. They make the meal tasty and satisfying too. Whenever we talk of vathals I remember those days (usually sundays) when we go along with my mom and grandma to the open terrace above our house and make them early morning before the sun starts to show his strong rays. Actually sun light is the most important thing needed for drying this and as it is available sufficient back home in Chennai, making this had never been a question there. Thats is the reason why its usually  made during the months of march - april, when the sun is bright and less wind. And its usually made in huge batches which will be stocked for the entire year.

When I thought of doing this in my place where we don't have a place like open terrace, I decided to keep it near my living room window where I will get some sunlight during the day time (I made it well ahead in summer, but sorry for posting it in fall). I was lucky for the first day, but the second  day didn't had much sunlight to dry up the other side. So I heated my convection oven on "warm setting" to dry it out completely. It took 3 days for my vathals to get dried completely. Thankfully it came out well and my family loves this so much. And I got the satisfaction of making some home-made vathals.

I tried both rice and javvarisi vathals. Here goes the recipe


Javvarasi/ Sabudana vathal

Ingredients:

Javvarisi/sabudana- 1 cup (soak overnight)
Green chilli - 2
Asafoetida/Hing - 1/4 tsp
Water - 1 cup
Salt

Procedure:

Grind the soaked javvarisi with green chillies and hing for 2 secs.

Heat water in a pan and add the ground paste to this. Mix salt.

Boil it till it gets cooked and the water is well absorbed to a semi solid state. Let it cool for half an hour.

Take a clean plastic sheet. Use a spoon to take 1 tsp of the spread it on the sheet. Try to make it flat and thin circles.

Let this dry under sun the whole day. After the top part is dry turn the vathals to dry the other side of the vathal.

Make sure you dry it well, absolutely dry without any moisture, so it will have long shelf life and it will be frying well too.

 

 

 

Rice/arisi vathal

Ingredients:

Cooked rice - 1 cup
Green chilli - 2
Asafoetida/Hing - 1/4 tsp
chopped Onion - 1
Salt

Procedure:

Grind the cooked rice with green chillies and hing slightly. Or else you can even mash the rice if its well cooked.

To this mix salt and finely chopped onions. This will be very sticky.

Take a clean plastic sheet. Apply little oil on your hands. Take small balls of the rice mix and keep it on the plastic sheet. The balls need not have to be perfect shape.

Let this dry under sun the whole day. After the top part is dry turn the vathals to dry the other side of the vathal. As the sun was not very hot the day I made it, I had to heat the oven in "warm setting" for an hour and dried it there.

Make sure you dry it well, absolutely dry without any moisture, so it will have long shelf life and it will be frying well too.

Store them in airtight containers. Fry in hot oil and serve. It goes very well with sambar and curd rice.


Store them in airtight containers. Fry in hot oil and serve. It goes very well with sambar and kara kuzhambu.

Rice crackers - Chekkalu

It is Krishna Jayanthi and I was searching for some new and easy snacks, I came across this recipe. This is very similar to 'Thattai' / Elladai. But this is made with fully rice flour and no urad flour. This is super simple if you have rice flour ready at home. Just with a few ingredients, we can make this ready in no time. And it tastes fabulous and will just be finished shortly. My husband likes this even with sambhar/ curd rice. Its damn good. The only difficult part, I would say is to flatten the balls. But you can master this after the first 2 rounds.

Enjoy this great, easy snack for any evening.

Ingredients:

Rice flour - 1 cup
Butter - 1 tbsp
Salt -  1 tsp / as required
Chana Dal - 1 tbsp (soaked for an hour. If you haven't soaked put it in boiling water for 10 mts)
Water - few drops
Oil - to deep fry

To grind
Green Chillies - 3
Ginger - 1/2 inch
Curry leaves
Coriander leaves

Procedure:

Take a bowl add rice flour & salt.Mix the dry mixture.

Grind ginger,curry leaves & green chillies to a fine paste .Add this paste to the flour along with chana dal and mix well.

Add butter to the mixture and mix well as it will work as a binding agent.At this point add few drops of water.Knead the dough. Make sure not to add excess water.

Divide the dough in equal parts as desired.Make small balls out of it similar to a dumpling.Take a plastic sheet rest the dumpling on it ,cover it with the other side of the plasticsheet & press it with your palm. 

Repeat the same procedure for all dumplings. You can do this flattening parallel when you are frying.

Heat oil in a deep frying pan.Ensure that oil has reached its correct temperature; then add chekkalu slowly.Allow it to cook on medium flame .

They are ready to be served


Tips:

Be careful when adding water to the dough as excess water may not give crunchy taste
Fry in medium temperature.
The dough kneaded is appropriate only when it forms uneven edges when pressed on the sheet.

I am posting this recipe for Let’s Cook #18 ~ Starters / Appetizers happening at Tickling Palate, Celebrate Month of Shravan at Spicy treats and Anu's South Indian Cooking Event #1

Teddy bear cookie

Cookies are ever time favorite for kids. Why not make it even more interesting for them? Yeah.. its cookie in the shape of teddy bears with a cool handle to hold. I got a cool idea from Howdini.com.  This will be perfect for birthday parties too.

And the most important thing, we can involve them in decorating. My cookies were decorated by my kid. So please don't bother about the perfection. All I'm happy is they are getting engaged outside the TV box..For the video recipe please check here. I used the instant cookie mix this time, but you can try with your own cookie recipe.

Ingredients

For making Cookie Betty crocker peanut butter cookie mix - 1 packet
Egg - 1
Oil - 1/2 cup
Water - 1/4 cup

For Decoration Icing mix
Colored candies
Popsicle sticks


Procedure

Mix all the ingredients for cookie to a dough.

Make a big ball around the size of a golf ball of the cookie dough. Shape it round and keep it on the greased cookie tray. This is for the face of the teddy

Make two small balls for and keep on the top part of the big ball to shape as ears. These 3 balls(1 bug and 2 small) makes 1 teddy.

Make similar balls and keep 8 teddy in one sheet with spacing inbetween.

Next insert the popsicle sticks to the neck part and press down. Gently press the balls to flatten them

Bake them in a preheated oven at 375F for 10_12 mts until slightly brown. Cool them in a cooling rack.

After they cooled down using icing mix for making the parts of face.. eyes,  nose and mouth

Keep a drop of icing mix and press a candy on top of that for making nose. Similar way do for the eyes. Using the icing mix, draw the mouth part. Add some bows to make the teddies really inviting.

Yummy Teddy bear popsicles are ready to crunch.

I'm sending this recipe to Cookie-Mela happening at Cooking 4 All Seasons.

Pav Bhaji

This is a famous street dish on the roads of Mumbai but has got famous allover Indian. The Bhaji is the main thing which is served with Pav bun and the combination is exotic. The aroma and color are most inviting for this dish. Its quite nutricious too as it has lots of veggies in it, potato being the main. This compensates for the butter we add to the recipe. I actually served this bhaji with Hotdog buns but that didn't had anything les for the dish except have to be called as Hotdog Bhaji. :-),. I actually grinded my own Bhaji Masala, but u can always use store bought Pav bhaji Masala powders.

Ingredients:
Pav buns - 20
Big Potato -1
Carrots - 1
Cauliflower - 4 big florets
Green peas - 1/2 cup
Capsicum - 1/2 cup
Green chilli -2
Onions - 1 chopped finely
Tomatoes - 1 chopped finely
Red chilly powder - 1 tsp
Salt
butter - 1 tbsp
Red food color - optional
To saute and grind
Fennel seeds - 1 tsp
Coriander seeds - 2 tsp
Ginger - 1 inch
garlic - 3

Procedure:
Pressure cook all the vegetables from potato to green chillies with 1 cup of water till they become well cooked. This has to be mashed so cook very well. Vegetables are your choice and u can add or reduce any vegetables
Mean while saute the ingredients for grinding with little oil and grind to a smooth paste with water
In a pan heat 1/2tsp butter and add the chopped onions and tomatoes one by one and saute very well. This has to be cooked well but take care not to burn them. To this add the ground paste and red chilli powder. Cook well and add little water if needed.
Mash the vegetables that we pressure cooked. we don't want to see anything whole so mash very well. Add this to the pan and mix well and mash again. Now add the food color if needed (I didn't) and salt.
Finally add remaining butter and chopped coriander leaves
When this is ready toast the buns with butter and serve with Bhaji. While serving decorate with fresh chopped onions, coriander leaves and lemon juice.
Let your soul say yummy while u enjoy..

Beetroot Moongdal Pakoda

One beetroot was sleeping in my refridgerator for a long time. Lasttime when I made beetroot poriyal, it was left with me at end as noone had interest. An idea striked suddenly and they were transformed to pakodas shorlty. My usual pakoda are made of onion and gramflour. This is very different as it is made with moongdal and had the slight sweetness of beets. In fact I thought it was a healthy pakodas though being deepfried.

Ingredients:

Beetroot - 1, shredded

Onions - 1, thinly sliced

Chopped Curry leaves, coriander leaves - 2 tbsp

Salt

Oil - to deep fry

To coarsely Grind:

Yellow Moong Dal - 1/2 cup (soak for 1 hr)

Fennel seeds - 1 tsp

Red chilly - 1

Ginger - 1 inch, thinly sliced,chopped

Garlic - 3 crushed into pieces

Procedure:

1. Wash the soaked moong dal and grind coarsely with fennel seeds, ginger, garlic and Red chilly. Please grind without any water.

2. To this add the beetroot, onions, curry and coriander leaves. Mix salt to this.

3. Heat oil in a pan. Make small balls and drop in the hot oil slowly.

4. Cook it medium heat, till cooked on all sides.

5. Drain the oil well and serve hot.

I am sending this recipe for "Only" Snacks And Starters event happening at Vegetarian Tastebuds