KEYS TO MY HEART » Cooking

Cooking Rampage on a long weekend

Archana — Sun, 19 Feb 2012 17:46:56 +0000

Juicing away

Archana — Sat, 15 Oct 2011 21:47:38 +0000

Since I acquired a Waring Pro Juicer, I haven’t really tried too many variations; however, one of my favorites so far is carrot-apple-orange. Yum!

This time around, since I had store-bought grovestyle orange juice at home, I added that into my freshly made carrot-apple juice from 3 carrots and 3 apples.

Yummy chocolate chip cookies!

Archana — Sun, 20 Dec 2009 01:16:20 +0000

Cooking Healthy & Yummy

Eating healthy, staying healthy

Jagadish — Wed, 08 Jul 2009 22:17:43 +0000

I have never been one of those crazy health freaks. I have laughed and ridiculed people who watch their calories everyday, drinking diet sodas, eating fat-free food and drinking fat-free milk. I love good, tasty food. Having grown up in India where almost all the vegetables you eat are organic and the milk was freshly squeezed from the buffalo every morning (agreed it was diluted with water but still it was yummy). I really just hated everything I ate when I first came to US. The milk tasted like water, the yogurt didn’t taste right. The potatoes and peas were sweet. The eggs I ate had no taste and smelled too bad . Eggplants were huge and tasteless. The complaints I had about food were endless. Recently, I started going organic and that made a world of difference to the taste. Organic whole milk tastes much better than Indian milk, organics eggs = yummy; I just avoided the label ‘fat-free’ and I realized that the food in US never tasted better.

There was a downside to this whole experience. When you start avoiding fat-free label, you are getting into a territory where your food is potentially unhealthy for your body. Obviously, the trade off has always been taste and health and that’s really unfortunate. I don’t understand how we can’t have tasty and healthy food which are not fruits. You don’t really know how much of this food is polluting your body until you check your weight on a regular basis.

Recently, I started going to the gym because I realized my body needed some strength and stamina. I was always too lazy to go to the gym because it was too far away and I didn’t want to spend an hour walking there when I have about 4-5hrs of time to myself every day besides work. But, one of my friends offered to drive me back and forth every morning and I told myself why not? I started getting into the habit of checking my weight on a daily basis and I realized how much you can gain by gouging yourself on good food for just one night .

I always felt like I was a fairly healthy person. I have good immunity and I still don’t have glasses. I don’t get sick too often. But, there is always the need to improve the tone of your body and also increase the stamina. Especially at this age, where we get little to no physical activity, it is important to know what you are eating and keep yourself healthy. I still don’t get fat-free food but I limit my intake and get some exercise to burn off the excess calories .

Good weekend, good food

Archana — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 03:20:56 +0000

Yummy

It feels like it has been forever since I last blogged. Jagadish would definitely agree (I can almost hear him say, “That’s because it HAS been forever”). But here I am. It was a generally good weekend. I did a lot of clean up around the house. I may (or not) be moving, but I’ve come to realize I have a zillion things I don’t need or use around the house, but that blog is probably for later. I made a scrumptious meal this weekend–one of my all-time favorites: Vegetable Fried Rice with Cauliflower Manchurian. Here is how you can make it yourself: trust me, it is not as painful or time-consuming as it may seem if you use the shortcuts I did!

For the rice, heat some oil and toss in a teaspoon of ginger and garlic, along with half a green chilli, and a couple of red chillies (these are entirely per taste, and I picked the addition of red chillies up from Sanjeev Kapoor). Add onions, but do not brown them. While they turn translucent add sliced green peppers, and frozen carrot/beans/peas. Saute on high with a light sprinkling of salt until the veggies turn bright green, but do not let them brown! Set aside.

For the crispy florets of cauliflower, first steam cauliflower in the microwave (2-3 mins). If you are using frozen cauliflower, make sure it’s thawed out, and then steam it in the microwave. For the batter, I used half cornflour and half all-purpose flour, 1 tbsp of red chilli powderand 1 tsp of soy sauce. The batter should be the consistency of pancake batter–not too thin though, because as I’ve learned, that absorbs a lot of oil. Heat the oil until hot enough for deep frying and coat each floret and drop it into the hot oil carefully. Gently turn over until the florets are completely browned on all sides. These are very yummy all by themselves, and I must admit I sampled a little at this point

For the gravy, heat a tbsp of oil until hot, toss in 1 tbsp of ginger, 1 tsp of garlic, and depending on your taste for spice, 1 green chilli. Add finely chopped onion, and chopped bellpepper, and fry until onions are browned. Add soy sauce, cook for half a minute or so, and then add water. Lower the flame and let it simmer for 2-3 minutes. While it’s simmering, add some cornflour to water. While stirring, add the cornflour mixture to the sauce and continue to simmer for another minute or two. This will aid in thickening the sauce to a perfectly edible consistency. Toss in the florets and coat well with the sauce. Top with some freshly chopped coriander/cilantro.

Finally, for the rice, add a tsp of oil and separate the grains. Then combine small amounts of rice gently with the veggies on low heat. Continue until desired amount of rice+veggies is reached–I try and add lots of veggies! Now turn up the heat and continue to gently fry the rice. Remember to use a tsp or two of oil as it is frying, especially if the pan is not non-stick. Sprinkle soy sauce generously (I used Tamari sauce, which had extra flavor I thought), about 1 tbsp for the amount I made. Although I did not use them, spring onions add a definite kick to this rice–if you have them, use them in the veggie step.

Now, that does seem pretty easy does it not? Anyone can make it! And not only is it incredibly delicious, the rice packs in a lot of veggies, so I’m thinking, it can’t be all that bad either.

Tomato, Basil & Mozzarella=Yum!

Archana — Wed, 22 Apr 2009 03:48:52 +0000

They say the way to a man’s heart is through his stomach. Now, I don’t know how true that is, but I do like cooking and trying out ‘something new’. And Jagadish is game for anything that comes off of my stovetop or out of my oven While he is away working hard and finishing up his MS, I am learning and perfecting some new recipes I’ve picked up on of late. Most of these are also quick to make, as long as the ingredients are available, which is great, since I don’t have much spare time these days.

Okay, I love cheese. I’ve been trying not to eat too much of it of late, but I saw fresh mozzarella at my local grocery store and just could not resist buying some. Fresh mozzarella is very different from the hard grated variety you find in Kraft bags, or the kind used most often to top pizzas sold by commercial brands. It is very soft, very white, almost like freshly made paneer, and is usually stored in water or whey to keep it fresh. One of the easiest things to do with fresh mozzarella is eat it Yes, as is, it tastes great, but when combined with the flavorful herb basil, and tomatoes, it really is awesome!

After a long, hard, tiring day at work, there is nothing like being able to make a fresh meal under half an hour. Seriously, that beats frozen or instant cooked pasta any day. Here’s how you can make it too. You will need, as the title says, fresh mozzarella (although regular old mozzarella might do too, never tried it myself), tomatoes (slightly firm ones), basil leaves, fresh garlic clove, onion (optional), whole wheat bread (I prefer wheat, but white or ciabatta should do too), salt & pepper.

On a pan you can place directly into the oven, place your bread slices. Chop the tomatoes into pieces about half an inch long; top the bread with them. Add finely chopped garlic, and finely chopped onions, if you use them. Sprinkle salt and pepper. Top with basil leaves (use plenty!) roughly chopped, and slices of fresh mozzarella.

Toss this into an oven (I always forget to preheat it, although that would help it cook faster, I’m sure) at about 400F. In just under 7 minutes, this was done to perfection. The cheese was melted and the bread was toasted to a gorgeous shade of brown. One thing I will say here is to ensure the bread is properly toasted; the water content of the tomatoes will make it soggy if the bread is not fully toasted. I found that out the hard way, even though it didn’t change the deliciousness, it made it a little messy to eat!

I had a particularly strong craving for the taste of tomatoes and basil, and so I opened up� a can of Progresso’s Tomato Basil Soup and popped it into the microwave to combine with my sandwich.

Ah yes. And I used Dixie plates so I did not have to do dishes afterwards! All in all, the combination really makes for a light, yet hearty dinner. For the calorie watchers, this really is not loaded with that many calories–one slice of bread is about a 100 calories, the cheese was about another 100 (remember this also has protein), and the soup, another 100 or so.

I am definitely hoping to make this for Jagadish some day. I do hope he will like it as much as I did

Cooking Healthy & Yummy

Archana — Sat, 04 Apr 2009 19:10:50 +0000

I love cooking. Or rather, I love experimenting with cooking. Of late, I have been trying out recipes, from my imagination, and the internet, that incorporate a lot of goodness (read healthy) into you. I was fairly impressed with this version of stir-fry that combined a recipe I found online, and the ingredients I had at home. It tastes like something from Panda Express, except it’s all vegetarian (for sure), and is made with fresh veggies. Does this look delicious or what?

This pic snapped in a hurry with my MacBook does not do the dish justice. Here’s what I did: Drain tofu and cube it. I used extra-firm tofu to give it a better texture. Heat up some oil (I used olive), and toss in the drained/dry tofu along with a clove of chopped garlic and half a serrano green chili (add more according to taste, of course). Stir it around gently and carefully until it just begins to brown and toss in the other veggies (red bellpepper, red onion, broccoli & anything else you like). Continue stir frying carefully on high heat.

As the veggies are being done, combine some water, soy sauce, brown sugar, vinegar, and corn flour. Toss the mixture in with the veggies (hear it sizzle and turn your kitchen into an aromatic delight). Keep stirring quickly until all the veggies and tofu are well coated with the sauce. And you’re done! Dig in.

The Art of Cooking..

Jagadish — Sat, 29 Sep 2007 22:41:10 +0000

Let me begin by saying apologies to all the readers for lack of activity in the past couple of months. Life has been hectic and now that things are finally falling in place, you can expect posts every once in awhile. Now that I have gotten it out of the way, let me get to the crux of the post.

Cooking is an art and it is definitely not for the impatient. There is nothing like fast food just crappy food. With busy modern lives, instant food has become a favorite among many. Frankly, it doesn’t taste too bad but there is nothing like a good home-cooked meal. I have to say that I’m lucky that Archana belongs to the classic breed of girls who know how to cook the old fashioned way. I feel that good cooks are not only capable of cooking an awesome meal themselves but equally good at helping novices cook good food too.

Archana, has time and again helped me cook a good meal. There were times when my parents would go visit relatives leaving me alone in the house because someone has to take care of the dog (travelling with pets is a really huge issue).Its really awesome how easy she makes it all to be. It also helps that I am very quick learner (false modesty alert). Not every time has been a success of course. There were times when I screwed up royally. When I used the wrong kind of dal to make Dal Makhani and ended up with a big vessel of sticky stuff I couldn’t eat. There was also that time, when I made a really awesome Peas fried rice only to realize in the end that I had forgotten to put salt in it. Well you get the idea. Just one small mistake, you end up with a curry you can’t eat. No matter how perfectly you followed the rest of the steps.

Anyway, so this post is not to commemorate the screw ups but to celebrate a success. I had been able to successfully make Rajma for the second time in succession. I had been a big fan of Rajma for a long time but I have never thought I would be able to cook it with such good taste. Thanks to Archana, I could. So here are some of the pictures of my master piece. Enjoy!

Once again, many thanks to Archana for I can still eat a good meal. You might also want to check out the comic we made awhile back on our cooking adventures.