Goan Fish Curry

Curry Masala:
6 kashmiri chillies
1/2 scraped coconut
A small piece of ginger
3 cloves of garlic
5 - 6 black pepper corn
1 tsp corriander seeds 
1 tsp Methi Seeds
small ball of tamarind
1/2 tsp turmeric
1/2 tsp cumin
1 green chilli
1 Tomato (optional)
Salt

Other ingredients:
1/2 onion
Fish (Any kind as you like). 

I am going to use kingfish - my favorite. 



















Directions:

Grind the masala ingredients mentioned above, in a mixer with little water.

 

Take a wide saucepan, add oil and chopped onion once oil it hot. 
Add masala once onions are translucent.

Add water as per thickness required. Once the entire mixture reaches a boil you can add the fish to the curry.  Add kokam (or anything sour) to the mixture (as per desired sourness). Let the fish cook (avoid mixing with spoon). 

Add tirphala (looks like black pepper, but it adds beautiful aroma to the curry). Not sure what is it called in English. Here is how it looks. It has a seed inside the cover which looks like ball pepper. But you can remove the seed and add the cover. This adds aroma as well as removes fishy smell. 

Turn off the heat once fish is cooked. Serve with Rice. 

Seyal Pav (Sindhi Chutney Sandwich)

Ingrediants:

Eight Pav

Two medium size tomatoes 

Green coriander, 

garlic, 

ginger, 

green chilly, 

salt

1/4 teaspoon red chilly 

1/2 teaspoon salt 

1 teaspoon dhania powder

1/2 teaspoon garam masala.

Directions:
Grind green coriander, garlic ginger and tomatoes make purée add dry masala and salt. Cut Pav from mid and stuff with the mixture. Heat tava and toast putting ghee both sides till golden brown. Serve hot.

Veg Manchurian

Servings - 3 - 4

INGREDIENTS
Minced carrots - 100 grams
Minced cabbage - 100 grams
Minced cauliflower - 100 grams
Salt - 2 teaspoons, divided
Refined flour - 30 grams
Corn flour - 30 grams
Water - 200 ml, divided
Oil - for frying
Olive oil - 2 tablespoons
Ginger - 1 1/2 teaspoons
Garlic - 1 tablespoon
Onions - 50 grams
Green chili - 1 tablespoon
Green chili sauce - 1 teaspoon
Red chili sauce - 1 teaspoon
Soy sauce - 1 teaspoon
Vinegar - 1 tablespoon
Ketchup - 50 ml
Corn flour paste - 1 tablespoon

PREPARATION
1. In a mixing bowl, add 100 grams minced carrots, 100 grams minced cabbage, 100 grams minced cauliflower, 1 teaspoon salt, 30 grams refined flour, 30 grams corn flour and 50 milliliters of water. Mix the mixture well.
2. Shape the mixture into lemon sized balls.
3. Heat sufficient oil in a heavy skillet and deep fry vegetable balls until golden brown. Drain on absorbent paper.
4. Heat 2 tablespoons of olive oil in a pan. Add 1 1/2 teaspoons ginger, 1 tablespoon garlic, 50 grams onions, 1 tablespoon green chili and stir. Add 150 milliliters of water, 1 teaspoon salt, 1 teaspoon green chili sauce, 1 teaspoon red chili sauce, 1 teaspoon soy sauce, 1 tablespoon vinegar and 50 milliliters of ketchup. Bring mixture to boil, let it boil for a minute.
5. Add the fried vegetable balls, 1 tablespoon corn flour paste and mix well. Cook for 2 - 3 minutes or until the sauce starts to thicken, keep stirring continuously.
6. Garnish with scallion greens.
7. Serve hot with rice and enjoy.

Pho - Vietnamese Soup

Many years ago I worked very close to China Town and used to go there probably every friday for lunch. We used to try different varieties of Chinese, Thai, Vietnamese and Burmese food there. Since we don't get such food where we live now, so I decided to bring chinatown home.

Here is the recipe for famous Vietnamese Soup - Pho. 

1. Bring stockpot of water to boil. Add a few pieces of chicken with bones like ribs. return to a boil and cook for 5 minutes. 
2. Toast cloves, star anise, cinnamon, pepper corns, coriander seeds and fennel seeds in a small skillet over medium high heat, stirring until fragrant about 2 minutes. Transfer to pot. 
3. Heat broiler. Place onion halves, shallots and ginger on a rimmed baking sheet. Broil, until charred. Turn occasionally. Char in spots about 10 mins. Transfer to pot.
4. Bring simmer over medium high heat (Do no boil). Skim foam with a spoon, adjusting heat as necessary to maintain simmer. 
5. Simmer until liquid has lowered 2 inches (6-8 hours). Drain and keep aside. 

Note: If you don't want want to go through all this trouble, take 6 cups water, add 3 chicken bouillon cubes and mix well. Continue with step 2 and 3. And boil till liquid is reduced to 4 cups. 

6. Strain the broth. Add sugar and fish sauce. The broth is now ready to be served (it should be very hot)
7. Soak rice noodles (very thin ones, I have used flat ones in this receipe) until noodles are soft. Cook noodles in boiling water for 3 minutes or al dante and transfer to bowls. 
8. Saute veggies like mushroom, scallion and transfer to bowl. 
9. Saute seafood (Shrimp, Squid), thinly sliced chicken, transfer to bowl
10. Add scallion greens, sprouts to the bowl. 
11. Now add the hot broth and let it cool for 2-3 minutes. 
12. Add Sriracha sauce if you like heat. 

Batata Vada

For the Vada Filling

1. Heat oil in a pan. Add mustard seeds, cumin seeds, coriander seeds in it; when it crackles, add hing (asafoetida), curry leaves, ginger-garlic-green chili paste and sauté for a minute. 
2. Add mashed potatoes, lemon juice, chopped coriander leaves and sauté again for few seconds. Add turmeric powder, salt and mix it well. 
3. Switch of the flame, keep aside and let it be cool for 4-5 minutes.
4. Now take the mixture and divide it into small- small portion and make balls. 

For Besan Covering

1. Take a bowl. Add besan, salt, turmeric powder, carom seeds, pinch of soda in it and mix well, make a smooth lump free batter, using necessary water. 
2. Now heat oil in kadhai/pan for deep frying.
3. Dip each round of the Vada’s balls into the prepared batter and allow it to coat the mixture well. 
4. Now drop the batter coated ball into the hot oil carefully, use same process for remaining balls, and then deep fry them into the hot oil, till all sides become golden brown (fry balls into small-small batches). 
5. Drain fried vadas on paper towel and keep aside. 
6. Serve Vada with green chutney and/or garlic chutney.
7. You can slice each Pav (bun) into half, heat up a little on tava, spread some green chutney and dry garlic chutney inside. Place one vada in each pav and serve it fresh.

Sushi Fever

All you can eat Sushi :)

Me and my husband loved eating Sushi. After having kids, going out to Sushi restaurant for dinner became a rare thing. So my husband came up with an idea. Why not make Sushi at home. I first laughed at the idea, but apparently it was so simple that we started making sushi almost every week now. Below is the recipe and tools needed for rolling Sushi. 

Stuffing:

Avocado
Cucumber
Crabmeat
Shrimp (Cooked and cut into small pieces)
Smoked Salmon
Sesame Seeds

Dried Seaweed

You can have all vegetarian stuffing or you can mix and match with seafood. I don't like raw seafood so we got smoked salmon. We cooked shrimp in a skillet with small amount of oil and shredded it once cooked. 

Sushi Rice Recipe:

2 Cups Jasmin/ Sushi Rice
1/2 cup rice vinegar (Do not try any other Vinegar)1 tbsp oil1/4 cup white sugar1 tsp salt

Cook rice in a rice cooker. In a small saucepan combine rest of the ingredients till sugar is melted. Add the Vinegar sauce to rice and mix well. It will initially look too much liquid, but it will eventually dry out. Your rice is ready now. 

Dipping Sauce:

Wasabi Paste, Soy Sauce (Mix together Soy sauce and very tiny amount of Wasabi and you can dip your Sushi in it 

Ginger on side: thinly sliced young ginger that has been marinated in a solution of sugar and vinegar. 

Tools needed:

Sushi rolling mat or Sushi Roller

Rolling Sushi:

1. Take the sushi rolling mat, cover it with plastic wrap. 
2. Put seaweed wrap (Without the seaweed wrap, it's difficult to hold the sushi together unless you master it, so start with the wrap around. Once you know how to roll it, you can put wrap after the layer of rice, so it stays inside the sushi)
3. Spread a layer of sushi rice on it
4. Sprinkle sesame seeds
5. Add cucumber, crabmeat and other filling ingredients. 
6. Roll the mat and cut the sushi
7. Sprinkle sesame seeds on top once arranged on platter

Here is how Sushi looked on our platter:

Photos of rolling of Sushi taken from site WikiHow. 

Mallu Style Fish Curry

Ingredients 

500 g Kingfish

1 and 1/2 chopped onion 

1 tomato - cut into thick pieces

1 cup grated coconut

2 cloves og Garlic - chopped

1 small piece of ginger - chopped 

1/2 tsp turmeric powder

2 tbsp chili powder

1 tsp whole pepper

3 tbsp coriander powder

Tamarind

Water

Salt for taste

Oil

curry leaves

mustard seeds

1 tsp sliced red chilli

Steps

1. clean and cut fish pieces, wash well with water and salt. Keep aside.
2. soak tamarind in to 1/2 cup of water. 
3. In a bowl add chili powder, turmeric powder and coriander powder and then add some water to it (approx 3 tbsp of water). Mix well and make a fine paste. 
4. heat oil in a pan add grated coconut, garlic, pepper corn and half of the onions. Saute well in a medium flame until coconut become brown. Add 2 pinches of chili powder and coriander powder to it. switch off the stove and saute well for few more minutes. Let it cool.
5. Transfer this to a processor and grind well (add 1/2 cup water for grinding) and make a fine paste.
6. Heat oil in a fish curry pot, add curry leaves and remaining onions. Saute well till onions become soft. Add chopped ginger and garlic. Saute till its cooked. Add the masala paste and saute till oil comes up, then add ground coconut paste and tamarind water.
7. Add 1 -1 1/2 cup of water approximately and mix it well. Let the curry boil.
8. Once boiled, add fish pieces, tomato and salt.
9. Cook in a medium flame, stir in between (do not use spoon swirl the pot as fish meat might break) once the fish cooked well, switch off the stove.
10. Heat oil in another pan splutter mustard seeds, then add curry leaves and chili flakes. Add this tadka to the curry. (This is optional). 
11. Serve with rice (my favorite) or you can have with chapati/ paratha/ naan/ garlic naan.