Navarathri Festive Food

I did not want to miss the Navaratri Festive Food Event, but deliberately delayed this post until I could make the wheat laddoo at Uma's Essence of Andhra and rava laddoos by Sireesha of Mom's Recipes. And surprise! I ended up making a laddoo with Rava, Wheat, and Rice Flour together on Vijayadashami. I wish to call them Thri-Laddoo (you can pronounce it 3-laddoo in English :D). I also did not use sugar, and substituted it with jaggery.

To make the Thri-Laddoo, you will need:

Rava/ Sooji/ Semolina - 2 cups
Wheat flour - 1 cup
Rice flour - 1 cup (I used Puttu Podi)Coconut - grated - 1.5 cups
Milk - 1/2 cup - boiled and cooled (or according to consistency for laddoo)

Jaggery - grated - 1 cup (I grated a big block of jaggery to get 1 cup)
Cashew - 1/2 cup
Raisins - 1/2 cup
Cardamom powder - 4-5 pods
Ghee - 5-6 tbsp (a little too generous use, being a festival food)

Method:

• Take a non-stick pan, heat a tbsp of ghee, add the cashews, roast them, add raisins, roast until raisins swell up and turn golden brown, and remove into a small measuring bowl
• Heat a tbsp of ghee again, add the rava and roast until light brown and crisp, and remove into a mixing bowl
• In the same pan, add another tbsp of ghee, add the wheat flour and roast until light brown taking care not to burn, and remove into the same mixing bowl as the rava
• Again, heat another tbsp of ghee, add rice flour and roast until light brown and remove into the mixing bowl
• Heat a tbsp of ghee again, add the grated coconut and roast until golden brown and remove to a measuring bowl
• In the mixing bowl add the jaggery while the roasted rava, wheat, and rice flours are still warm and mix well. Leave this mixture to cool down
• Add roasted coconut, raisins, cashews, and cardamom powder to the cool mixture and mix well. The jaggery would have melted a little leaving the mixture with a binding texture
• Add milk at this stage and ensure that the consistency is just enough to form round laddoos with your hand
• Start rolling the laddoos with your palm and leave on slightly warm pan

Offer as Prasad in Pooja, and later serve with your festive meal:-)

Another shot:

Palak Puri

Puris are usually made at my house only for festive occasions, or when my daughter has not had anything of wheat and I start feeling guilty. A loves puris, and apart from wheat bread or wheat dosa, she hardly eats anything made containing wheat, like chapathis/ rotis. She also likes Aloo Parathas, but again (more guitly), those are rare too in my house!

I had bought fresh palak (spinach) and did not want to make the palak paratha or dal palak curry, so decided to try a new combination. The palak puris turned out to be really tasty, and I also made Lauki-Moong Dal (Bottle Gourd in split-dehusked-green gram bean) curry.

To make the puris, you will need:

Wheat flour - 2-3 cups
Spinach/ Palak - 2 cups - chopped
Green chilly - 1
Cumin seeds/ Jeera powder - 1 tsp
Turmeric powder - 1/2 tsp (optional)
Salt - to taste
Water - for mixing dough
Oil - 2 tsp and for deep frying

Method:

• Heat 2 tsp oil in a pan, add turmeric, jeera powder to roast, add palak and green chilly, cook covered for 3-5 minutes, and cook uncovered after adding salt until dry and cooked
• After the palak cools down, grind into smooth paste
• Take wheat flour in a mixing bowl, add the palak paste, and start kneading after greasing your plams with a little oil or ghee/ butter until the dough is well done and keep aside for 15-20 minutes
• Heat in a heavy bottomed pan/ kadai
• Start rolling out small balls of the dough into thin circular puris

• Add one into the oil and keep adjusting the flame in order that the puris don' get burnt
• After one side puffs up, turn it over with the ladle and ensure that the other side is also well done
• Drain the extra oil, and start with the next puri
  

Moong Dal with Bottlegourd Curry

Things you need:

Bottlegourd - cut into cubes - 1 cup
Moong Dal - 2 cups
Green chilly - 1 - sliced
Turmeric powder - 1/2 tsp
Jeera/ Cumin seeds powder - 1 tsp
Red chilly powder - 1/2 tsp
Coriander powder - 1/2 tsp
Methi/ Fenugreek seeds powder - 1/2 tsp
Mustard seeds - 1/2 tsp
Curry leaves - 1 strand
Oil - 2 tsp
Salt - to taste

Method:

• Pressure cook moong dal with bottlegourd and green chilly in about 1.5 cups of water for 3-4 whistles
• Mash the dal well after it cools down, without breaking the cooked bottlegourd pieces
• In a tadka pan, heat oil, splutter mustard seeds, add curry leaves, and while the pan is still hot, add the powders and mix well
• Add this to the moong dal wih salt and mix well, add water to adjust consistency and bring to boil

Serve with puris (I made normal puris also, just in case A refused to eat the unfamiliar green coloured one).

This post is my entry to the Festive Food Event: Navaratri hosted by LG of Taste of Mysore

Palak Paratha

I love leafy vegetables, and try to include them in my diet as much as possible. Palak (Spinach) is such a rich source of iron, and instead of making Dal Palak or Spinach Thoran, I try to make parathas occasionally. This time, I was in a hurry, and decided to try and make them as quickly as possible.

This is what I used to make the Palak Paratha:

Palak - finely chopped - 4 cups
Wheat flour/ Atta - 2 cups
Ginger - peeled and pounded - 2 tsp
Jeera/ Cumin powder - 1 tbsp
Red Chilly powder - 1 tsp
Oil - 2 tsp (for palak); per taste (for roti)
Salt - to taste

Method:

• Heat oil in a kadai, and add the jeera powder, red chilly powder, ginger, palak and salt, and stir well for 2 minutes
• Leave to cook and when the colour of the palak changes and water from the vegetable evapourates, leave to cool
• Take a mixing bowl and knead the flour with the palak and keep aside (Do not add water, you can add more salt per taste)
• Heat the griddle, sprinkle oil and spread with the flat ladle
• Make small balls with the dough and start rolling them with a rolling pin, using oil if you wish to
• Cook both sides of the flattened rolls using oil per requirement, and store in a hot pot

I am a little sceptical about using oil, so I did not use oil while kneading, and while rolling them flat. They were still soft and tasty. The parathas definitely taste better with more oil, I can't deny that!

My six parathas were ready in about 30 minutes from start to finish!

Serve with pickle/ chutney/ youghurt/ raita