Easiest Way To Make Gajar Ka Halwa / Carrot Halwa Recipe

One dessert I can swear by is Carrot pudding known as Gajar Ka halwa in India ! It was one of the first desserts I tried making when i was in school ! Hell yeah ! Carrot halwa prepared by mom doesn’t last two days. Everybody love gajar ka halwa and eat it either after a meal or relish it as a sweet dish whenever they get a chance :P
I am from a huge family with a whole lot of siblings and with so many of them one can hardly expect gajar ka halwa to stay refrigerated for atleast a week. Hence I myself made a version of gajar ka halwa which was easy and i could cook it in huge quantity without having to grate the carrots for hours ! Read on to know how to cook the easiest, tastiest and quickest halva recipe! You can use a pressure cooker to cook the carrots but I prefer the traditional way of cooking the carrots in thick bottomed vessel on a low flame. But I prefer
Preparation Time: 20 mins  
Cooking Time: 50 mins  

Ingredients

• 2Kg grated carrots
• 6 tbsp ghee
• 2 liter milk
• 3/4 kg sugar
• 250gms mava (khoya)
• 4 tbsp raisins (kismish)
• 4 tbsp chopped almonds (badam)
• 3 tsp cardamom (elaichi) powder

Method

1. Peel the carrots and wash them and set aside. Once the water has dried cut them into small sized pieces and grate them in a food processor. Its best to process them in 4-5 sections. do not add water.
2. Heat ghee in a pressure cooker if you are willing to cook in 5-10 minutes and if you have the time and want to go ahead with slow traditional method of cooking use a kadhai or a heavy bottomed vessel like I have used here. Its easy both the ways. Add the carrots and sauté on a medium flame for 10-15 minutes, while stirring continuously.
3. Now add the milk to the carrots and let it cook. The milk will start to thicken, keep scraping the milk solids from the sides and keep adding them to the cooking mixture.
4. Once the milk and carrot mixture has evaporated and redced to 1/4th of the mixture , add sugar and some more ghee, stir the mixture continuously.
5. Now add the khowa, mix well and cook for more 1 to 2 minutes, while stirring continuously.
6. In a tadka pan add 1 tsp of ghee and add raisins, crushed almonds to it. cook for 1-2 minutes. Switch off the flame. Add this to the carrot milk mixture . You can add them without frying in ghee, but I like the almonds and raisins to have a different taste hence fry them in ghee. Now add cardamom powder and cook for another 3-4 minutes.
7. Your carrot halwa is ready ! Serve hot or serve cold!

Carrot halwa is one of the favorite desserts in my family and its a favorite during winters. Just make sure the carrots you are using are fresh and juicy!With Eid ul Adha/ Bakri Eid coming in the next few weeks I plan on making this halva recipe. What have you planned to cook for the upcoming Eid? Temme!:D

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Methi Ki Khichdi Easy Recipe

Everytime I had stomach pain or fell ill my mom would make the tastiest khichdi for me, but as i grew up I started cooking khichdi for breakfast and not just at times of illness. I find Khichdi a tasty meal which is high on nutrients and low on fats. I have tried a lot of variations of the khichdi and one among them is the Methi ki Khichdi. Its simple and hardly takes 10 minutes for preparation if you have all the ingredients for it stacked up.
Next time you wake up hungry and want something tasty and hot and filling , go for the methi ki khichdi!

Ingredients:

• Fenugreek seeds
• Methi Leaves
• Rice
• Oil
• 2 tsps Ghee
• Coriander leaves
• 1 Cup finely sliced Onions
• Green Chillies
• Spices: Salt, Turmeric powder

Method:

1. Wash and soak rice and fenugreek seeds separately for half an hour.
2. Wash coriander leaves and methi leaves and grind them into a  paste
3. Heat oil in a pressure cooker and add soaked fenugreek seeds to it. Let it sputter.
3. Now add the finely sliced onions to the oil. (Optional)
4. Add green chilies and the grinded paste to it.
5.Now add turmeric powder, salt and water(2 1/4 of the rice soaked) to the pressure cooker
6. Let the water come to boiling point. Now add the soaked rice and let it cook till the pressure cooker whistles twice or thrice.
Serve hot with curd or pickle and don’t forget to eat the hot tasty khichdi with ghee ! Enjoy your quick khichdi !

Methi ki kichdi for dinner! Tried cooking for the first time and super yay because it's yummilicious! 😊 Recipe to come up on the blog soon :D Watch out! #khichdi #fenugreek #recipe #cooking #foodie #dinner #IndianFood #yummy #instafood #rice

A photo posted by Miss Big Dreams (@happychirpings) on Jul 26, 2016 at 10:10am PDT

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Vegetarian Kofta: Raw Banana Kofte

During Ramazan my mom cooked beef koft’s and I have to say , they were the most yummiest kofte I have ever eaten. After Ramzan it was natural I had increased weight and wanted a lighter version of kofte and hence ended up asking mom to cook veg koftes.
Full of fresh herbs and spices, beef kofta has always been delicious. But when my mom cooked raw banana kofte’s I loved them as much as the beef koftes. Though they take a lot of patience and time , the result and outcome is worth all the trouble. Plus eating green bananas offers some advantages you won't get from eating the ripe, yellow ones. Green bananas or raw bananas have benefits for both dieters and diabetics and contain resistant starch which helps to keep the digestive tract healthy by acting as "food" for friendly, probiotic bacteria.
Though I love raw banana bajjis I also like to have plantain(raw banana ) kfote’s. Its a special dish famous in the north of India and is cooked when guests visit them. Undoubtedly this recipe is labor intensive dish but the final result is a great one!

Raw Banana Kofta

• Prep time: 45 min
• Cook time: 50 min
• Serves: 4

Ingredients For Koftas:

• Raw bananas - 2, boil in 3 cups water till soft
• Onion - 1, small, very finely chopped
• Grinded Channa dal (besan) - 1 tbsp
• Ginger garlic paste- 2 tsp
• Coriander powder - 1/2 tsp
• Amchur powder (raw mango powder)– optional
• Coriander leaves - 2 tbsps, finely chopped
• Salt to taste
• Oil - for deep frying koftas
• For Gravy:
• Cinnamon stick - 1
• Cardamom - 1
• Onion - 1, finely chopped
• Tomato - 1, large, pureed
• Green chillies-ginger paste - 1 tsp
• Turmeric powder - 1/4 tsp
• Red chilli powder - 1/2 tsp
• Cumin powder – 1/4 tsp
• Coriander powder - 1 1/2 tsps
• Garam Masala - 1/4 tsp
• Cashew - 10 (soak in 1/4 cup milk for 15 mts and grind to a paste)
• Salt to taste
• Oil - 2 tbsps
• Coriander leaves for garnish

Method

1. Cut each raw banana into two pieces. Do not peel the skin. Let them boil with 4 cups of water along with 1/2 tsp salt on low to medium flame. It will take around . Insert a knife into the raw banana and if it goes through smoothly then its cooked till soft. Turn off heat and drain the water. Cool and peel the raw bananas and mash them. Set aside.
2. Add the mashed raw bananas, finely chopped onions, cut green chilly, coriander powder, amchur powder, coriander leaves, channa powder and salt. Mix well and if necessary add another tbsp of chenna powder to bind the mixture such that you can make  lime sized balls (koftas). Make medium sized balls and keep aside.
3. Now heat oil for deep frying. Once the oil is hot, reduce flame to medium and gently drop the balls into the oil. Deep fry to a golden brown shade and remove into a bowl . Make sure to remove excess oil. Keep aside and get to cooking the gravy.
4. To prepare the gravy, heat oil in a cooking vessel. Add the cinnamon stick and cardamom and allow to splutter. Add the chopped onions and sauté till golden brown. Add Now add all the paste’s . Later add salt and all other powders and mix well. Add tomato and cook until oil separates from the masala.
5. Add 2 cups of water and bring the gravy to boil. Reduce flame and simmer for around 10 minutes or till it reaches the desired curry consistency. Turn off heat. You can add water according to the thickness you want your gravy to be.
6. Now add the kofte’s into the gravy and simmer for 4-5 minutes, serve warm. Garnish with coriander leaves.

Do you love kofte’s ? Have you tried other veg versions like lauki kofte or kele kofte? Temme !

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Recreation Of The Delicious Phirni !

Dessert is my favorite part of the meal ! My mom makes the best desserts but there’s some magic when she cooks a pot of the sweet pudding hailing from North of India – The delicious phirni ! Every time phirni is cooked at my home it hardly lasts in the fridge for it is emptied within a day ! Trust me phirni made by mom is so delicious one can not be satisfied with just one bowl of phirni! Though it’s a sweet pudding my mom would make sure the amount of sugar used to make the dessert does not harm our health and at the same time does not lose the taste of sugary heaven .
Since many years my mom has substituted honey instead of sugar in desserts . Recently my dad complained how long it had been since he had eaten phirni and that’s when I decided to whip up the delicious phirni but with a twist. Substituting Sugar free natura instead of Sugar ! It was the most delicious phirni ever for the phirni pot was empty within 24 hours (At my place a dessert is judged on how fast it is consumed by family :P)

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Best Sea Food in Bangalore !

Sea food is perhaps the most tasty food when it comes to non vegetarian food. But you do know that sea food is something not all can get right when it comes to cooking them. Fresh, perfectly cooked with no odor…ummm that’s how most of us prefer right ? A lot of people tend to fuss over the way certain seafood has been cooked. For example my granny is very strict when it comes to sea food, she goes on to enquire if it was rinsed well  or how long was the fish preserved before it was cooked.
I prefer sea food cooked at home . What could be better than fish and prawns cooked at home by dearest mother but when mom is out of station I hardly have the time to run to the supermarket and buy fish , then clean re clean them and cook them patiently..hence I prefer eating out at best sea food restaurants in Bangalore.

Few of the best restaurants that serve the best sea food where I happened to dine include Fisherman’s wharf on Sarjapur Road . The restaurant gives you a village wali feeling once you step under the clay Gazebo. They have an open kitchen ( This is the best part as you can drool at your order being whipped up :P) The fish and the sea food served here is fresh and melts in your mouth. Love love love ! :D

I also drop in at Fishland in Gandhinagar when I am in the mood for some sea food and don’t want to spend too much. It’s a beautiful place with simple decor and offers only the most basic of comforts but it is the place one should visit if you are die-hard fish lover! Its famous for its Prawn Biryani, Pompreht and fish fry ! *Yummy*

And lastly its Spicy Tree in JP Nagar. Spicy Tree is also simple on décor but the sea food served there beats everything else. You simply can’t just have one fish dish , so delicious ! My favorites from their menu are Fish manchurian gravy with Rumali roti and Prawn chilli gravy with zeera rice !
What are your favorite restaurants that serve the best sea food in Bangalore ? Temme !

Until next time
Love
Najm

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Baarish , Borosil & Monsoon Magic !

How many times have you looked up at the grey ominous sky praying it would rain again ?The summer in Bangalore has been hot and long ut the slight breeze and dark clouds that appeared this morning had given me hope. How I longed for the days I would sit by the windowsill, allowing the rain to splash gently on my arm. I would sip a steaming cup of masala chai along with hot spinach pakodas looking down at the busy street....downpours are not just a gloomy season It is a season to devour delicious food and fall in love, to get drenched in the downpour and dance in the rain.

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A remarkable send-off Full of love, warmth and ghar ka khana..

“Sir please, this is very important , the class test can happen tomorrow or any other, pluhessssssssssssssssseee” we moaned
The test was postponed , boys heartily took off to the canteen grinning and hi fiving each other on getting a line of free periods along with attendance.
The girls were back at work. They gathered in huge numbers from those in 10th and 11th. There were lots of talking, murmuring, discussing going on.
We were planning The most unique send-off for our seniors!
After a lot of tu tu mein mein we jotted down the events that would take place on the send off and those who took responsibilities for that.
1. Entertainment dance show with bollywood hit numbers, Tenth grade boys along with 11th grade girls
2.Play by tenth grade girls
3. Gifts for the teachers (Namitha,Sharon,Ayesha aijaz, Joshna,Mamtha,Jayashree,Sariya,Anees,Omesh,Merina,Kulsum)
4.Gifts for the send off seniors ( 11th grade)
5.Food glassware and serve ware ( Me)
6. Props and cake ( Sohail,Anil,Uzma and Ibn Anwardeen)
7. Food( Homemade food to be cooked by 1th grade girls)
8.Props for games and homemade cake ( Pavithra, Sohni, Friedy)
9.dance number by 11th boys (Song unknown, volunteers unknown) –Doubt
10.Permission to host party at xyz’s house (11th grade and 10th grade girls)

Few of the girls among us were expert chefs and we weren’t worried about the cooking part and I was handed over the responsibility of bringing plates, cutlery serve ware .

We had opted for home cooked food because nothing else could bring more joy on our peers faces than the joy of eating a home cooked meal. After a through discussion on what we would cook for our seniors on the send off we settled upon a sumptuous mughal meal.
When I asked mom if I could borrow her favourite Borosil glassware for the send off party as I wanted the best of everything to be put up on the unique party we were organising, she agreed but reluctantly, because you take extra care of things you love the most ! I happily packed cute, blossom melamine dinner plates, smart lid dishes , casseroles and a celebration platter on which I thought we could place our homemade cake. My mom always made sure the kitchen sparkled with dainty and beautiful serve ware in which the food when served created a total new different ambience for the one who relished !

Finally the big day arrived, the girls who were handed the responsibility of cooking got to work, it was very kind of our headmistress to grant permission to host our party at one of our classmate’s home. The teachers, our seniors and guests were to arrive in the afternoon on the venue.

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Fasting to Feasting…Beautiful food along with Breathtaking Borosil glassware!

With Ramazan approaching in a few days, I can already feel the tranquillity,can hear the loud prayers,  can smell the heavenly aromas of the delicious food being cooked in the kitchens… Ramazan makes me nostalgic; the tastes and aromas of piping hot pakoras, tangy chaats, haleem, aash( a popular drink in the Middle East called doodh) and sticky sweet jalebis fill my senses. When I was a child, I would patiently wait for iftar (sunset meal) time, in my mind elevating it to a moment of pure magic.There was also the excitement of the end of the month celebration of Eid , which was a thrill with new clothes, bangles and lots of parties promised.

Ramazan is the month of glory, the month of benefits, the month of holiness, the month of prayers,the month of delicious mouth watering food, the month of rewards…..So everyone desperately wait for the pious month to begin.A whole month of Ramadan would always leave me calmer and help me turn into a more understanding person.The best part was the prayer, the bond between you and your creator increases tenfold, and one thing you can never get enough is the gorgeous food served during the Iftar invites !
Our Ramadan mornings started early at Sehri (before daybreak), waking up to the nutty aroma of ghee with square shaped paratha’s on the tawa, spicy omelettes being whipped up and a bottomless pot of masala wali chai being prepared.

And there were these iftar parties you could never avoid. Fun, food, and frolic rolled into one..where Iftari was  not only the culmination of a day dedicated to discipline and self control, it is also symbolic of unity among people who break their fast at the exact same moment.

Me and my siblings would wait for days and days for an Iftar invitation to drop by, all my cousins and uncles along with their snobbish wife’s would gather up at a place and break the fast a, there would be laughter,banter, chattering among the women and not to forget we simply loved the partie for the extra ordinary FOOD!

But as time passed by, I understood the real meaning of Ramazan and started boycotting Iftar parties,I would somehow make an excuse and decline an invitation politely.

Last year my parents went on a religious pilgrimage (umrah) during ramazan and I had a hell lot of time coping up without my mother.Waking up early, making sure the house was not in a mess, praying the maid would never get sick, running a trillion errands all by myself etc etc. And it was then when one of favourite aunt paid me a visit and invited me to an Iftar party , I was tired of the same old bland and boring recipes I cooked ,i decided it was time to branch out and bring on the flavor!Heat up my Iftar dinner experience with the help of those mouth watering spicy and savory dinner recipes that would be served at the Iftar party.
The day I had to got his party I came back from a tiring day at work, with mom not around to help it was a hell lot of work. The maid was on an unannounced leave which left me inwardly muttering words that would have broken my fast :P. My aunt called in the evening and asked me to pick up another of my cousin residing in my neighbourhood.

I took a last look in the mirror, I had not taken effort to dress for a party as I knew, everybody would have their eyes on the food laid on the table rather than eyeing who wore what…Within minutes I was entering a beautiful house with a small garden neatly kempt. All  present at the Iftar greeted each other, some were seated on silken janamazas praying, some were on the diwan reciting Qur’an .

As I waited in anticipation, I tried not to let my expectations get out of control with all of the heavenly aroma tickling my taste bud senses.The sugary aroma of fresh deep fried pakodas  and sugary sweetness of roohabzah & trifles tickled my nose. As i further progressed into the house,I caught a glimpse of the pristine and lovely kitchen buzzing with activity. My aunt’s were happily chit chatting and doing their bit to put off those finishing touches to the voluptuous meal that would be served in a few minutes of time..A hurricane of savoury spicy aromas rocked my nose and created delectable images of food in my mind.. OH GAWD WHY ! So much for acting sane on the outside while all I wanted was to barge into the kitchen and inhale the scents of all those mouth watering dishes.Better taste and lick every bit of from the vessels.
It was getting harder to control what all those aromas were doing, sending delicious sensations doing funny things to my stomach, I prayed that the time would buy itself some wings and fly ! My stomach growled and I felt embarrassed. Two of my cousins pulled me across the dining table, and i was informed the men would break their fast, My eyes hungrily wavered over the dining table, and I forgot why i was here..The 12 hour fast had left me damn hungry and the food looks tenfold delicious when you are hungry!

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