Saravana Bhavan Sambhar

I still remember the first day i visited saravana bhavan that too i was forced by my friend kavya, but after i tasted it, i was thanking her so much for bringing me there,Thanks to her else i would definitly have missed tasting the sambhar.From that day i was searching for the receipe and finally i got the secret.It came out very well in my kitchen than i expected and so thought to publish this in my blog.saravana bhavan sambhar is my all time best and favourite.This sambhar excludes tamrind and replaced with coconut. Saravana Bhavan sambhar and mini idlies is such a delicious receipe.

Ingredients:

To Temper:

Onion        -       1 Medium size(Finely Chopped)
Green chillies  -    2 Nos(chopped)
Mustard seeds   -       Half Tspn
Fenugreek seeds -       Half Tspn
Cumin seeds     -       Half Tspn
Red chillies    -       3 Nos
Urad dal        -       Half Tspn
Curry leaves    -       2 Tspn

To Grind:

Roasted gram/chutney dal/Pottu Kadalai- 1 Tspn
Tomato-   1
Chilli powder-1 Tspn
Turmeric powder-half Tspn                                                            
Grated Coconut-2 Tspn

To Pressure cook:

Toor dal- Half Cup                  
Onion  - 1 Medium size                    
Tomato-1                    
salt -To taste

At Final:

Coriander leaves- hand full
Sugar-half Tspn  

Method:

Add all the items under To pressure cook in pressure cooker,add required water and cook until 4 whistles.Smash it so that dal will be mixed well.

Grind all the items under To Grind to a fine paste and set aside.

In a pan, add oil and add all the items under To Temper and saute it well, now add the pressure cooker baked items into this and
add the grinded items as well, the very important step to get the restaurant taste is by closing the texture with the lid.Let it cook
for about 5 mins in a medium flame.

Finally add coriander leaves and half Tspn of sugar and and mix it well and serve Hot.

Tips:

"Adding sugar is optional,but this is important to get the restaurant taste.

While tempering you can also add half chopped tomato to make it thick."

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Masala Vadai

A cup of Tea and masala vada cant be replaced with anything to eat while raining outside. During Winter at evening times,my bf will be very desperate to reach home early from office as he knows i would ve prepared it.It goes well with coconut chutney. I like Rasa vada more than masala vada as my mom makes "Rasa Vada". Rasa vada is made out of masala vada immersed into hot rasam for an hour, the taste is awesome and i love that with hot idly.

Ingredients:

• Rava/Sooji-1 Tspn
• Onion-1 (Finely Chopped)
• Green Chillies-4 Nos
• asafoetida- half tspn
• Fennel Seeds- half Tspn
• Ginger- 1 Small pieces 
• Garlic- 5 Small nos

Method:

Soak Channa dal atleast for 5 hours, drain completly the water and grind it not fine mixture, and not very rough too.
You will get the mixture if you grind it without adding much water.

Grind ginger,garlic,green chillies coarsely.

Now, mix the ginger garlic mixture with the channa dal,add finely chopped onion,asafoetida,fennel seeds,rava.Make the mixture as
Vada shape and keep aside.

Deep fry in hot oil and flip both the sides, until it becomes golden brown and transfer it to the paper towel.

Tips:

"Adding rava will make the vada crispy and good taste and its optional too.

Oil should very hot while dropping the vada into it, else it will get seperated from the oil.

You can add a pinch of baking soda as well if you need to make it more crispy.

As i mentioned above, if you want rasa vada, you can make masala vada and immerse in hot rasam for atleast half an hour."

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Sweet Paniyaram

Most of the kids love this and even my bf too, he always wants this, whenever he is at home in the weekends. Two types are there, karam and inipu paniyaram. Inipu paniyaram is very easy to make where in Kara paniyaram needs little more effort, so let me start with sweet paniyaram first.

Ingredients:

• Maida or All Purpose flour- 1 Cup
• Rava- ½ Cup
• Banana- 1 Mashed
• Jaggery
• Cardamom- ½ Tspn
• Ghee- 2 Tspn
• Cashews- 5 Nos

Method:

Heat jaggery with little water, to make syrup.you can heat it upto 10 minutes and keep aside, no need to thick the syrup.

Mix maida, rava, banana mashed, jaggery syrup, cardamom and cashews and make loose dough, the consistency should not be very thick.

Add ghee to the each pit in the pan cake maker or if you have paniyara kal also is fine, and heat it. Pour the dough into each pit.Fry it and reverse it and bake it again.

Tips:

"You can substitute maida with rice flour, however you need to little fry it in the vessel and make it.

If you don’t want to make jaggery syrup, you can skip that, instead you can use the jaggery powder into the dough."

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Ribbon Pakkoda

Ribbon Pakkoda is famous in Tamilnadu made in most of the festivals at home, and the idea of making this came from my MIL as she calls this as Ola Pakkoda. It’s very easy to prepare and kids usually love this as it’s not spicy and it is crunchy like chips.

Ingredients:

• Rice Flour – 2 cups
• Gram Flour (Kadala Mavuu) – 1 cup
• Pepper (Coursed) – 1 Tspn
• Butter – 2 Tspn
• Salt – To taste
• Asafetida – 1 Tspn
• Oil – to deep fry

Method:

Mix rice, gram flour, pepper, butter, salt and Asafetida with little water

Add water little by little and make non-sticky dough (just like how you make for poori)

Press the dough through the muruku press and push gently to the boiling oil in the vessel.

Deep fry it. Let it be in the oil for a minute and transfer it to paper towel and dry out excess oil.

Tips:

"Water should be added little by little, as excess water will spoil your dough and it may not come out from 
the muruku press.

Pepper should be course texture, as it well tastes better.

You can add red chilli powder instead of pepper."

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Egg/Muttai Kuzambu

There are lots of ways to do muttai kuzambu, however, the one which I have mentioned below is one of among the best I would say, This is a little spicy recipe and goes well when served with hot white rice or chappathi. Normally many people like this, as this has a curry as well as egg in it.

                                                   

Ingredients:

• Egg-2 Nos
• Onion- 2 Large size
• Tomato- 1 Medium
• Fennel Seed (Perinjeeragam)-1/2 Tspn
• Poppy Seed (Kasa Kasa)-1/2 Tspn
• Pepper Seed -1 Tspn
• Grated Coconut-1/2 Cup
• Black Gram-1/2 Tspn
• Mustard- ½ Tspn
• Red Chilli Powder- ½ Tspn
• Corainder Powder-1/2 Tspn
• Chicken Curry Masala-1 Tspn
• Turmeric Powder- ½ Tspn
• Curry Leaves
• Salt- To Taste
• Oil- 2 Tspn
• Coriander Leaves –for seasoning 

Method:

Grind the fennel, pepper and poppy seeds with grated coconut with little water and extract the pulp out of it and set aside ( Just like how you to extract coconut milk)

Now, in a vessel, pour oil, add mustard,black gram and curry leaves, and add onion to that and sort it till turns brown, now add tomatoes to that and sort well again till it becomes like a juicy mixture.

Add chilli, turmeric, coriander and chicken masala powder into this and sort it again until the masala smell goes off fully.

To that, add the extracted pulp(coconut milk) and let it boil for sometime at this stage, you will get a nice aroma, here you should drop the broken egg one by one. Do not stir the content after the egg is dropped.

Let it boil completely till it immense in the curry and add coriander leaves and switch off the stove.

Tips:

"Allow spaces between each egg in the curry so that it gets baked well.

If you need more gravy you can add little water along with the coconut milk"

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Suzhiyan

This recipe is my bf’s one of the favorite dish, I remember my first diwali day after marriage when I prepared this and he just loved it. This is called as Mothagam in Kerala.This is a easy sweet recipe which can be prepared during festival times.

For this recipe you need to first prepare purnam which I have mentioned below.

Ingredients:

• Jaggery  - 1 Cup
• Channa Dal- half Cup
• Water-As needed
• Cardomom-3 Powdered
• Coconut flakes-half cup
• Maida or All purpose flour-half Cup
• Salt- a Pinch

Method:

To Make Poornam: 

 

Pressure cooker the channa dal for 3 whistle, let it cool and grain it to a fine paste and keep aside

In a heavy bottomed vessel, take jaggery and pour the needed water. Let the jaggery completely immense in the water and let it boil for sometime till the texture becomes thick.After it cools down, filter it so that any impurities will get removed from the syrup.

Add coconut and cardamom powder into this and keep stirring without any lumps till the coconut completely mixed with the jaggery syrup, mix well and keep it aside. Let it cool completely.

To Make Suzhiyan: 

Mix maida with salt in water, as a thick batter. Make small balls of the above purnam and dip those balls in the maida batter, and drop it into hot oil. 

Fry it and transfer to paper towel to remove the excess oil.

Tips:

"Do not pour excess water to jaggery , as it may take long time to get the syrup.

Adjust the jaggery as per your taste, as some doesn’t like if its too much of sweet."

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