mayurisjikoni

adding spice to your life When I made idli sambhar a few days ago, Nami my daughter suggested that I should make a different chutney to the normal coconut coriander, mint one we make. I made the normal one with less chillis for the kids and a garlic coconut one with more chillis. I loved the chutney and realised that it can be used with anything. Have with a paratha or leftover roti, add it to left over rice, sprinkle it on a khakhra or use it to make a sandwich. The dry version will stay at least for a week in the fridge. GARLIC COCONUT CHUTNEY Makes about a cup 1 cup fresh grated coconut ¼ cup split chickpea lentils (chana dal) 2 tbsp oil 2 tbsps garlic paste 4 to 5 dry red chillis 5 to 6 curry leaves a pinch of asafoetida (hing) 1 tsp salt Heat oil in a wide pan over medium heat. Add all the ingredients except for salt and roast over low heat till you get the aroma of cooked garlic and the coconut becomes dry. Cool the mixture. Put the roasted ingredients in a food processor and mi...

refreshingly lemony    The first appealing thing about lemon rice is the lovely fresh yellow colour and secondly it definitely the taste. Eat it alone, hot or cold, have it with sambhar or yogurt it tastes yum. A good way to create a new dish with leftover rice. Simple ingredients make it tasty. However, I cooked the rice specially for this dish. A few days ago I had guests over for dinner. I made idli sambhar and wanted something simple to accompany it just in case someone felt  unsatisfied with just idlis. I usually find that any type of rice dish acts as a filler when in doubt. Not only did they like the idli sambhar but also loved the rice.  LEMON RICE Serves 6 to 8 6 cups cooked rice, the grains should be separate 3 tbsps oil 2 dry red chillis 1 tsp mustard seeds (rai) 1 tbsp split chickpeas (chana dal) 1 tbsp split black gram lentils (urad dal without the skin) ¼ cup peanuts ¼ tsp turmeric powder (haldi) a pinch of asafoetida (hing) 2 tsps ginger paste 1 t...

odd combinations....delightful taste   When I got back from the market on Tuesday, Rachel my maid was helping me to sort out the veggies and fruits. She found some beetroot in the basket and just sighed and said in kiswahili that this lady loves beetroot, she buys it every week. I find adding beetroot to salads a great idea and my hubby and I both love them. For the salad recipe given below, I added boiled beetroot to mango and to offset the sweetness from both, I added feta cheese. Colourful and appetizing.  Before I blog the recipe all my followers out there, please please please take some time to add comments to the recipes you have tried out. Please put them on the blog and not just on facebook. When I am browsing on other blogs, the comments like yummy, looks great, colourful etc are actually not an incentive for me to try out the recipes. I actually look for comments where someone has tried out the recipe and described their experience. Lets make the blog more interactiv...

30th Anniversary Ajay and I celebrated our 30th wedding anniversary yesterday. 30 years..... the number seems big but the years short. In spite of all our differences, we have worked to reach this far and are hoping for many more years of togetherness. When we got married, love was the important word for me, does he love me or not etc. As I went along, I realised that trust is more important than love. If you trust your partner 100% the rest just follows.  To make our anniversary more memorable, my daughter Nami decided to bake a cake. Well let's put it this way, I had to do all the washing and chopping under the pretext of supervising the whole thing! It was worth the effort. She made an eggless chocolate cake and topped it with fresh mango and cream. Mangoes and chocolate together taste heavenly. Lovely idea for a dessert, since mangoes are in abundance at the moment. All you lucky people in Mombasa, use apple mango if you can. Also check out the really cute card she made for us....

so chocolatey I love going through food blogs of other bloggers. Some have amazing photos and some urge me to try out the recipes. One of my favourite blogs is what megan's making.com. Her bread, dessert and cookie recipes are nice, easy to follow and look yummy. My daughter Namrata is a chocoholic and I decided to try out Megan's double chocolate brownie bites. We loved the cookies and they are different from the cookies I have blogged so far as the texture is between a cookie and a brownie. I made slight changes to the original recipe to suit our needs. I did not roll them in sugar as I didn't want sweet cookies. I love the cracked effect on top of the cookies. Thank you Megan for sharing the recipe with us. DOUBLE CHOCOLATE BROWNIE COOKIES makes about 30 1½ cups plain flour (all purpose flour) ¼ cup cocoa powder ¾ tsp soda bicarbonate (baking soda) ½ cup butter (approx 110g) ½ cup packed brown sugar ½ cup honey 1 cup chocolate chips 1 tsp orange zest or vanilla extract ½...

passionate about a passion fruit I have been away for a long time. Some of my friends have been asking whether I have stopped blogging. The answer is definitely not. December was just too hectic.... family wedding, guests and a bugging flu and fever with a persistent cough. Still getting over the cough. I have been cooking and noting down the measurements. My note book is filled with squiggly fonts in red, black and blue. I had to start blogging before those squiggly fonts become indecipherable to me. Last week some friends came over for dessert and   I made some cheesecake. Most cold cheesecakes have eggs or are gelatin based. I tried out the cheesecake using agar agar flakes and loved the end result. Instead of cream cheese I used curd cheese. It is pretty difficult getting some decent cream cheese in Mombasa. I used about 2 litres of yogurt to get the required amount of curd cheese. I was pretty adventurous in trying out a passion fruit flavour cheese cake, but hey it worked. PA...