mayurisjikoni

The Holiday State    February is when Shhh Cooking Secretly group (started by Priya of Priya's Versatile Recipes ) had a virtual tour of Goa. Its been over 30 years since I've visited Goa. I remember when we were passing the town centre, there was a huge crowd of people. We asked the taxi driver what was going on and he replied "koi naya actor ki shooting chal rahi hai, aap ko dekhna hai?" he asked. We asked if he knew the actor and he said no so we didn't stop to watch. Who was the new actor? None other than Shakrukh Khan shooting for the movie Kabhi Haan Kabhi Naa!    I remember we were staying at some hotel in town and would go to the Taj Holiday Resort to get onto the beach. Back then there were not many hotels. I remember getting to the beach and for miles there would hardly be anyone. There use to be a fish shack near Taj and hubby, my brother and my cousin would enjoy fresh fish and I'd get only French fries (fishy ones)!    Goa is  the smallest...

Today is Pancake Day Theme : Pancakes         Imagine a whole day dedicated to pancakes. Most people love pancakes. When I say pancakes there's such a huge variety out there that its unbelievable. Right from fermented batter to quick batters. I could eat pancakes everyday, but have to control myself because of all the butter and honey or maple syrup. Pancakes without butter taste dry. However, what I've made for this theme, hoppers can be eaten without any guilt as they are gluten free and hardly have any sugar in it.    For Christians Shrove Tuesday marks the last day before Lent. Lent is the 40 day period of fasting before Easter. Usually ingredients like sugar, fat, flour and eggs had to be used up before the fasting period began. So the most obvious way to use them up was to make pancakes.Nowadays Pancake Day is enjoyed by all whether Christian or not. It gives one an excuse to indulge in pancakes.     Wendy of A Day in the Life on the Farm ...

A Himachali Curry Theme: Main Course with Gravy/Rice BM#85 Week 2 Day 2    The whole of India has so many varieties of curries that its really unbelievable. I'm guessing that if we tried out all the curries we'd probably need more than 200 days! Each variety then has a variation from state to state, region to region and home to home. As I keep on visiting other bloggers sites, I come across so many varieties that my bookmarked list is just getting too long.     Recently, for another group (Shhh Cooking Secretly) we had Himachali Cuisine as the theme and that's where I came across this wonderful curry made from two main ingredients, chickpeas and yogurt. I wanted to make this curry but the ingredients I was given made me choose another recipe. When I chose the main course with gravy or rice for this group, I knew that this curry would be one of them that I would surely try out. I am so glad that I did as I love anything that is yogurt based. Addition of simple ba...

Team Love     For the past few days the weather has completely changed in Bangalore...its chilly cold and rainy. It could be due to the cyclone Ockhi that hit Kerala.Unlike homes in the western world, there is no central heating system so one has to wrap up pretty warm. I hate wearing a sweater as I find them too itchy so come evening and I wrapped myself in a shawl and topped with a thick bed sheet. After that didn't want to budge even a millimeter. Hot water and hot milk becomes one's best friend. It also meant that I didn't want to have my usual smoothie for breakfast. I wanted something hot that would warm up the body. What better breakfast treat is there than hot parathas and masala tea.      The #121st theme for FoodieMonday/Bloghop is Pushpita's recipes. Who is Pushpita? She is one of the members of the FoodieMonday group. In all we are 15 members. We usually take turns to decide on the theme. The 121st theme was to be decided by Pushpita. However, she h...

  Land of the Dawn Lit Mountains    As I had mentioned last month, The Shh Cooking Secretly group started by Priya Suresh of Priya's Versatile Recipes is traveling round India state by state. Not physical travel, but cuisine wise. For the month of October participating members had to come up with dishes that are popular in Arunachal Pradesh with the given secret ingredients.    This state wise cooking is opening up a whole new world of cuisine for me. I'm learning new names of dishes, new ingredients and different cooking methods. Food in Arunachal Pradesh in general does not have much oil unless its a fried dish and they depend largely on ingredients grown or available locally. People of Arunachal Pradesh love their meat and bamboo shoot. Rice is a must with any meat or vegetable dish. Arunachal Pradesh is a state with 4 main regions and 26 major tribes and over 100 sub tribes. Dishes will vary according to the tribe and availability of ingredients.  Arun...

Love this recipe    Its Monday and yes you've guessed right.. its #FoodieMonday #Bloghop day. Our #98th theme was chosen by Saswati who blogs at Delish Potpourri . Saswati's got a beautiful blog full of travel stories, a variety of recipes from different parts of the world and I love her desserts. She suggested #CWFB which means Cooking with a fellow blogger. For this theme we had a choose any recipe from a fellow blogger in our group. I have so many recipes bookmarked from all these members, it was difficult to choose which one to cook.    Sticking to my healthy cooking as far as possible, I narrowed it down to 2 recipes that I've tried and made again and again. One is rava kara paniyaram from Saswati's blog and the other is beetroot appe from Sujata's blog Batter up with Sujata. I've made both these a number of times and the reason I decided to make the beetroot appe is because I had just bought some fresh beetroot. I made them for Sunday brunch and serve...