Parippu Vada (Deep fried Lentil Fritters)

Posted on | January 18, 2012 | 9 Comments |

When the weather outside is frightful, deep fried goodies can be delightful! It is always nice to have an excuse to eat unhealthy stuff, although I hardly ever need one. I don’t even think this is that unhealthy, it has lentils which are highly nutritional and were fried in fresh sunflower oil, which has a high smoke point and low Trans fats. I agree that consuming deep fried food from restaurants on a regular basis is not a good idea, mainly because restaurants are known to reuse frying oils, which means the oil gets heated repeatedly to really high temperatures beyond its smoke point, which can cause some hydrogenation and oxidation and such bad stuff. But making deep fried [...]

HDR Wednesday – Stormy Sunset

Posted on | January 18, 2012 | 1 Comment |

I miss posting pictures, though I don’t miss posting them every day! So I am planning to do a weekly photo post here, mostly my HDR experiments. Seattle is under a heavy(for Seattle) snowstorm and we have been homebound for the past three days. I am not complaining! This was the view from our living room last night when the sky started clearing up a bit. Click on the photo for a bigger version. Photo details – HDR tone-mapped from three exposures, 1/40, 1/160, 1/640 seconds at Aperture f11 and ISO 100.

Restaurant Review – Altura

Posted on | January 15, 2012 | 3 Comments |

I haven’t done a restaurant review here in a while, though we have been trying out a lot of new restaurants. Even though I had my camera with me on most outings, I just couldn’t muster up the energy to type even a mini review of some of the great places we tried. Finally the amazing dinner we had at Altura this weekend has given me the inspiration to get out of my rut and publish a review! Altura opened up to some raving reviews in early October 2011 in Capitol Hill, but we never got a chance to visit due to the holiday season hustle and bustle. Finally we made reservations for Friday night, a late birthday dinner for [...]

Spicy Pompano – Kerala Style Fried Fish

Posted on | January 10, 2012 | 21 Comments |

Fried fish is such a quintessential part of Kerala cuisine that every seafood eating Malayali starts drooling at the mere mention of it. During my initial days in the United States, I remember seeing fried fish on a restaurant menu for the first time and getting all thrilled. But when the order arrived, it was the most tasteless batter fried Cod – the typical American Fish and Chips preparation. I was so frustrated by how different it was from what I was expecting that I almost cried. Those days I could only cook a few dishes and fish was not really my forte, so I had no way of satisfying the cravings set off by that menu. Well, that was [...]

One Dish Dinners – Lemon Caper Tilapia with Roasted Garlic

Posted on | January 2, 2012 | 13 Comments |

Hope everyone had a great start to the New Year and nobody has broken any resolutions yet. I didn’t make any resolutions this year, have decided to just take on life as it comes. I did think of a few tweaks I would like to make to my lifestyle though! First one is to be a bit more organized in life. Most of last year was kind of a mess where I just couldn’t get a daily routine going and as a result we had to get take-out dinners day after day while the groceries sat rotting in the fridge and the pantry. It is hard to make healthy choices when ordering take-out food, especially when the decisions are made [...]

Happy New Year 2012 with a Bubbly!

Posted on | December 31, 2011 | 3 Comments |

Here’s wishing all of you a wonderful 2012! It was a great 2011 and I think 2012 is going to be even more amazing! May the new year bring you joy, love, happiness, great friendships and lots and lots of delicious food! Here’s a bubbly to bring in the new year! Ingredients raspberries St.Germain Champagne Method Place three raspberries in a champagne flute, fill 1/4th of the glass with St.Germain and top it off with champagne. Drink, repeat and enjoy!

Mutton Varutharacha Curry (Goat meat in a fried Coconut Gravy)

Posted on | September 25, 2011 | 18 Comments |

As I am looking through my drafts folder, I see that it is mostly filled with mutton recipes. Looks like I will have to do a mutton marathon event to get through all these. Mutton aka Goat meat, while very popular in India, is considered somewhat of an exotic meat over here in the US and only the very adventurous foodie will dare give it a try. This attitude seems to be changing though; according to Bon Appetit Foodist Andrew Knowlton, goat meat is the next big thing: http://www.bonappetit.com/blogsandforums/blogs/bafoodist/2011/06/goat-meat-next-big-ingredient.html. To quote the Foodist: While goat sits somewhere near the bottom on the list of America’s favorite proteins, it’s the most widely consumed meat on the planet. Goat has found a [...]

Onam Sadya (Sadhya)

Posted on | September 7, 2011 | 26 Comments |

Onam is Kerala’s largest festival celebrating the harvest season. There are many traditions associated with Onam, but the only one I am interested in is the one that involves food – the feast we call “Onam Sadya”. This scrumptious feast is an all vegetarian spread consisting of a spectrum of dishes meant to tickle all your taste buds – salty, spicy, sour and sweet. An Onam Sadya is served on banana leaves with rice in the center (You have to have Rosematta rice for a proper sadya – ironically the picture above has white rice), a bunch of accompaniments served on the side and a few gravies served in courses over the rice. The meal ends with a generous serving [...]

Sambar – Spicy Lentils and Vegetable Stew

Posted on | September 6, 2011 | 12 Comments |

Anyone who has ever had a South Indian Vegetarian meal will be familiar with this quintessential South Indian dish that has so many small variations and deviations that you won’t be able to find the exact same recipe in two different households. I am not sure if it is a Tamil Naadu thing or not, but at Siv’s home they normally make Sambar with just one type of vegetable as the main ingredient. They have onion Sambar, tomato Sambar, okra Sambar etc. But my mom throws in any vegetable she can find into her Sambar, the more varieties the better. So needless to say, my Sambar also follows the same trail as my mom’s, always a medley of vegetables! If [...]

Brunch – Swiss Chard Frittata

Posted on | August 27, 2011 | 12 Comments |

I know it is not much to look at, but trust me it is one tasty brunch. I wasn’t really planning on blogging this, but it turned out to be a great dish that I had to click a quick picture and note down the recipe before I forgot. I am sure I could’ve made it look a little better, but hey it is all about the recipe, right? Ingredients (Serves 2) 1 small bunch Red Swiss Chard (About 2 packed cups of the chopped leaves) 3 strips of thick cut bacon 1 large fresh chicken sausage (The kind with a thin removable casing and loose meat inside.) 1/2 red bell-pepper, chopped. 2 tbsp sliced shallots 1/4 tsp crushed dried [...]

A Quick Chicken Kabob

Posted on | August 14, 2011 | 47 Comments |

Howdy folks, remember me??? I am back!!! Can’t believe its been almost 5 months since my last post. People I know from my real as well as virtual lives have been asking me if/when I was going to get back to food blogging and I had no real answer. I’ve been getting a few concerned emails now and then from readers and most times I did not even send back a courtesy reply. I am ashamed, but what can I say, I had totally lost interest in this space and just couldn’t muster up the energy to do anything about it. Someone even asked Siv – I am not making this up – whether we were going through some marital [...]

Spinach-Walnut-Ricotta Stuffed Chicken Breasts

Posted on | March 22, 2011 | 17 Comments |

I know I have been ignoring this blog lately, it feels funny to start every post with an apology for the long absence. I think it is time to come out and admit it -I might have lost interest in food blogging! Yes, I said it! I’ve been spending a lot of time on my latest passion lately and you know how hard it is to keep up with two hobbies simultaneously. This blog was my first love though, so once in a while I get these strong pangs of guilt, especially when someone comments on an old recipe. It is the same feeling that one gets from staring at a giant to-do list. I can’t let this one die, [...]

Mutton Curry in a Ground Chickpea and Coconut Gravy

Posted on | February 27, 2011 | 21 Comments |

This is one of those recipes that was conceived quite by accident. All I wanted was a quick mutton curry to go with a mutton biryani I made for dinner when Siv gets back from his trip tonight. We always make something nice for each other whenever one of us return from a trip as there is nothing like warm homemade comfort food that says welcome back home. The masala I made for the gravy turned out a bit spicier than I was going for, so I went searching in the pantry for something that can tone it down. That is when I came across a can of garbanzo beans. I remembered my sister mentioning something about adding ground chickpeas [...]

Pigging it out at Cochon 555

Posted on | February 20, 2011 | 14 Comments |

We attended Cochon 555′s Seattle edition today. Cochon 555 is the ultimate event for pork lovers. In the organizers own words "Cochon 555 is a one-of-a-kind traveling culinary competition and tasting event–five chefs, five pigs, five wine makers–to promote sustainable farming of heritage breed pigs. Each stop along the ten-city tour offers hard-working local farmers the opportunity to connect with like-minded agriculturalists, renowned chefs and the pork-loving public. Our goal is to help family farms sustain and expand their businesses and to encourage breed diversity." Now, you all know Siv and I are both suckers for anything pig and an event like this is something we can’t/won’t miss. So we bought tickets, $175 per person for VIP tix which gets [...]

Thomas Keller’s Herb Crusted Rack of Lamb With Honey Mustard Glaze

Posted on | February 20, 2011 | 6 Comments |

I’ve had the Thomas Keller cookbook “Ad Hoc at Home” for a few months now. I leafed through it quickly as soon as I got the book, but then it was lost amongst the 60 (last time I counted) other cookbooks on my bookshelf. It was Siv who finally dragged it out of there recently while looking for ideas for a special dinner. Obviously, he was still under the French Laundry hangover. It is a HUGE book, filled with tips and techniques and anecdotes from Chef Keller, that it really deserves a cover-to-cover reading. Of course Siv doesn’t have the patience for that, but he managed to read just enough to drop tidbits from the book, like “Did you know [...]

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Categories

Parippu Vada (Deep fried Lentil Fritters)

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HDR Wednesday – Stormy Sunset

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Restaurant Review – Altura

Read More...

Spicy Pompano – Kerala Style Fried Fish

Read More...

One Dish Dinners – Lemon Caper Tilapia with Roasted Garlic

Read More...

Happy New Year 2012 with a Bubbly!

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Mutton Varutharacha Curry (Goat meat in a fried Coconut Gravy)

Read More...

Onam Sadya (Sadhya)

Read More...

Sambar – Spicy Lentils and Vegetable Stew

Read More...

Brunch – Swiss Chard Frittata

Read More...

A Quick Chicken Kabob

Read More...

Spinach-Walnut-Ricotta Stuffed Chicken Breasts

Read More...

Mutton Curry in a Ground Chickpea and Coconut Gravy

Read More...

Pigging it out at Cochon 555

Read More...

Thomas Keller’s Herb Crusted Rack of Lamb With Honey Mustard Glaze

Read More...

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