Simple vegetatrian, Daily-cooking, Comfort food, with regular utensils and real time pictures.
This blog will help the beginners learn and give them the confidence to cook edible food without too much fuss.
Wash and dry the amla. Keep in sunlight for 1-2 days so that they reduce in size. This is to decrease the water content in the amla.
Next give each of it 3-4 vertical slits right down to the seed. Do not cut completely, just slit. These slits will help the oil reach the center of the amla.
Heat oil in a heavy bottom pan and add the amla one by one. Place them gently and cover with lid.
Keep the heat in simmer and cook for 3-5 minutes.
Remove the lid and gently turn around the amla so that they cook on all sides.
Do not cover with lid from now.
It will take about another 5-8 minutes to completely cook the amla.
Turn off the heat and let it cool.
Then add the salt, red chili powder, Roasted Mustard & Fenugreek powder. Mix well. The remaining oil in the pan will help mix the ingredients.
Prepare tempering by heating oil in a small pan and adding mustard seeds and asafoetida. As the mustard splatters, turn off the heat and add to the amla mixture.
Mix well, squeeze one lemon and mix again.
Let it cool, store in airtight container at room temperature away from dampness.
Can be served with rice, roti.
Stays good for up to 15 days in normal weather. If it is raining, try to keep it in refrigerator.
Grate jaggery and add to 1/2 cup water. Let it melt and then strain the liquid to remove dirt.
Add salt, semolina/rawa to whole wheat flour and mix once. Now to this add hot ghee and start mixing.
Then add water, spoonfuls at a time to made a dough. Knead it till it doesn't stick to hands and let it rest for 20-30 minutes.
Cover with lid or damp cloth to prevent drying.
After 30 minutes, knead it again for 5 minutes and make tiny balls.
We can at this stage roll out one to two rotis and cut those into 1 inch diamond shapes like in the picture.
With the rest of the dough, make smaller balls, the size of a marble.
Flatten each ball a little.
Take a fork and press the flattened piece of dough lightly, rolling it over. The fork will give ridges on the dough. By rolling it we'll get the curvature and the result will look like a shell.
In case you have or can find the 'gavalu peeta/board' use that as it is designed exclusively to prepare these.
Once done heat the jaggery water and let it come to one-string consistency. Heat oil simultaneously and fry the diamond shapes till golden brown.
Take excess oil on a tissue paper and to these add the hot jaggery syrup one spoon at a time.
Toss the biscuits to make sure each one is coated with the syrup.
It took me about 3 tsp of syrup. Let it remaining syrup keep bubbling on simmer.
Set these aside on greased plate separating so that they don't stick to each other.
Now fry the gavalu in batches till golden brown.
Set all aside on a tissue paper.
When the jaggery syrup attains the soft ball consistency turn off the heat. (Soft ball stage is when we add a drop of jaggery syrup to water and it forms a ball)
Add the fried gavalu to the jaggery and mix gently to coat each one with the syrup.
Let it cool enough so that we can separate those from the jaggery and plate on a greased plate.
Don't let it cool completely as it will harden up.
Let those sit to dry and the store in an air tight box away from dampness.
Now here we are left with jaggery syrup and the bottom of the pan.
We need not throw this away.
Instead dry roast the putnalu and melt this hardened syrup by adding 2-3 tbsp of water.
Once the syrup melts. let it bubble to lose the excess water we added.
Thrown in the roasted putnalu and mix well.
Turn of the heat once the mix becomes sticky and lumpy.
Now we can either grease our palms are roll this mixture into small balls or grease a plate and pour onto it.
Spread it evenly on the plate and let it sit for 5 minutes. Now run a greased knife and cut into pieces.
Let it coll completely and then break along the cut lines.
Store in an airtight container.
Notes:
The syrup will largely depend on the type of jaggery we use. There will be times when the syrup looks good but then ends up too sticky or too hard.
It happened with me and I had a trouble shaping the balls of putnalu mixture. Hence I made a slab out of it.
Also the jaggery might melt a little later on and form a layer at the bottom of the stored container.
If you feel doubtful just bubble the syrup to the one string consistency even for the gavalu. That will help prevent any further messing up of the sweet. Also in that case reduce the quantity of the jaggery to half.
Grated Coconut- 3/4 cup (Remove the brown skin and grind the flesh) or Use Desiccated coconut
Ghee- 1 tsp
Water- 2 tbsp
Desiccated coconut- 1/4 cup
Method:
Add 1 tsp ghee to a nonstick pan and roast the grated coconut. Make sure the heat is in simmer and keep stirring occasionally. It should not change color. It will take about 10 minutes.
Meanwhile, wash and roughly chop the paan leaves.
Add the chopped leaves and gulkand to a mixer jar and grind once. Add 1 tbsp water, .mix and grind again.
Add another 1 tbsp of water and grind into a smooth paste.
Add little more water if required.
Pour the condensed milk onto the roasted coconut and mix well. Let it thicken up for about 3 minutes.
Now pour in the paan and gulkand paste and mix well. Keep the heat in simmer, always.
Stir continuously as it thickens up. Let it come together and form a lump in the center of the pan.
It will take about 15 minutes. Make sure the water has completely evaporated and the mix is not sticky.
Turn off the heat and let it cool. Apply some ghee on your palms and shape ladoos.
After all ladoos are done, take desiccated coconut into a bowl and add each ladoo individually into it.
Coat the ladoo with the coconut and place in another plate one after another.
Let these sit for 10 minutes or until they are completely cool.
Store in airtight container or serve.
To prepare Desiccated Coconut:
Fresh coconut pieces- 1/2 cup
Remove the brown side of the coconut pieces and grind into a fine paste/powder. Do not add any water.
Now roast this mix in a nonstick pan, on simmer by stirring continuously. All the moisture has to evaporate leaving behind only the dry and white coconut powder.
It will take around 15-20 minutes depending on the quantity.
Take the coconut between fingers. It should fall freely.
Once it is ready, let it cool and store in an airtight container.
Notes:
You can add a little more gulkand depending on how you like it.
Also you can add some chopped cashews or almonds after adding the paan paste.
Wash the arbi for 4-5 times till the dirt and mud get cleared completely.
Now add to water and boil for 20 minutes.
Check to see if cooked. Just cut an arbi, if the knife runs smooth through it, it is done.
Turn off the heat and let them cool.
Next peel the skin and cut into equal sized pieces. Or you can keep those as you like.
While peeling, if the skin does not come off easily or the arbi still feels firm, it is better to discard that one.
Add oil to a pan and prepare tempering. Add urad dal, mustard seeds, cumin seeds and asafoetida.
As the mustard splatters, add the arbi, mix once.
Let the heat be on simmer. After 3-4 minutes check once and gently mix.
Cook again. Do not over mix as we are using less oil and do not want to mash the arbi.
If you want, you can add more oil but I prefer lesser amount.
As they turn red on all sides, add salt, turmeric powder and roasted chana dal powder and mix.
Let those cook for another 3 minutes. Now add red chili powder, turn off the heat and mix well.
After another 5 minutes, serve with rice or roti.
Notes:
You can add crushed garlic for extra garlic taste, while adding the powders.
Arbi becomes slippery after boiling, so peeling the skin is a sticky process. Applying oil on hands will help. It will also prevent itching. If arbi is itchy after boiling, it is safe to discard it.
You can add garam masala or roasted jeera powder as well.
Wash and peel the skin of the ash gourd piece. The skin will be hard, so remove carefully.
Remove the seeds, if any and cut into 1/2 inch pieces.
Boil in water till tender. It will take about 10-15 minutes.
After 8 minutes or so add salt, turmeric powder and the Coconut paste mix.
Let it boil for another 10 minutes.
Do not throw away the remaining water after boiling.
Let it cool down. Meanwhile beat yogurt with a spoon or fork into a smooth paste.
Heat oil in a small pan and prepare tempering. Add mustard seeds, cumin seeds, fenugreek seeds, dry red chilies and asafoetida.
Turn off the heat as the mustard starts to splatter.
Let it sit for a minute.
In the meantime, add yogurt to to the ash gourd and mix well.
Now add the tempering.
Mix well and let it sit for 10 minutes.
Serve with rice, roti.
Notes:
The ash gourd can be boiled in advance (on the same day) and added to the yogurt later on before lunch or dinner.
It can be stored in the refrigerator for dinner if you have prepared it for lunch,
Do not keep it for the next day as the yogurt will turn sour and start to ferment.
The Coconut paste mix can be prepared in a batches and stored in air tight container in the refrigerator.
Adding green chilies is optional as the coconut paste has ground chilies in it. Add the chilies to the tempering immediately after turning off the heat.
Dry roast the peanuts and toss to remove the skin after cooling.
Heat water in a non-stick pan and add grated jaggery to it. Let it boil.
Keep the heat on medium to boil it faster.
Stir occasionally to check for the consistency.
It will take about 10- 15 minutes.
Meanwhile apply ghee to a flat surface, (plate or tray) and keep it ready.
Drop a tiny quantity of the mixture into a bowl of water. If it forms a ball at the bottom the mixture is ready.
This is called 'unda paakam' in telugu. It means to form a round with the jaggery mixture alone.
Now to this add the roasted peanuts and mix well.
Turn off the heat and transfer this mixture onto the greased plate.
Spread it evenly using a spatula or roller.
Cut into squares or diamonds after 2 minutes. The mixture should still be hot, but not too hot. It is best to cut shapes when the mixture is just firming up.
Let it completely cool down and then remove from the plate and break along the cut lines.
