Mahanandi

Living in Consciousness ~ Indi(r)a’s Food and Garden Weblog

Ridge Gourd Dal (Beerakaya Pappu)

Everyone has their own food weaknesses. Mine has always been rice and dal. I loose my dietary control over this combination. I am a dal-holic.:) So, what did I do with ridge gourd purchased from ‘Lotus’ yesterday, I have ridge gourd dal. Simple yet divinely tasty when mixed with rice and ghee. Today, no portion control for me.

Ridge Gourd (Beera Kaya, Turai) Pressure Cooked Ridge Gourd and Toor Dal Mixture
Ridge Gourd – In bite sized pieces………….. ……………Presssure-cooked toor dal and vegetable mixture

Recipe:
for two for two meals

Toor dal – 4 fistfuls (¾ cup)
Vegetables:
One medium sized ridge gourd
outer ridges peeled first and then cut into small cubes
One medium sized onion & 6 to 10 green chilli peppers –all finely chopped
Seasoning:
1 tablespoon of tamarind extract
¼ tsp of turmeric
½ tsp of salt
For popu or tadka: 1 tsp each of mustard seeds, cumin, urad dal, minced garlic and curry leaves

Take toor dal, vegetables (listed above), tamarind and turmeric in a pressure cooker. Add about two cups of water. Pressure-cook them til 3 whistles or until they turn soft. Wait until it’s safe to open the lid, then add salt to this cooked mix. With a wood masher, make a smooth paste of the cooked dal-veggies. At this stage, for a more soup kind of dal, add water to your liking, stir and bring it to a boil. (Do this step only if you add more water to the cooked-mashed dal. Otherwise it’s not necessary to cook the dal further.)

In a steel vessel, heat one teaspoon of peanut oil. Sauté the popu or tadka ingredients until golden, then add the mashed dal-veggie paste from the cooker. Mix the dal with popu ingredients thoroughly. Serve hot with rice and ghee.

Ridge Gourd Dal with rice and curry

Ridge gourd dal and curry with rice and ghee – my weakness and indulgence.

Posted by Indira©Copyrighted in Amma & Authentic Andhra,Beera kaaya(Ridge Gourd),Toor Dal (Thursday February 9, 2006 at 2:36 pm- permalink)
Comments (23)

The New Home of Mahanandi: www.themahanandi.org

Silk Squash Curry Burgers (Neti Beerakaya Kura)

We went to Strip district, last Saturday. This downtown wholesale produce market is where people go to hangout on a weekend morning in Pittsburgh. Full of ethnic groceries, wholesale organic produce, fresh meat and fish shops, roadside stalls, bakeries, cheese and coffee shops, eateries, difficult to find free parking space and big crowds; The atmosphere is usually like a carnival, more so on last Saturday, because of Steelers Super Bowl. We saw Polamalu wigs, face paintings, jam packed stalls carrying Steelers memorabilia. There were impromptu parades and street dancers, dancing to Steelers songs. The mood was boisterous and we had a fun time watching the spectacle.

We also did some grocery shopping; we bought Indian vegetables at ‘Lotus’, the big Chinese grocery shop in Strip distrcit. Because of Chinese New Year, the shop was buzzing with people. Crowds everywhere. One vegetable I bought after a long time was silk squash (or ‘neti beerakaya’ in Telugu), the smooth and silky cousin of rugged ridge gourd. Similar in taste to ridge gourd and its distant cousin zucchini, silk squash is great in curry avatar. This is very easy to prepare and is an Andhra variety.

Silk Squash (Neti Beerakaya in Telugu)

Recipe:
(For two, for 4 mini burgers)

1 medium sized, fresh and firm silk squash (neti beerakaya)
(Lightly scrape the outside skin, wash and cut into bite sized pieces)
1 onion – finely chopped
2 green chillies – finely chopped
½ tsp each of coconut powder and turmeric
¼ tsp salt

Popu or tadka ingredients – 1 tsp each cumin, mustard seeds, minced garlic and curry leaves

I also added half cup of bean sprouts for little bit of crunch and to boost the nutritional value.

Silk Squash, Red Onion, Green Chilli and Bean Sprouts

Preparation:

In a wide pan, heat one teaspoon of peanut oil, toast the popu ingredients, add and saute onion and green chillies first, then add the silk squash. Cover and cook for about 5 minutes until the squash pieces soften. Remove the lid, stir in turmeric, salt and coconut powder, cook for few more minutes. Just before switching off the heat, I added bean sprouts.
This Andhra style curry tastes great with rice and dal or with chapatis.

This weekend, in addition to vegetables, I also bought some fresh dinner rolls (buns) for pav bhaji. With some of those rolls, I prepared mini burgers today, for lunch. I sliced the roll (bun) into half, removed little bit of white bread from insides (to make space for curry filling), and pan grilled them for few minutes, on each side. Then filled them with silk squash curry. For Vijay, I also made an egg-white omelet for his burgers. The whole preparation took me about 20 minutes and the curry burgers tasted awesome.

Silk Squash Curry Burgers (One with Omelte and the second one no omelet)

Silk Squash Curry Burgers ~ our lunch today and my entry to the Stephanie’s ARF Event.

Posted by Indira©Copyrighted in Beerakaya-Neti(Silk Squash) (Tuesday February 7, 2006 at 2:55 pm- permalink)
Comments (24)

The New Home of Mahanandi: www.themahanandi.org

Fifth for the Steelers & First for Mahanandi

Yay, Steelers won the Super Bowl. Opposite team play was boring and the advertisements, oy… It was like watching the competition in boredom.
But what matters is the win, and I’m happy that Steelers won the Super Bowl, got their 5th ring.

Yay for my beloved ‘Mahanandi’.

Muruku - South Indian Snack Made of Rice and Lentil Flour

I’m glad that my entry won the January ‘Does My Blog Look Good In This’ contest. More than the recipes, focus of my food blogging has always been, how the recipe looks before and after in images. Many thanks to the host for organizing this event. Also unlike Super Bowl, for blog’s events, what matters is the participation and the resulting exposure, so congrats to all participants and their super fabulous entries.

Comment form is closed at this time. Thank you!

Posted by Indira©Copyrighted in Zen (Personal) (Monday February 6, 2006 at 9:44 am- permalink)
Comments

The New Home of Mahanandi: www.themahanandi.org

Steelers Super Bowl

Steelers Flag
Steelers flag

Posted by Indira©Copyrighted in Zen (Personal) (Sunday February 5, 2006 at 12:09 pm- permalink)
Comments (8)

The New Home of Mahanandi: www.themahanandi.org

Steelers Pittsburgh

Images of Pittsburgh on this Super Bowl Weekend.

 Heinz Stadium - Steelers Home
Heinz Stadium (Steelers Home) – On a Regatta Day

 Cathedral of Learning - University of Pittsburgh
Cathedral of Learning – University of Pittsburgh

 Downtown Pittsburgh on a Beautiful Sunny Day Sri Venkateswara Temple, Pittsburgh
Downtown Pittsburgh on a beautiful sunny day…………….Sri Venkateswara Temple, Pittsburgh

Photographs © Vijay Singari

Very detailed and well written article about the condition of Pittsburgh for burgh fans by Charles McCollester from Monthly Review.

Excerpt:

“Pittsburgh is little known or appreciated nationally despite the important role that the city played in the rise of U.S. global power. Pittsburgh’s birth occurred at the cutting edge of imperial French and British expansion into the heartland of the continent. The city’s rapid decline coincided with the recent assumption of global imperial power by the United States. In between these two eruptions of global imperial realities into southwest Pennsylvania flows a story of collective work, struggle, and skill that arguably created the most productive region on the earth between 1880 and 1950 considering both diversity and volume of production.”

“Plant-closing activists in the 1980s used to refer to what was happening to Pittsburgh and other manufacturing centers as “breaking America’s backbone.” Now the once muscular city lies on the operating table surrounded by ideologues with knives, its public services and union contracts are of being eviscerated. While the black and gold faithful from coast to coast sport colors in salute to their team, Pittsburgh itself is being gutted economically without anesthesia or mercy.”

“The glory that is Pittsburgh today derives from its stunning beauty and historic character, its people and its memories. Sitting in a natural amphitheater carved by the three rivers, its hillsides green and leafy, its rivers once again filling with fish, its neighborhoods a crazy quilt of accommodation with its convoluted geography, the town has character and complexity. Pittsburgh has always been a proud place despite the often bitter labor relations that played a significant role in its history. What has remained true is an intense loyalty to this rooted locale: its neighborhoods and hollows, its forgotten corners and “seldom seens,” its churches, teams, taverns, schools, and unions. A loyalty from the heart beats in the Pittsburgh Nation, at home and away, waving the ‘terrible towel’ of memory.”

Posted by Indira©Copyrighted in Zen (Personal) (Saturday February 4, 2006 at 8:14 am- permalink)
Comments (8)

The New Home of Mahanandi: www.themahanandi.org

Red, Yellow and Green – Bell Pepper Curry

Eye catching and good looking, the 3 bell pepper curry is a flavorful, quick side dish to make.

1.Take one each of red, yellow and green bell peppers, cut each one into half. Remove the seeds inside and slice them thin lengthwise.

2.Heat one teaspoon of peanut oil in a wide pan. Toast pinch of each mustard seeds, cumin, minced garlic (popu).

3.Add and cook bell peppers, covered for about 5 minutes on medium-low.

4.Remove the lid; add pinch of turmeric, a tablespoon of spicy dalia powder (pappula podi) and salt to taste. Cook/saute them for another 5 minutes openly, on high heat, stirring often.

Serve hot with rice and dal or with chapatis.

Celebrating Steelers Superbowl Sunday with 3 Bell pepper curry.

Posted by Indira©Copyrighted in Bell Pepper,Chana Dal-Roasted (Dalia) (Friday February 3, 2006 at 2:29 pm- permalink)
Comments (15)

The New Home of Mahanandi: www.themahanandi.org

This Year I Dare (Food Wise)

Ilva of Lucullian Delights who started the meme “2006 Food Challenges” (or “This year I dare”), and Winslow of Seven kinds of Soy Sauce, they both tagged me, to share 5 things I want to do for 2006, food wise. So here they are…

Blogwise:
1 Blog about Idly, Dosa and Vada, the delicious breakfasts of India, before my blogs one-year anniversary, in beautiful images.
2 Prepare and blog about traditional Indian sweets like ‘laddu’, ‘jangiri’ etc.,
3 I so want to prepare and blog about my favorite cake “German Chocolate Fudge Cake” and also, I don’t know why, but I’m very drawn to this American style, artery clogging, disgustingly decadent sweet “Krispy Crème Donut Pudding”. First, I’ve to find people to feed it. 🙂

Personally:
4 Going minimal on every Wednesday – Reducing the food consumption gradually to a full day fasting. I call it, my ‘Yogi diet on Wednesdays’. I was doing this before I went to India last year, started it again last week; it takes some time to get along with the hunger pains.:)
5 Continue food blogging to improve my skills and knowledge.

Thanks Ilva and Winslow for tagging me to share my ideas for 2006. I’d like to tag Priya of Sugar and Spice, to share her food ideas for 2006 with us.

Posted by Indira©Copyrighted in Zen (Personal) (Thursday February 2, 2006 at 10:33 am- permalink)
Comments (12)

The New Home of Mahanandi: www.themahanandi.org

Upma with Hominy Grits

I got hooked on grits, a type of coarse meal, and product of stone grind, dried corn. In looks, grits are similar to rice ravva (the kind we use for rice upma), coarse sand like and grainy. The texture, smell and taste of grits is really something and quite addictive. Do you know the taste of dried corn kernels (before popcorn), grits taste almost like that.

I keep the preparation of this particular upma very simple; don’t like to add lots of vegetables, like I do for couscous/cracked wheat. Just the basic upma ingredients and some roasted nuts-either cashews or peanuts, that’s about it. Just enough for my Wednesday’s yogi (minimal) diet.

Grits, red onion, ginger, green chillies, curry leaves, ghee in the cup--- cumin and mustard seeds, urad dal, chana dal --- ingredients for grits upma

Recipe:

2 cups of grits (I used Quick Cooking Grits)
4 cups of water
1 onion, 2 green chillies & a small piece of ginger – all finely chopped
Salt to taste
A fistful of roasted cashews or peanuts

For popu or tadka
1 tablespoon of ghee
1 tsp each-mustard seeds, cumin, urad dal, chana dal & curry leaves

In a large pan, heat ghee. First add and sauté popu/tadka ingredients, then the finely chopped onion, green chillies and ginger. When they are golden, add water and stir in the salt. Cover and bring to a boil. Remove the cover, slowly add hominy grits, stirring continuously. Reduce heat, cover and cook for 15 minutes longer, stirring occasionally to keep from sticking. Serve hot with chutney.

Hominy Grits upma with Amla chutney
Hominy Grits Upma with Amla chutney ~ My Wednesday’s Yogi Diet

Posted by Indira©Copyrighted in Corn - Hominy Grits (Wednesday February 1, 2006 at 2:51 pm- permalink)
Comments (12)

The New Home of Mahanandi: www.themahanandi.org

« Next Page