Easy Penne Pasta

Pasta is one of our favourite dish. We can have it for any meal, or even as a snack. Here is one of the many ways that we cook our pasta. This one's without cheese. The key to this recipe is the tomato puree that is prepared fresh. You could also use ready-to-use tomato puree, if you have no time to make it fresh. We make our pasta in pressure cooker which greatly reduced the effort of boiling, cooling and draining the pasta. In this recipe we add just enough water to cook the pasta without having to throw out any water.

Ingredients:

Penne Pasta:                     200 g
Carrot:                                1/3 cup, chopped
Beans :                               1/4 cup beans
Cabbage :                           1/2 cup, finely chopped
Onion:                                 1/3 cup, chopped
Tomato:                               3 medium size, chopped 
Oil:                                       2 tsp
Salt:                                     To taste

Seasoning:
Black pepper:                     1 tsp, crushed
Oregano:                            1 tsp, flakes

Procedure:

For tomato sauce:
Blend the tomatoes in a mixer. Heat a kadai, add 1/2 tsp of oil, and then add the blended tomatoes. Cook for about 8-10 minutes or until you don't get the raw smell of the tomatoes.

For pasta:
Add the penne pasta in a pressure cooker and add water, just to cover the pasta in the cooker.

Add all other ingredients in the cooker.

Cover the cooker with the lid and cook it on medium flame. After 1 whistle, reduce the flame to minimum. After 5 minutes switch off the gas.

After the pressure in the pressure cooker is normalized, open the cooker.

Add in the tomatoe puree and mix well.

Season with the pepper and oregano.

Easy penne pasta is ready to serve.

Variations:
You can add some Mint/Pudina leaves in the tomato puree as its cooked. It gives a tangy taste to the pasta.

For seasoning you can use a combination of pepper, oregano, chilli flakes, basil, thyme and any other spice that you can think of. 

Wheat-oats muffins

Here's a recipe for making wheat-oats muffin. Rich in energy and fibre, its a healthier alternative to maida based muffins. Very low on oil and sugar, its an ideal snack that you can eat without feeling guilty.

Ingredients:

Whole wheat flour:        ½ cup 

Oats flour:                      ½ cup

Baking powder:            1 tsp 

Baking soda:                ¼ tsp

Powdererd sugar :        2 tbsp

Powdered jaggery :      1 tbsp

Honey :                          1 tbsp

Milk :                              ¾ cup

Egg white:                    1 egg

Cinnamon powder:      ½ tsp

Vanilla essence :         ¼ tsp

Salt:                              1 pinch

For garnishing:

Raisins: 10 -15

Almonds: 3 - 4, finely sliced

Procedure:

Mix wheat flour, oats flour, baking powder, baking soda, sugar, jaggery and salt in a bowl (dry mix).

In an another bowl  whip the egg white, add honey, milk and vanilla essence, and mix them well (wet mix). 

Add the dry mix in the wet mix and mix it slowly with a spoon for 2-3 minutes. Remember not to mix it too much. Add the raisins to the mix.

Pour the mixture in the muffin moulds and garnish on the top with sliced almonds. Preheat the oven to 200 degrees Celsius for 10 minutes.

Bake the muffins for 15 minutes. Poke it with a tooth pick and check whether it is done. 

Keep it in the oven for the next 10-15 mins. And remove it from the mould once its cooled down and enjoy.   

Rosogolla / Rasgullas

Rosogollas (রসগোল্লা) or Rasgullas are the quintessential Bengali sweet and loved by almost everyone who loves sweets. Any occasion is a good occasion to indulge in Rosogollas. If you visit the home of a Bengali family, you may be served sweets for breakfast, lunch, tea and dinner.

They are basically balls of cottage cheese cooked in sugar syrup. Not very difficult to make although it may seem so before you try it out. With a pressure cooker at your disposal, it becomes even easier.

Our first results. Each one turned out about 1.5 inches in diameter.

Ingredients:

Milk: 1 litre. You may use high fat milk, although we got good results from 3% fat milk. 

Vinegar: 2 tbsp mixed in ½ cup water or 1 lime

Sugar ¼ kg or as per your taste.

Rose water: few drops (optional)

Ice water: 1 litre

Servings:

Approximately 12-15 Rosogollas. 

Procedure:

Boil the milk. Once the milk comes to boil, reduce the flame and slowly add the vinegar/lime juice till the milk starts curdling. Stir the milk slowly till the milk curdles completely. Switch off the gas and pour the curdled milk (chenna) on a muslin cloth to separate the water from the chenna. Be careful when handling the hot liquid while pouring it out on the muslin cloth.

Now pour ice water over the chenna in the same muslin cloth and wash well to remove the sourness due to the vinegar/lime juice. Drain out all the water and hang the chenna in the cloth at least for 20 min so that all the water is removed. Now your chenna is ready. Knead the chenna gently. Do not knead it hard. Make small balls of chenna. It should be smooth and there shouldn’t be any cracks.

In a pressure cooker take water (sufficient to cover the chenna balls) and mix the sugar in it. Add the chenna balls and pressure cook for 1 whistle in a medium flame. And then 5 min in low flame and switch off the gas.. Open the pressure cooker only after the pressure inside the pressure cooker drops to normal. If you open the pressure cooker before the pressure normalizes, the Rosogollas may shrink. 

Optional: Once cooked, you may add few drops of rose water for added flavour. 

Refrigerate after preparing and consume hot or cold. Do not store Rosogollas for too long as the sugar syrup tends to spoil.

From 1.5 litres of milk, we got 23 Rosogollas

Tweak: Make badam milk and add chopped almonds and pista and soak these Rosogollas in the badam milk. You will have Ras Malai prepared right in your home.

Do visit our FaceBook page - J & R Kitchen

 

Making Gulab Jamuns From Readymade Mix

Making great looking Gulab Jamuns is not magic. At least we don't think it is. But our friends and family are mostly awestruck by our Gulab Jamuns. So we decided to share our method of preparing them. What I believe is that making good Gulab Jamuns takes lots of effort. The kneading of the mix with milk into dough takes good amount of shoulder power. Again making the round dough balls takes lots of effort that we have mentioned below. So here goes.

We follow the recipe almost as it is written on the back of packs, with certain deviations. We prefer to use Gits Mix. It has given us the best results.

1. Use lukewarm milk to mix the dough instead of water.

2. Add the milk slowly, about 1 tbsp at a time. If the pack asks you to use 150 ml, measure exactly that much and mix that full amount.

3. Sometimes while mixing you will see the mix will become very sticky but keep on kneading. It'll become dry again. Remember, FINISH mixing the entire measured milk into the dough.

4. The consistency of the dough should be soft. If you don't see oil/ghee on your palm, mixing is not complete. Remember this.

5. Cut the dough into about 1 cm dia. Put in between your palms and press it hard while rotating palms in opposing directions. Reduce the distance between the palms slowly and you will see that the round shape forming slowly. NOTE: If you don't see you palms becoming oily AND warm, you are not putting enough effort 

6. If the dough ball is kinda sticky on your palms, then its having extra water. In that case, compress and roll with extra force to work out some of the water. The moment the palm becomes oily again, reduce the extra force and make a ball to be fried.

7. Either fry it immediately or keep it covered with moist muslin/cotton cloth. The surface of the round dough ball SHOULD NOT dry up before putting in the oil.

8. There must be enough oil that the dough balls do not touch the bottom of the frying vessel.

9. Fry till you get golden brown colour. Remember if you get one shade while frying, it will become lighter than that after soaking because it expands.

10. Making syrup is pretty simple. Follow instructions on the pack. You can increase the water to reduce the sweetness. But cool down the fried balls to room temperature and add to the hot syrup for soaking.

11. Next step is to wait for the GJs to soak up the syrup. At least 2-3 hours it takes to fully soak.

12. Refrigerate immediately and serve chilled or hot, as per your preference. Gulab jamuns with vanilla ice cream s a great combination.

 

Do visit our FaceBook page - J & R Kitchen

 

Juicy Pepper Chicken Fry (Low oil version)

If you want to have fried chicken but are hesitant to consume the deep fried pieces coated with oil, we present a recipe that will give you the taste of fried chicken without the guilty calories from the oil its fried in. Do try out this recipe and let us know your feedback.

Preparation and marinading time : Approx. 40-60 minutes
Cooking time : Approx. 30 minutes
Servings : 3-4

Ingredients Required:

1. Chicken : 1/4 kg.
2. Turmeric powder : 1/2 tbsp
3. Red Chilli powder 1/2 tbsp
4. Roasted coriander powder : 1/2 tbsp
5. Cumin powder :1/4 tbsp
6. Coarsely ground pepper (1/2 tbsp for mixing with the chicken + 1 tbsp for flavoring/garnishing)  (You can always adjust the quantity)
7. Ginger garlic paste : 1/2 tbsp
8. Salt to taste.
9. Whole Jeera (cumin) : 1/2 tsp
10. Mustard seeds :1/2 tsp
11. Bay leaf :1
12. Coconut Oil: 1.5  tbsp
13. Curry leaves : 20-30 leaves 

 Method: 

Mix the ingredients 1-8, 1/2 tbsp of oil and keep it aside for 30-45 minutes. Cook the chicken mix in a pan on low flame, without adding water. Cover the pan with a lid while cooking. Chicken will get cooked in its own juices. Once the water almost dries up and the chicken is fully cooked, switch off the stove. In case you notice that the water isn't there and chicken is not yet cooked fully, add little water to cook it completely.

In a heated non stick pan, add rest of the oil and stir fry the curry leaves and remove the fried leaves from the pan. Now in the same pan (in the remaining oil), add mustard seeds, jeera seeds, and bay leaf, Once it splutters,  add the chicken and mix well. Add the rest of the pepper powder and the fried curry leaves. 

We have tried this recipe with coconut oil, sunflower oil and mustard oil. According to us, this dish tastes best when prepared with coconut oil.

Do visit our FaceBook page - J & R Kitchen

Aam Panna, a green Mango based drink

Aam Panna (आम पन्ना) is a very popular summer drink in North India. It’s primary ingredient is pulp extracted from boiled/roasted green mangoes. Roasted mango version is the best one though not easily available these days, thanks to lack of wood/coal fired ovens in households

Chilled Aam Panna

Aam Panna has health benefits too. It helps in fighting heat stroke and exhaustion. It quenches thirst caused by excessive sweating. In summer you can find lots of mobile Aam Panna shops in most of the cities in North India. The actual taste will vary from place to place according to the mango variety and the spices added. Mint flavoured Aam Panna is probably most popular. We also get cardamom (Elaichi), black pepper, cumin (Jeera), ginger (Adrak) flavours. You can use one or more spices to make your own version. I like it with mint, black pepper and cumin seeds. Normally I prefer it with ice but it tastes equally good without ice.

So here is my recipe for Aam Panna. This recipe for Aam Panna is not with exact measures and there are several reasons for this. One of the reasons is that the core/seed of the mangoes will vary in size depending on the variety hence the amount of pulp that can be extracted will also vary. The amount of fibre content in the mango can also give difference in the pulp quantity. Again the salt required in this drink will vary according to the inherent sourness of the green mangoes. Sugar quantity can be varied according to personal choice. It will taste good even without sugar.

Recipe

Serves: 3-4 glasses

Ingredients:

1.    Raw mangoes – 500 gm

2.    Sugar – As per taste

3.    Salt/rock salt – As per taste

4.    Black pepper corns – 4-5 corns crushed roughly

5.    Cumin (Jeera) seeds – 10-15, crushed roughly

Procedure:

 

Preparing the mango pulp:

1.    Wash the mangoes. Put them in a pressure cooker and pour water till the mangoes are fully under water. Pressure cook for 1 whistle, or if required 2 whistles.

2.    Once the pressure has come to normal, open the pressure cooker and drain the water.

     

      WARNING – Even though the outside of the mangoes may feel cool, the core can be very hot even after 20-30 minutes, so take precautions to check the temperature of the mangoes before trying to peel them in the next step. You can easily scald your fingers if not careful.

3.    Let the mangoes cool down for 20-30 minutes and then peel the mangoes. The skin should come off very easily. 

4.  Add the peels and the peeled mangoes into a deep vessel and add about 2 cups of water and squeeze out the pulp from the mangoes and the peels. Discard the peels and the core.

5.    Sieve the pulp through a large rough strainer/filter to discard the fibre from the pulp.

6.    Now this pulp can be bottled and refrigerated as it is and used later.

Preparing the drink:

1.    Take 2-3 tbsp of the pulp and to that add water about 3 times the volume of the pulp, sugar and salt and blend. Do a bit of trial and error to arrive at the consistency that you would prefer.

2.    Add the crushed black pepper corns and cumin seeds and blend again.

3.    You can add ice cubes/crushed ice before serving, although it’s optional.

Aam Panna, without ice

So try this out and share with us about your experience with Aam Panna.