Ondhwo, or Handvo for Sunday brunch

I love Sunday mornings as it's one of those quiet and peaceful days.  Most of the family members tend to enjoy a lie in and It gives me a chance to cook them something nice for brunch.  This morning we are having hot Ondhwo. (Some people call it Handvo or Ondhwa).  This dish is a regular one in our household as it's often been a life saver when we are decorating or gardening.  It's a meal in itself as it if full of a selection of lentils and grains as well as fresh vegetables.  I would say that it's like eating a savoury cake.  It needs a bit of preparation as you need to soak the Ondhwa flours in yogurt overnight.  Lots of people skip this step and make it instantly (by adding Eno fruit salt  as a raising agent I think) but this it tastes better when prepared my way.  The fermentation in yogurt helps it the ondhwa rise and also gives it the lovely yogurty taste.  We usually serve it hot with a selection of chutneys and dips.   The left over Handvo will go in my lunch box.

This Handvo  was served with green chutney, tamarind sauce and coconut chutney.  Links to the recipes are in this article.

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Sev Poori and Gulab Jamuns

On Friday evenings I really look forward to enjoying a nice meal and relaxing for the rest of the evening.  We had some boiled chick peas left over from yesterday so I decided to make some sev puri.
The complete recipe is here.  Its really very simple.  You take boiled chick peas, boiled potatoes, finely chopped onions, green chutney, tamarind chutney, sev mamra , yogurt and firm puris.

You top each puri with a bit from the ingredients shown above.

And enjoy the spicy, crunchy,  sweet and sour sev puri.

For afters we had warm gulab jamuns dipped in sugar syrup.  The quick easy step by step recipe for sev puri and gulab jamuns is in my blog.

Please browse through my blog and enjoy the easy to follow step by step recipes.

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Chora Fari and Farsi Puri (Crispy Indian Snacks)

I try and make a variety of snacks during the holidays.   It makes life a bit easier if you ae travelling during the day and dinner isn't ready on time.  This Easter I made chora fari which is quite quick to make and tastes great when you spinkle some spices such as chilly powder or even Chaat masala on it.

I still follow my recipe for chora fari which was posted by me two years ago.

I also made some farsi puris .  I know that my recipe for farsi puri is very popular judging by the number of times other bloggers have used pictures of my puris on their blog.  It's plagiarism but I am taking it as a compliment.  I hope they enjoyed making the puris as much as I did.

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Mixed Bhajias (Fried pokoras)

Today is the start of my busy Easter break.  My son is home from Uni and he and his friends have been doing the rounds of spending time at each other's homes.  8 of them are spending Good Friday and Saturday morning with us so it will be a busy time for me BUT fun too as I am keen to cook some new dishes and see whether they enjoy them.  I find that it's always more fun cooking when you have a people visiting.   For that reason, I spent most of evening tidying up and shopping.  I wasn't in the mood for eating a full Indian meal after all that hard work so decide to make a mixture of bhajias.

I made my favourite maru bhajias and Onion bhajias.

I also make some fenugreek bhajias and rice and onion bhajias for which recipes will follow soon.

I served these hot and spicy bhajias with a tamarind sauce and finished the meal with a slice my almond barfi and a hot cup of chai.

Tomorrow's starter is butternut squash soup served with hot French bread  For the main course I will be serving cannelloni with roast potatoes, green beans and a rocket salad.  To finish the meal we have New York Cheese cake  - so watch this space for all the recipes. (Not to mention the Graze box of crisps and pop corn that gets eaten during the night!!)

Have a great Easter Break and enjoy your Easter eggs.

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Sev mamra (Gujarati nasto (snack) with chick pea noodles and puffed rice)

Sev mamra is an Indian snack. It is a mixture of spicy dry ingredients such as puffed rice called mamra and chick pea savoury noodles called sev.  It is a very light yet filling  dish.  Some people add fried peanuts and spicy rice noodles to it as well.  I tend to make it with a  mixture of sev and mamra. This can be eaten on it's own as a snack or used for toppings on bhel puri and other Indian street foods such as pani puri, ragda patis, sev puri etc...

Ingredients:

4-5 cups of home made sev Recipe is here (you can use ready made sev but can never be sure how fresh it is)
3-4 cups of mamra (puffed rice)
1 tsp turmeric
1-2 tsp sunflower oil

Method:

1.  Transfer the mamra to a microwave dish and cook for one minute, stir and cook again for 1 minute. All microwaves have different wattage so the time is according to my microwave which is only 750 watts. The mamra can burn or leave a burnt smell if cooked at very high wattage or for too long. You shouldn't need more than 2-3 minutes to crisp the mamra.

2.  Sprinkle the turmeric on the mamra.  Dip your spoon in the oil and mix well.

3.  Add to the cooked sev and mix well. Some people add extra oil to the mixture by doing a tadka or vaghar but I don't as there is really no need to add extra oil to the sev mamra.

4. Once cool, store it in an airtight container.  This can be stored for a couple of weeks if using home made sev.

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Punjabi Samosas – To fry or not to fry?

Samosas are available in most places in the world as little triangle pastries filled with a variety of vegetarian or non-vegetarian fillings.  They can be eaten as a snack with a cup of tea or served as a starter with any meal. 

The recipe is easy to make but as with most cooking - preparation is the key to making these.

Ingredients for 30 samosas

6 medium potatoes

6  medium carrots

1 ½ cup of frozen peas

I finely chopped onion (medium size)

A teaspoon of blended ginger

2 or 3 finely chopped green chillies (can be reduced or missed out if you do not like hot food)

Small bunch of finely chopped coriander

1 tsp salt

2 tsps sugar or sugar substitute

1 tbp lemon

1 tsp of garam masala  (optional)

1 litre sunflower oil if you wish to try the samosas

For the pastry

2 ½ cups of plain flour

¼ cup of butter

½ tsp of carom seeds (optional)

½ tsp of rosemary

½  cup warm water

½ cup plain flour to help roll out the pastry

Method:

1. Add butter, carom seeds and rosemary to the plain flour and mix. Add some warm water a little at a time to the flour to make the pastry dough.  The dough should be of a similar consistency to play doh. Cover this dough and leave in a warm place.

2.   Dice the potatoes and carrots into small cubes.  Wash the vegetables and transfer them to a microwave dish with the frozen peas.  Add in the ginger, salt and sugar.  Let this mixture cook for 10 minutes, stir and cook again for 10 minutes.   The vegetables should now be cooked.  Add in the lemon juice and stir.

3.  Transfer the mixture to a large mixing bowl and add in the garam masala , finely chopped onions, green chillies and coriander and mix well.  Allow this mixture to cool. By adding the garam masala and uncooked onions, chillies and coriander at this stage will give the samosas a nice flavour.

To prepare  the somasas  

4.    Knead the dough and divide the pastry dough into 30 small balls.  Take one ball and using some dry flour roll out a circle of about 4-5 inches in diameter.

 5.  One circle will make two samosas.  Cut the circle into two.

6. Place the samosa mixture on one quarter of the semicircle. 

7. Pull the second quarter to cover the samosa mixture.  

8.  Join the edges by pressing them with a fork.  

9.   Finish making all the samosas and save them on a lightly floured surface.

10. You can now choose the healthy option for cooking your samosas by rubbing/spraying  some sunflower oil on the samosas and baking them for 20 minutes at 180 degrees (350 degrees F)  or you be naughty and deep fry them until golden brown.   I baked half and fried the rest. Both tasted equally nice.

This is the baked version:

This is the fried version:

11.  Serve them hot or cold with any dip. 

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Khasta Kachori (lentil filled pastry topped with onions and chutney)

This Christmas my sons gave me some really thoughtful gifts – some of which took me by surprise.

The gift I really enjoyed and am still enjoying is a cookery book called “Hansa’s –more than just a restaurant, it’s my life “- written by Hansa Dhabi the owner of Hansa’s restaurant in Leeds, UK. The book takes you through her life’s journey and also shares with the reader- some of her recipes.  My sons said that they hoped that this book would inspire me to publish a book of my recipes.  Only time will tell if I can achieve that ambition.  At the moment, I am having fun trying out new recipes – one of which was for Khasta Kachoris.  

I made these kachoris as a starter for my New Year’s party and served them in Hansa’s restaurant style.  I made some changes to the recipe but I don’t think it made any changes to the taste of the dish. They went down a treat with everyone.

Hot and spicy kachoris are one of my favourite snacks.  Kachoris can be made with lots of different fillings but I usually make them with mung dall. Hansa’s recipe uses mung dall which is soaked and ground but I decided to make them with a variety of mung dalls and frozen peas and not grind the filling.

Ingredients for making 15 large or 25 small kachoris:

Time 60 minutes.

½ cup of dehusked split mung beans

½ cup of a mixture split but husked mung beans

1 cup of frozen peas

1 medium onion

Fresh green coriander

A tablespoon of mixed garlic and ginger paste

2 to 3 green chillies – depends on how hot you like your food!

1.5 litres cooking oil:  you will need some for the lentil mixture, some for the dough and some for frying.

2 cups of plain flour for making the kachori's outer covering

1 teaspoons of dry cumin

2 or 3 sticks of cinnamon

3 or 4 cloves

1 tablespoon salt

1 tablespoon chilly powder or pepper if you like mild food.

1 -2 teaspoons sugar (optional) – I like my kachoris to have a sweet and sour type of taste.

1 -2 tablespoons lemon – again adjust this after tasting the kachori mixture.

1-2 teaspoons of ground cinnamon and cloves mixture (optional)

For serving:

2 cups of sev (recipe here) This is readily available in most supermarkets & Indian grocery stores

1 cup of chevdo (recipe here)(optional) This is readily available in most supermarkets & Indian grocery stores

1 medium onion cut finely

½ cup of green chutney (recipe here)

½ cup of tamarind sauce ( I used Maggie’s tamarind sauce which is available in most supermarkets & Indian grocery stores)

½ cup of Red chilly sauce( I used Maggie’s red chilly sauce which is available in most supermarkets & Indian grocery stores)

Method

1. Wash the two mung dalls and allow to soak for at least 30 minutes (or longer if possible).

2. Heat 2 tablespoons of oil and add in the dry cumin, cloves and cinnamon

3. Strain the lentils and add them to the oil - I usually use a long slotted spoon to gently add the lentils to the hot oil. Whilst straining the dall, don’t worry if it’s not too dry as this will give some moisture to cook the lentil mixture.

4. Add the salt, sugar, chilly powder, ginger and garlic paste.

5. Stir and allow to cook gently for 5 to 6 minutes.

6. Add in the frozen peas and allow to cook for further 5 minutes.

7. As I didn’t want to add water to my mixture, I transferred my kachori mixture to the microwave for 6  minutes, checked it, stirred it and cooked it for a further 5 minutes.The lentils need to be cooked completely so do sprinkle a tablespoon or two of  water if you feel it needs it. 

8. Once the mixture is cooked, add the lemon juice to it, add the ground cinnamon and cloves mixture to it.

9.  Cut the coriander, green chillies and onions finely and add to the kachori mixture together and mix well.

10. Cook it for a couple of minutes in the microwave and transfer it to a mixing bowl.

 

TIP: If for some reason, the lentils are cooked and you have added too much water - allow the water to evaporate.  You can add a couple of tablespoon's of potato mash to soak up the extra moisture. Also taste the mixture and make adjustments.

11. Spread the mixture to enable it to cool.

12.  In the meantime, prepare the dough.

13. Sieve the dough and add in 2 tablespoons of oil and 1 teaspoon of salt. Adding the bit of extra oil to the dough helps to make the outer pastry crisp but nice and flaky too.

14. Using warm water ( I needed a little over half a cup), mix and prepare the dough.. The dough should be pliable and not be too firm.

15. Cover and allow the dough to rest.

16. Now back to the kachori filling-  Divide the filling into 15 or 25 small balls.  For parties, I would suggest making small kachoris.

17.  Mix the dough and divide it  into a similar number.

17.  Now take a small amount of dough and roll it out in a small circle.

18.  Flatten the kachori filling in the middle of the circle.

19. Picking the edge of the circle, try and join all the edges together to form a ball. I tend to go round the circle joining up small bits of the outer circle.

20. The ball should be sealed from all sides or the mixture will leak out when frying.

21.  Now dust your work top with some plain flour and using your fingers press the kachori into a round puri shape.  You can also use a rolling pin if you find this easier.

22.  Heat the oil . Drop a small tiny piece of dough into the oil.  If it rises up, the oil is ready for frying.   Lower the heat and add the kachoris to the oil, and allow them to cook slowly.  Tap them gently with a slotted spoon or a skimmer  and they should puff up.  Cook them until they are crispy and and golden brown.

 

23.     To serve the khasta kachori, take one kachori at a time, open the top layer by cutting a square on the kachori.

24.  Spread some green chutney on the kachori and sprinkle some sev on this.  

25.  Add some onions, topped up by tamarind sauce and chilly sauce and finishing with more onions and a chevda topping.  The sweet and sour taste with all the crunchy toppings was perfect for us. 

26.  Our guests loved topping up their kachoris according to their taste. Some guests even added yogurt to their topping so I hope that you too will try different toppings to pick the best taste for you. 

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