Karpuravalli ( Doddapatre ) Moru, Ajwain Leaves Buttermilk

          After I tried and tasted the Thayir Pachadi/ Raitha/ Tambuli with Ajwain Leaves/ Karpuravalli, I wanted to try out something else with it. Since these leaves tasted very good with yogurt, I wanted to try a moru/ buttermilk with it. The buttermilk tasted really good, just like the  ' masala moru ', but using just two ingredients apart from the buttermilk. I used the raw leaves, no sauteing or boiling, so no nutrients lost in the process, next time you make ' moru ' do try this out, you'll definitely love it..

Kadmbuttu, Steamed Rice Balls

          Kadmbuttu/ Steamed Rice Balls, this is a Coorg dish ( Kodava Cuisine ), I had eaten this only once, during our trip to Coorg, we had stayed in a Coffee estate, the cook had made this dish for us. Traditionally Kadmbuttu is served with a pork curry, we are vegetarians, so the cook had served this with Kadala Curry. We loved it, I asked the cook for the recipe, and couple of weeks back, I had made this at home along with the kadala curry. This is a very simple dish, made with idli rava ( idli rava is widely used in Kodava Cuisine ), these steamed rice balls are very soft and goes very well with the kadala curry or any kurma..

Kothiraivali Sakkarai Pongal, Barnyard Millet Sweetened With Jaggery

          This month, I am very late in posting my dish for the ' Shhhhh Cooking Secretly ' challenge, I was paired with Nalini Suresh, she had given me Kothiraivali/ Barnyard Millet and Vellam/ Jaggery as the secret ingredients. I was kind of very busy this month and hardly cooked anything, but I didn't want to miss the post, so finally, yesterday, I made this sakkarai pongal with barnyard millet. I thought I'll make a kesari ( sweet dish, usually made with semolina and sugar ), using kothiraivali and replacing the sugar with jaggery, but after finishing the dish, I understood that, when sugar is replaced with jaggery, the dish gets the taste of pongal. This is such a simple dish, can be done in under 30 minutes, but the taste was awesome, I felt that it tasted even better than the regular sakkarai pongal that we do with rice. And since we are using millets and jaggery, I can definitely say, it's a very healthy sweet or dessert when compared to other sweets made with white rice, flour and sugar..

Kadala Curry, Brown Chickpeas Curry

          Kadala Curry is a very popular dish in Kerala ( a state in India ), it's mostly served with puttu ( a steamed dish made with rice flour ). We use brown chickpeas ( it's more nutritious than the white variety ) for this curry, and it's cooked in a coconut based gravy. The flavor is very distinct and it tastes equally good even with idlis and dosas..

Kambu Idli, Pearl Millet Idli

          Many of us are opting for healthy options, trying to replace white rice and flour with whole grains, brown rice and whole wheat flour. Millets is another healthy choice, there are so many varieties, ragi/ finger millet, kambu/ pearl millet and thinai/ foxtail millet, to name a few. They are available whole or in flour form, and we can use them in the place of rice in so many dishes. I have used Pearl Millet today to make the common South Indian dish, idlis. Idlis are usually made with parboiled rice and urad dal/ black gram, I have replaced half the amount of rice with the pearl millet. The idlis turned out really soft and delicious and I also made dosas with the batter, they came out very crispy and we loved the sweet flavor of pearl millet..

Potato And Eggplant Dry Sabzi

          The past couple of weeks has been really hectic, travelling and weddings had kept me away from my blog, I have made only three posts this month. I had made some dishes, clicked pictures but didn't have the time to edit and do a post, neither could I visit other blogs, I think everything should fall back to routine by the end of this month. Coming back to today's dish, it's a semi-dry curry with potatoes and eggplant/ brinjal, I had made it along with Gujarati Khichdi and Kadhi. I have another dry curry with potatoes and eggplant here, but that has a South Indian flavor, whereas this curry is more along the lines of a Gujarati Shak, but a dry version. It is a very easy dish and tastes really good with the khichdi and kadhi and it would also go very well with some rotis or puris too..

Jowar Roti, Sorghum Flat Breads

          Jowar Roti ( also called as Jolad Roti or Jonna Roti ) is a healthy and gluten free roti/ flat bread made, as the name suggests with jowar/ sorghum flour. It's a very popular dish in the North Karnataka region and is mostly served with a stuffed eggplant curry ( yengai ). Since the flour is gluten free, it's not actually easy to roll out these rotis, and we don't use the rolling pin for it, it's done with the hands. Making thin jowar rotis is really hard, a process that one can master only by practice. I have tried my best, my rotis were not very thin, but they were soft, but I'll keep doing this again and again and I am sure, someday, I'll update this post with pictures with much thinner rotis..

Mampazha Moru Kuzhambu, Mango Buttermilk Stew

          I wanted to try out a number of recipes with mangoes, while they were still in season, one of them is this Mampazha Moru Kuzhambu. I knew that mangoes go very well with yogurt/ curd, but had a slight doubt about how it would taste in a moru kuzhambu and then I saw this recipe at Saffron Trail. Since I had all the ingredients in hand, I made it the same day, I have followed the original recipe, with only very few changes. It's a very easy dish, takes very little time and tasted really good with rice..

Prune Lekvar ( Jam )

          As mentioned in my last post, I had made Hungarian Lekvar for making the Hungarian Kipfels. Lekvar is a jam, usually made with dried apricots or prunes and I had used it as a filling for the kipfels. I made the jam with dried prunes and the taste was excellent. After using some for the kipfels, I used the remaining to serve with plain bread. If you like prunes, then go ahead and make this easy jam and enjoy..