Bottle Gourd & Peas Milk Curry, Lauki Matar Malai, Sorakkai Pattani Paal Curry

          It's holiday time, and most of us are either busy with kids at home or visiting family and friends. We are in Singapore now, visiting my sister's family and some old friends and I am having a wonderful time with my 2 year old nephew, and very little time to spend on the blog. I had wanted to schedule my posts, back in India itself, but it didn't work out, at least I had edited and uploaded these pictures there, so I could do a post today. Today's dish is Lauki Matar Malai/ Bottle Gourd And Peas Milk Curry, it's a slight variation from Methi (Fenugreek Leaves) Matar Malai. The curry goes well with rotis or any kind of pilaf, absolutely delicious and very different from the regular dals or curries that we make with bottle gourd. Even though malai means cream, it's not very rich or loaded with calories, I have used only low fat milk here and the flavor from kasuri methi is too good..

Fettuccine Bolognese

          Pasta Bolognese, I have never tasted this dish, because most of the restaurants serve only a non-vegetarian version of the bolognese sauce which is made with meat. And then one day, I watched this vegetarian version in a show, the sauce was made with soy granules and some Indian spices. Usually the sauce is served over spaghetti, but I had only some fettuccine with me and had all the other ingredients. I made it the same evening, but I used only Italian seasonings. It's really a simple dish, but at the same time very delicious and nutritious,and my family loved it too..

Dali Varan, Lentil Gravy

          Couple of months back I bought this cook book Rasachandrika, a very old book on Saraswat cooking, originally written in Marathi and later translated in Hindi and then in English. The first edition of the book came out in 1943 and I love the picture on the front cover, showing an Indian kitchen in the 1940's. There are many interesting recipes, and I tried this Dali Varan, a simple gravy with tuvar dal/ split pigeon peas. It's like our sambar, but tastes a little different and goes very well with plain white rice or even with idlis and dosas..

Cabbage Briyani, Muttakos Briyani

          The last couple of weeks has been so busy, can't spend much time with my blog, today I had made up my mind that I have to do a post. I had made this Cabbage Briyani or Pulao couple of weeks back, it came out very well, very flavorful, I also used some fresh raw peanuts in it instead of the usual green peas, it gave a nice different taste to the rice. Serve it with some raitha for a complete meal..