“पाकातल्या पुऱ्या” (Indian Sugar-Kissed Cookies)

The last sweet food in Diwali Schedule!!!

My Aai (mother) is a lovely cook.While growing up,she taught me the art of associating food with tastes & textures.

Mamma (mother) said “taste” is the appreciation of tongue for the accurate appraisal (appraisal is ascending or descending too :P) of the first tantalizing touch of food and “texture” is the quality of the contents (condiments) that caters to the glutton’s gastronomy!

Very interesting definitions,aren’t they?

I thought of selecting a recipe for “Indian Sugar Kissed Cookies” that could suit the taste & texture preferences of international audiences as much as my Desi (Indians) brigade.With Halloween (31st October),Thanks-giving (4th Thursday in November for US),Turkey,Christmas (25th December) & New year (1st January) lined up back-to back,this one’s a sure winner for kids & grown-ups.

Presenting the traditional,home-made Indian Sugar Kissed Cookies !

Ingredients

• 1 muffin-full bowl of fine Semolina-My last experience with kneading semolina wasn’t great,so used only 3 tbsps of it for texture.
• 1 muffin-full bowl of all purpose flour (maida)-Instead of using semolina as the main ingredient I used all purpose flour since its easy to deal with.One can substitute all purpose flour with whole wheat flour or use the two in half-half proportions.
• 1 and half muffin-full bowls of sugar (quantity may vary)
• 1 tsp oil for kneading.I did not put hot oil into the flour as mentioned in the original recipe.
• Ghee /cooking oil for frying-I used olive oil to fry.However,one may choose to bake the cookies too.
• A pinch of eating soda
• Salt to taste.
• Few strands of saffron.
• 2 tsp cardamom powder-I added it to the dough while kneading it instead of adding it to the Sugar syrup for two reasons,to avoid loss of its distinct flavour while cooking the syrup and to avoid any wastage due to sticking of the powder on sides of the saucepan.
• 2 tsp nutmeg powder-Its my addition and I put it in while kneading the dough.
• Few drops of lemon juice (optional)-This is to be added to the sugar syrup.
• Dry fruit powder (my suggestion)-I did not use it though,but if kids are to eat this one must sprinkle a little dry fruit powder over the sugar kissed cookies.
• 3 tbsp plain curd (sour) or yogurt-I used the usual plain yogurt which wasn’t sour.
• 5 tsp poppy seeds (my addition)-I dipped the dough balls into some poppy seeds for texture before frying them.
• 1 muffin-full bowl of water for syrup.

Total Time=Cooking Time+Preparation Time=150 minutes.

Roll Thy Balls,Fry them Flat avec Kisseth de Sucre

This recipe could be simplified in 3 easy steps(I found it easy to follow them as its difficult to nose around the book while cooking :P)namely: Knead the dough-I mixed semolina,all purpose flour,nutmeg powder,soda,cardamom powder,little oil and yogurt to knead it into a less softer dough.Then,I set it aside for 2 hours (my suggestion-wrap in a tissue napkin,so that it does not get too dry or too moist).I made small dough balls post 2 hours.

 Roll the dough Balls-2 hours later,I rolled the dough balls (pressed them into poppy seeds) into small,thick circles (any shape is fine,circular is traditional one). Heat the Oil/Ghee-I added the thick circles to the hot oil and fried them.I moved them onto a tissue paper to drain extra oil from them.

Slide them into the Syrup-I made the syrup heating water & sugar together.Then I added the crushed saffron sticks for a wonderful orange colour.As the book suggests,one may add food colour to the syrup or to the dough while kneading,but I refrain from usage of artificial colours.I slowly pushed the “puris” or fried cookies into the syrup and allowed them to rest within for a while.

I arranged the cookies on my serving plate…shiny and sweet,round are they,absolutely stunning piece of art!Introduce the gen-next to the traditional yet trendy Indian Sugar kissed Cookies! These cookies could be stored for about a week..

One Halloween tip:To add some crunch to the cookies,try stuffing a walnut in each cookie while rolling them!

Treat for 10 kids (10 cookie recipe) :)

Simply Fruit Salad :)

Reading my blogs, most of the readers might feel that I am “A Mamma's Pet”. Interestingly, I have been very much “A Daddy’s Darling Daughter” always. Being an only daughter, I have been very close to both my parents. However, baba (my father) is definitely “The Numero Uno” friend, philosopher & guide that a daughter could ever dream of. Now,that I am in the US,not missing him is difficult.

Baba has quite a multi-faceted persona. He penned down a beautiful poetry for my wedding that Jyotsna Kaku (my paternal uncle’s wife who is a professional singer) sang & composed most aesthetically. Its a memoire to treasure & pass on to the future generations.

His wit & intelligence, teamed up with modesty as well as optimism makes him unique. There is a lot to learn from him. A workaholic, is extremely enthusiastic at an age when people retire from work. Baba’s efforts of all these years of innovation in the field geo-tech engineering are finally going to be paid off with completion of his PhD this year (at age 67,he is already working on the next one :) and I want to grab this opportunity to congratulate him.

This is a very proud moment for any daughter with a father of amazonic personality. A man of simple tastes, he loves sweets. Fruit Salad is one of his favourite sweets. So, I am making Simple Fruit Salad from my source bible Ruchira to celebrate the honour of being the daughter of such a dashing Doctor!

Voici!

Total Time=Cooking Time +Preparation Time=30 minutes

Ingredients

• 1 Green Apple-deskinned and cut into small pieces (my addition)
• 1 Red Apple-deskinned and cut into small pieces
• 1 orange-peeled,deskinned,pitted
• blueberries (my addition)
• 2-3 plums (alubukhar)-cut into small pieces (my addition)
• 1/2 muffin-full bowl of Chikku pieces (Sapota,this is my addition-frozen ones are available at Indian stores)
• 1 banana-peeled & cut
• Pineapple pieces (I did not have them,so skipped :P)
• Mango cubes (I skipped them too)
• 2 mugs milk-condense it ,heat it (low-medium flame) on gas until it reduces to half the quantity.If you are short of time then you could just use any sweetened condensed milk.However,it would be best to use some portions of condensed milk from the can and some milk (low fat).This thins the salad and can serve more people.
• Walnuts,almonds,cashew nuts,raisins (5-6 e.a).I used roasted dry fruits and crushed them.Its not mandatory to do so.
• Fresh Cream-I used heavy cream instead
• pomegranate (I replaced it with “anardana” powder which is available at most Indian stores)
• Sugar
• few pitted dates (for sweetness and flavour)-chopped finely
• 2 tsp Brown & Polson Vanilla Custard Powder

Whip it In & Dress it Up!

Fruit Salad is made in various ways. The book itself suggests the following ways to prepare it:

• Replacing Milk with thick Curd/plain Yogurt (good option to cut calories in cream etc): This is done by making “Chakka” which we prepared for Shrikhand  and then mixing up all the fruits or Making Shrikhand & then adding the fruits to it.
• Making Custard liquid as instructed on the custard powder pack and pouring it over fruits & milk.
• The Milk & Fruit Mix: This is the simplest fruit salad,wherein we mix the fruits in sweetened condensed milk (sugar added to home-made condensed milk) ,followed by dry fruits etc.

My method

I condensed the low fat milk ,2 tsp of custard powder along with 1/2 muffin-full bowl of heavy cream. One needs to stir this mixture often.While the milk was on the flame condensing, I added sugar to eat. Few may add in “saffron” (3-4 strands) to this condensing milk like my Aai.But,considering the other ingredients that I m adding (my mom does not add them) like custard powder might not blend well with it (vanilla extract or essence may be added).  The final salad gets a wonderful flavour as well as colour. I roasted the dry fruits, powdered them manually & added them to the milk while it was condensing.

After the milk was condensed, I set it aside to cool then shifted it to the refrigerator (One has to let the milk cool down before its goes into the refrigerator to avoid any curdling of milk) and added the cut fruits to it (after @ 5-7 minutes).

(*You may add any fruits to the salad as per liking and availability.I did not have time to rush to Safeway or Lucky,so used the fruits at home)

I poured fruit with condensed milk into the serving bowl and put in the refrigerator. The fruit salad was ready and looked stunning. Garnished it with few dry fruits ,cannot get better! :P

Serve it chilled :) One suggestion,eat it with blueberry or chocolate chip cup cakes or muffins available at Wal-Mart & Costco!

Try this folks and transform your Diwali into a healthy & happy Celebration!!

Cheers!

Encounter With A Baked Flan :)

After a series of authentic recipes from Ruchira, here’s a “fhoreign” (Indian slang for foreign)recipe of a Baked Flan for the weekend !

What is a Flan?

A flan is an open-topped pie, similar to a quiche but, especially in savory versions, lacking the custard style filling. The base is of short crust pastry, distinguishing it from the tart, which more often has a puff pastry base.

The British savory flans may have diverged from the sweeter Spanish flans in the Middle Ages. In Latin America, the sweet flan is popular, and many local versions exist, including the Flan Napolitano of Mexico and the widespread flan de leche ,often eaten with cream.

My Inspiration

Madhulika (a very dear friend of Rohan & me) often puts interesting pictures of her successful cooking adventures on orkut.She has rightly named the exhibition of these pictures as “When Belly Rules The Mind! The pictures are very encouraging for a lazy bloke like moi!

Few days ago,she had put up a picture of a “flip-flopped caramelized baked flan” which my hubby happened to see.I knew what was coming next! The wish to have it was read out by Monsieur de Madame aloud and was granted wholeheartedly!

I decided to make it with a recipe from http://allrecipes.com .Its an amazing site for foodies who love to cook.Loads of interesting international recipes have been put down for learners like us by experts!

Check out the link for direct access to the recipe (http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Baked-Flan/Detail.aspx).

The flan turned out great ! Harshal ,Shraddha & Rohan survived the rockets comfortably [:P].

I hadn’t clicked any pictures while making it (it was some while ago),but have few after the flan was flip-flopped.Enjoy a different recipe :) I din’t make any changes with the original recipe,it was just so perfect !

Enjoy the “Flano a la Weekendo!”