Gourmet Upma

Other day I was meeting some old friends over brunch.  It was a pot luck so I decided to make Upma as my share of dishes to the bruch spread.  Upma is a common South Indian breakfast dish cooked as a thick porridge from dry roasted semolina.   There are many ways of preparing Upma.  In fact every cook usually incorporates variations to Upma flavor by adding certain spices and condiments.

Upma can be made in a very simple and basic way by not adding any condiments.  In fact the basic one would be just semolina, water, salt and mustard seeds.  I have added some other spices and condiments and turned the Upma into a gourmet one.  My friends liked it so much that they took second and third helpings.  Here is me recipe:

Ingredients:

1 cup Semolina(sooji), 2 cups of boiling water, 1 medium onion chopped finely, 1/2 cup chopped red pepper(bell pepper),  1 medium potato boiled and cut into small cubes, 1/2 tsp cumin seeds, 1/2 tsp mustard seeds, 12 - 15 curry leaves, 3 tsp cooking oil, 1 tsp ghee, 1/4 cup roasted peanuts, 1/4 cup cashews, 1/2 tsp coriander powder, salt to taste

Method:

Dry roast semolina.  You may roast semolina a day before and put in a airtight container.  

Heat the cooking oil, add cumin seeds and after 10 seconds add mustard seeds.  When they stop spluttering, add onion.  When onion turn light brown, add red pepper and potato cubes.  Sauté this mix for  two minutes.  Add curry leaves, peanuts, cashews and coriander powder.  Now add roasted semolina to this. 

Mix it well and add salt.  Add two cups of boiling water to this mix and stir continuously till the mixture thickens.

At the end, sprinkle melted ghee and stir it once.

Enjoy hot with pickle, chutney or just a cup of tea or coffee.

Rasgulla the King of Indian Sweets

Rasgulla is a syrupy sweet of Bengal and Orissa. It is mainly prepared by kneading chenna(the cottage cheese of India). These are rolled into small balls, and then boiled in light syrup made of sugar. This is done until the sugar enters the balls. Rasgulla or Rasagolla(as called in Bengal) has a very interesting history.

Rasgullas were invented in the holy city of Puri(Orissa)back in the 13th century. The Hindu female deity Lakshmi(Goddess of wealth) is served rasagollas on the last day of the annual Rath Yatra festival at Puri. Since this is almost 700 year old tradition the existence of this white spongy sweet is that old too.

The recipe or rasgulla then spread from Orissa to West Bengal. All this happened during the Renaissance when the Brahmin cooks from Orissa were employed by the Bengali families. It was from here that the various Orissa delicacies got incorporated into the Bengali kitchen.

Nobin Das, who was a confectioner in Kolkata is considered as the father of rasgulla. He is famously known as "Rasagolla's Columbus". He modified the original recipe of this sweet to give it longer shelf life. It was K.C. Das, son of Nobin Das who started the canned Rasgulla concept and that is how Rasgulla reached other parts of India. With the time, it gained popularity around the wold.

I consider Rasgulla as the king of all Indian sweets. If you eat one Rasgulla it is very hard to resist not to take second or third helping.

I decided to make the Rasgulla at home.  Here is my simple recipe:

Ingredients:

5 cups of milk, 3 tbsp of lemon juice, 1 cup of sugar, 4 cups of water, 1/2 tsp of rose or kewra essence

Method:

Take milk in a heavy pan and boil on the medium flame. When milk starts to boil, reduce the flame and add lemon juice gradually. Stir it gently till milk starts to curdle. Turn off the flame and let it cool off for a while. Take cheese cloth, place it on a colander and let curdled milk pass through the cheese cloth. Whey will drain away and thick creamy chenna will be left in the cheese cloth. Run this chenna or paneer under the cold water so that no residues of lemon are left in this. Now collect the opposite links of the cheese cloth tie then on the water tap of the kitchen sink.

Let all the water drain away. It takes almost an hour to two hours. After two hours or so, you may squeeze the chenna bundle gently between your palms so that no excess water is left. Transfer the chenna into a pan and knead it for 25 minutes. Put a drop of oil on your hands and make small round balls. When all the balls are made, place these on a plate.

In the meanwhile, make a sugar syrup by adding one cup of sugar to four cups of water in an uncovered pressure cooker. Give it a boil till all the sugar is dissolved. Now put six or seven of the white chenna balls in the pressure cooker(depends on the size of your cooker) and close the lid of the cooker. These chenna balls will expand in the sugar syrup. When steam starts to build, reduce the flame to low and put the timer for exact 7 minutes. Turn off the stove and immediately put the pressure cooker under the cold water tap in the kitchen sink. This will help opening the lid.

Take out the rasgullas in a big bowl with some syrup. Let them cool off.  Add rose or kewra essence to the bowl.  Then put this bowl in the refrigerator.

Your mouth watering Bengali rasgullas are ready. Enjoy with friends and family.

Note:

It will be a good idea to make chenna a night before so that by next morning all the whey will drain away.  If little water is left in the chenna, your rasgullas will turn flat or even break.

Pongal : the comfort food

One of those days when your stomach is acting out and you want to have some food which gives you that soothing feeling, it is Pongal. Pongal in South India and khichdi in North India are the comfort foods. They are pretty much made with same ingredients. Only difference is the way they are cooked.

We happen to go to Balaji temple of Greater Chicago in Aurora to attend a Annprashan(when a six month old kid eats solid food). This temple cafeteria has the best food. We ordered yogurt rice, tamarind rice,dosa, idli, vada and Pongal . Pongal was delicious beyond words. So much so, my niece even joked that she was thinking of coming to this cafeteria on a date with her husband just to enjoy freshly made Pongal.

I decided to make this comfort food. The end result was pretty good. So here is the recipe I am too glad to share with you all.

Ingredients:

1/2 cup rice(washed twice), 1/4 cup mung dal(green gram yellow or split)washed, salt to taste, 5 or 6 cashews(split into halves and pan fried), 1/2 tsp of asafetida(hing powder), 1 tsp ginger grated, 1 tsp cumin, 1 tsp mustard seeds, 1 tsp pepper corn, 1 tbsp cooking oil, 1 tsp ghee, 7 or 8 curry leaves

Method:

Heat oil in a deep pan.  Fry clean mung dal and rice for one minute. Add salt and 1/2 tsp of cumin seeds.  Add three cups of water.  Either pressure cook it for three or four whistles or cook in a pan till rice is mushy.

Heat ghee,  add hing powder, grated ginger, sauté for two seconds.  Add other half of cumin, mustard seeds, peppercorn and curry leaves. Add fried cashews and mix well. Decorate with a couple of cashews.

Enjoy with yogurt or pickle.