All posts by Healthy Cooking with Mitha

"Healthy food can be oh so delicious too!" Yes this site is all about that. Join me in my journey of healthy eating accompanied by my foodie of a husband and an equally foodie toddler.

Chutneys, Konkani Recipes

Gooseberry chutney/ Avale Gojju

November 11, 2019 Healthy Cooking with Mitha 1 Comment

Being a rich source of Vitamin C and also really good for digestion, for the hair and eyes along with numerous other health benefits, Gooseberries are a must include food in the diet. Ever since I got this recipe of chutney, I have been making it regularly as an accompaniment to our dosas.

Do you know that Vitamin C is essential for absorption of Iron in the body? Ever since we have come to know this, we try to include it in our diet daily and have seen improvement in our health. The simplest form being lemon juice or fresh oranges.

Gooseberries are available in dried candies or pickles and I love both of them. But when I get fresh ones, this chutney is the best bet as it is easy to make and is super delicious.

Here’s sharing the recipe. Happy and healthy cooking!

RECIPE:

Adapted from: The Konkani Saraswat Cookbook by Asha Satish Philar

Ingredients:

6 to 8 Gooseberries/Amla / Avalo (in Konkani)

1/2 Cup Coconut (freshly grated/desiccated)

3 Green chillies

1/4 tsp Hing powder/ Asafoetida

Salt to taste

Step by Step recipe:

1. Wash the gooseberries well and boil in little water for two minutes till the colour changes.

2. Drain water and keep aside to cool.

3. Deseed and cut into pieces.

4. Grind these pieces along with coconut, green chillies, hing and salt with little water as required to a smooth paste.

5. Remove into a bowl and serve with dosa, idli or rice.

Notes:

* This chutney lasts well for two days if refrigerated and handled well even though it’s best consumed when freshly prepared.

* You can even decrease the number of gooseberries that goes in the chutney depending on the availability.

Dosa corner, Konkani Recipes

Instant Cucumber Dosa / Thoushe Bhakri

November 7, 2019 Healthy Cooking with Mitha 6 Comments

Since most of my readers love my dosa recipes, here is one more of my favourite. This dosa too is a Konkani speciality but I have changed it according to my family’s taste.

Click on the image to save the recipe on Pinterest

Cucumber dosa uses very few basic ingredients and takes very less time to make but is filling and tastes delicious. Both my kids enjoy it with butter and when kids love anything healthy, it is bound to be a winner.

Here’s sharing the recipe. Hope you all will love it. Happy and healthy cooking!

RECIPE:

Ingredients: (Makes around 6 dosas)

1 1/2 Cups grated Cucumbers (read Notes below for more details)

3 Green chillies

1 inch Ginger (grated)

2 Cups Wheat Semolina/ Rava/ Sooji

1/2 Cup Wheat flour

1/2 Cup freshly grated Coconut

1 Tbsp Jaggery powder

Salt to taste

Buttermilk or curd or water to dilute the batter

Ghee or oil to cook the dosa

Step by step recipe:

1. Grate cucumbers in a large mixing bowl. Add grated ginger and green chillies.

2. Add semolina, wheat flour, coconut, jaggery and salt.

3. Dilute the batter using buttermilk or you could add around 1/4 cup Curd with water or you could use only water to make the batter. Do not add a lot of water. The batter needs to be thick.

4. Heat a dosa pan and add a ladle full of batter into the pan. Spread it using the ladle into a thick dosa.

5. Cover and cook till top portion cooks. Add ghee or oil as desired.

6. Flip and cook for few seconds. Remove and serve hot with butter or ghee.

Notes:

* I have used English cucumbers which do not have big seeds and needs no peeling. But if you are using Indian cucumbers, they do need peeling and removal of seeds. Grate after that.

* Wheat flour and coconut are optional and won’t make much of a difference if not used.

* I dilute the batter with buttermilk or curd just because I like the tangy flavour in my dosa but you could use just water if you don’t like sour flavour.

* You could make the batter at night and refrigerate till use in the morning. I do that most of the time. It lasts well for two days if refrigerated.

* This dosa is traditionally made as a thick bhakri while spreading on a banana leaf and transferring on the dosa pan. I have been making them as dosas since many years now because they are easier and less time consuming. Also, they come out softer in texture which my family loves.

Do let me know if you have any doubts on my facebook page and I would be happy to help.

Dosa corner, Konkani Recipes

Surnali / Sweet and spongy Dosa

November 4, 2019 Healthy Cooking with Mitha 3 Comments

Surnalis are sweet, spongy dosas made on Tulsi Pooja day in our GSB community. But since my family loves this dosa, I make it regularly.

My daughter is specially a fan of this dosa and she loves sitting beside me while I make these delicious, aromatic dosas. I don’t blame her as I too used to wait for my mother to make these dosas for our breakfast. These dosas don’t need any accompaniment and can be had as it is.

We, the GSB’s (Gowda Saraswat Brahmin) are famous for our variety of dosas and this is one of the most famous and loved one. You can call this the king of dosas made by konkanis. There are many other yummy dosas which I will be sharing one by one. My family loves dosas and over the years, it has made me a variety dosa specialist. Maybe some day I will open my own dosa corner, haha.

Anyhow, here is the recipe for delicious Surnalis. This was how my mom made them with the exception of adding curd. I add it to get the dosa more spongier. Hope you and your family enjoy them as much as we do. Happy Tulsi Pooja.

RECIPE:

Ingredients:

2 Cups Raw Rice (Any variety of white rice)

1 Cup grated coconut ( fresh/ desiccated)

1 Cup Beaten rice/ Poha

1/2 Cup Curd

3/4 Cup Jaggery

1 tsp Turmeric powder

1 tsp Fenugreek seeds/ Methi

Salt to taste

Ghee to cook the dosa

Recipe:

1. Wash well and soak the raw rice with fenugreek seeds for 2 to 4 hours.

2. Wash beaten rice/ Poha well in water. Keep aside.

3. Melt jaggery in very little water (about 1/4 Cup). Keep aside to cool.

4. Now grind soaked rice – Fenugreek seeds along with Poha, jaggery, coconut, curd, turmeric and salt to a smooth paste. Add buttermilk instead of water while grinding for spongier surnalis. Don’t add too much water while grinding. It should be a thick batter.

5. Mix well with hands to start fermentation. Keep aside covered for 8 hours or overnight in a warm place of your house. In winters, it takes up to 12 hours for the batter to ferment well.

6. Take a ladle full of the batter and pour a thick dosa. Do not spread like regular dosas. Add ghee on top.

7. Cover and cook on low flame till the dosa cooks. (This dosa requires low flame to cook. Else it will turn black due to jaggery in it.)

8. Remove and serve hot with butter.

Notes:

* Any variety of white rice ranging from Sona masoori to short grain white rice (used for eating) works well to make this dosa.

* You could substitute curd with buttermilk.

* Ensure the batter is a slightly thick ( not very thick) smooth paste and not watery to get perfect surnalis.

* The amount of jaggery is to taste. You could increase or decrease as per your taste.

* Cook the Surnalis on medium to low flame. Else it will turn black underneath if cooked on high flame due to jaggery and poha in the batter.

* Surnalis come out the best when the batter is freshly fermented. Once refrigerated, the dosas does not come as spongy. Still they come out like regular dosas.

* Although it tastes amazing with butter, I make Sambarpalli leaves chutney with it and it tastes super delicious. Here is the recipe for the Sambarpalli leaves chutney .

* You can also check this recipe of Mangalore cucumber or Magge Surnalis .

Curry house

Vegetable Chilly

November 3, 2019 Healthy Cooking with Mitha Leave a comment

I don’t know about other places but in Kerala, you get something called “Gobi chilly” which is a slight dry variety to Gobi Manchurian. My dad used to get one plate of both to go with fried rice and it was a heaven made combination for a weekend dinner.

Fast forward to restaurants here in Qatar and the Gobi chilly changed to “Paneer chilly” with a paneer loving husband. I used to love the gravy they made with large cubes of onion and capsicum with a humble ketchup based sauce.

After I started trying the sauce at home, I added more veggies to it ( because that’s how I sneak veggies into everything) and hence came “Vegetable Chilly”. Now it’s become the favourite in the family and my 5 year old also loves it.

And it is so easy to make that it gets ready within few minutes. Also it is super filling that I sometimes eat it without any rice.

This time, I used the precut vegetable mix from Emborg called Garden mix which contains Broccoli, orange and red carrots with beans. It added a whole lot of flavors to the curry. Do get it if you can.

RECIPE:

Ingredients:

1 tbsp Oil

5 pods of Garlic, chopped

1 inch Ginger piece, finely chopped

3 Green chillies

1 large Onion, cubed

1/2 a large Capsicum, cubed

5 to 7 Babycorn, cut into small strips

1 Cup mixed vegetables ( I used the Emborg bag of precut carrots, broccoli and beans)

2 tbsp Tomato ketchup

1 tbsp Chilli sauce

1 tsp Pepper powder

Salt to taste

Recipe:

1. Heat oil in a pan and add ginger, garlic and green chillies. Saute for few seconds.

2. Add onions and capsicum. Saute on high flame for a minute.

3. Add all the veggies. Mix well adding salt and pepper powder. Saute on high flame continually.

4. Cover and cook till the veggies get cooked. I keep a little crunch and do not fully cook them. Sprinkle little water if needed while cooking.

5. Now add both ketchup and chilli sauce and mix well. Remove from flame.

Note:

* You could also add paneer if needed.

* Sauces can be added as per your choice. Add red chilli powder too if you prefer it spicy.

* I did not take step by step pictures as I had no intention of posting this on the blog. But had to post due to many recipe requests. Will add the pictures when I make it next time.

Uncategorized

Makhanas can replace chips

September 30, 2019 Healthy Cooking with Mitha Leave a comment

There was a time when my 4 year old got kind of addicted to chips. Since she started solids at 6 months, I had always made sure to offer her healthy options. No processed junk like biscuits or chips. But as we moved along, somewhere along the line, I lost my determination and she fell in love with chips.

Now what do I do? How do I bring her out of this unhealthy love? As I read about various healthy options, Makhanas or lotus seeds came into my eyes.

Makhanas also called as Fox nuts (yes, fancy name too!) are super healthy and as crunchy as chips. I am lucky that it’s easily available in our local supermarket and hence it was easy to make the switch. It tastes bland in its original form but when fried in ghee, it turns out oh so yummy!

My little girl now crunches and munches on Makhanas and they have become her favourite snacks. Be it after school hunger pangs or post dinner snack, Makhanas are her best friend now. I also take them along during flight journeys so that she can munch on to curb boredom.

My one year old also loves Makhanas and they serve as excellent finger food too. Just fry and quarter them to offer to babies.

My one year old snacking on Makhanas. Have halved them before offering.

Health benefits of Makhanas/ Fox nuts: Low in cholesterol and fat, low glycemic index, high in magnesium, gluten free, rich in protein, beneficial to kidneys.

How to prepare fried Makhanas?

You will need:

* 1 Cup Makhanas/ Fox nuts

* 1 Tbsp Ghee/ Butter/ Oil

* A pinch of salt (optional)

How to prepare:

1. Heat a frying pan and add ghee to it.