All posts by Dr. Beena Rani Goel

All Posts, Breakfast

Coconut pancake

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Wandering along the Bogmalo beach, we entered a shack to have something before returning to the guest house to sleep. ‘Coconut pancake’ caught my attention and I ordered one for me. To my pleasant surprise I found my favorite childhood dish ‘muttayappam’ (my mother used to make it quite often) placed in coconut milk in a shallow dish and I enjoyed it to the last bit!

Makes 4 pancakes
Time taken: 20 min

Ingredients

1  cup refined flour for
A pinch of salt
2 teaspoons sugar
1 egg
¾ cup water to make a free flowing batter
2 tbsps ghee or oil
1 cup coconut milk

For filling:
1 cup grated coconut
1/3 cup sugar
½ tsp cardamom powder

Instructions

Take the refined flower in a container, add salt and sugar and break the egg into the center. Beat the egg and gradually blend it into the flour.

Add the water slowly and keep stirring, to make a batter of flowing consistency.

Heat a shallow kadai on medium flame, smear ghee or oil on the surface.

Pour a large ladle of the batter. Hold the kadai with both hands, take it away from fire, rotate it to spread the batter into a round. Keep it back over the flame.

When it is cooked, spread the grated coconut, sugar, cardamom mixture in a straight line close to one side and roll the pancake over.

Take it out and keep on a plate.

At the time of serving, pour some coconut milk in a shallow dish, and place the pancake over it.

All Posts, Sides

Roasted Cauliflower

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Ingredients

1 medium size cauliflower
2 tbsp yogurt
1 tsp ginger garlic paste
2 tbsp oil
Salt

To be ground together for green chutney
2 cups chopped coriander or cilantro
½ onion, chopped
½ tomato, chopped
2 cloves garlic
¼ tsp cumin seeds
¼ tsp dried mango powder (amchur)
1 tsp lemon juice

Instructions

  • To make the green chutney, grind together coriander leaves, tomato, onion, garlic, salt, sugar, cumin seeds, dried mango powder and lemon juice
  • Keep the cauliflower immersed in salt water for an hour. Take it out, wash under running water and steam it for ten minutes. Set aside to cool.
Steamed cauliflower
Steamed cauliflower
  • Mix together green chutney, yogurt, salt, and ginger garlic paste; apply this over the cauliflower and try to push it in between the florets. Let it sit for an hour or two to marinate.

two

Marinated cauliflower
Marinated cauliflower
  • Preheat the oven to 180 degrees. Keep the cauliflower in a dish smeared with oil, and pour some oil over the cauliflower. If you don’t want the cauliflower to dry out much, keep a small dish of water next to it, or you could cover it in foil.
  • Bake for 25 minutes.( You could also bake for 20 minutes and then grill for ten minutes too)

 

All Posts, Mains

Pudina (Mint) Rice

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When we were returning from a friend’s house at Koppal, his wife packed lunch for us as a surprise. When we had it on the way, I was blown off by its flavor and taste. On reaching home, I asked her for its recipe and she obliged.

Mint is one of the oldest and most popular herbs that is grown around the world. It can bring that extra zing and unique flavor to almost any thing you cook. Pudina is packed with antioxidants and phytonurients that can work wonders for your stomach. It relieves  acidity and flatulence. The strong antioxidants present in mint leaves leaves the skin with a natural glow and rehydrate dull and dry skin.

Ingredients:

1 cup Rice

Salt

2 ½ cups of water for sona masuri rice (1 cup water if you use Basmati rice)

To grind:

1 cup, lightly packed mint leaves

A small bunch of coriander leaves

½ inch piece of ginger

6,7 garlic flakes

1 green chilli

½ cup grated coconut

To season:

2 tbsps oil

½ tsp cumin seeds

1 bay leaf

3 cloves

1 mace

3 cardamoms

1 small piece cinnamon

To garnish:

1 tbsp cashew nuts roasted in 1 tsp ghee

Method:

  • Soak the rice for 15 minutes.
  • Heat oil in a pressure cooker; add cumin seeds, bay leaf, clove, mace, cardamom, cinnamon, saute for a while.
  • Add the ground masala and roast lightly.
  • Pour water, salt and bring to boil.
  • Add the soaked rice and cook on medium flame for two minutes.
  • Close the cooker and pressure cook for five minutes.
  • Serve hot with cucumber raita.

Pudina rice

All Posts, Mains

Pumpkin Rice

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Rice is a fundamental food in many cultural cuisines around the world. It has ability to provide fast and instant energy, regulate and improve bowel movements, and stabilize blood sugar levels, while also providing an essential source of vitamin B1 to the human body. Do you know that rice slows down the aging process? When I learned Vedic meditation from Tim Mitchell (http://www.vedicmeditation.eu/en/ayurveda/), he told me that after the age of fifty, one should eat rice and not wheat.

We love rice and I am always on the look out to create new preparations with rice. Here is a nice dish that combines pumpkin with rice.

Ingredients:

1 cup rice
200 gms pumpkin
Salt
2 tbsps Oil
1 Bay leaf
½ tsp grated ginger
1 green chilli cut fine
A few curry leaves
¼ tsp Cumin seeds
¼ cup roasted and ground pea nuts
1 tsp sugar
2 tbsps water

Method:

• Cook the rice and keep aside.
• Clean and cube the pumpkin, smear with oil, add salt, roast in the pre heated oven at 250 degrees for ½ hour to 45 minutes. Keep a small bowl of water in the center of the pumpkin pieces so that they won’t dry out.
• Cut the roasted pumpkin into small pieces.

pumpkin
• Heat oil in a thick bottomed vessel; add cumin seeds, when they splutter, add the bay leaf, grated ginger, cut green chilli, and curry leaves. Stir for ten seconds.
• Add the pumpkin pieces, sugar and mix well.
• Add the cooked rice, salt, roasted and ground peanuts, and 2 table spoons of water.

ground nut
• Mix well and remove from the fire after about 4 minutes. Serve hot.

Pumpkin rice

 

All Posts, Sides

Capsicum, Drumstick Flower Masala

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Ingredients

6 big green bell peppers (capsicum) de-seeded and cut into cubes
1 onion, cut into large pieces and separate the layers
¾ cup drumstick flowers, stem removed and washed
1 potato, peeled and cubed
2 cups water
2 tbsp oil
½ tsp cumin seeds (jeera)
1 bay leaf (tej patta)
2 pods cardamom (elaichi)
salt to taste

For the masala:

2 tsp poppy seeds
1 tbsp white sesame seeds
6-7 cashew nuts
2 tbsp peanuts
2 tbsp grated coconut
1 onion, chopped
1 green chili, chopped
1 tomato, chopped
2 tbsp ginger garlic paste
½ tsp turmeric powder
⅓ tsp red chili powder
1½ tsp coriander powder
½ tsp garam masala powder

Method:

Dry roast the pea nuts for about 8 minutes, add cashew nuts, poppy seeds and sesame seeds till they lightly brown, add grated coconut and stir for another 3 minutes. Remove and put on a plate to cool

Add 1 tbsp oil to the same pan, fry the finely cut onion and green chilli. When the onion browns, add the ginger garlic paste and fry for a few seconds.

Add the tomato pieces, stir and cook till it is cooked. Add all the masala powders (ingredients # 10 to 13), and cook till it starts leaving the sides.

Remove from the flame and let it cool completely

Grind the dry roasted ingredients and the onion tomato mixture with a little water to a smooth paste

Heat the pan again with 1 tbsp oil, add jeera, bay leaf and cardamoms.

When the cumins splutter, add the cubed capsicums, potato and drumstick flowers and fry till the capsicum pieces soften.

Add salt and 1 cup water. Cover and cook on low flame for about 8 minutes, till the potato pieces are almost done.

Now add the ground masala, stir well and add the remaining 1 cup water slowly, to adjust the consistency.

Simmer for about five minutes and remove from the flame.

It is a great accompaniment for chapatis, and goes well with steamed rice too.