Simple pleasures

I made beetroot cutlets today for snacks for my daughter. My son woke up to see that cutlets were being made. He remarked "wow, amma, you made cutlets today for me ! I want 1,2, 3,...100" Finally he said, "Amma, you are so nice".
That made my day, to see the joy in the 4 year old over simple pleasures is priceless.

Hawkins Pressure Cooker

I recently gifted myself the Hawkins contura 2.0L pressure cooker. Just like a kid eager to open his/her birthday present, I was eager to unpack and put it to use immediately. I was very pleased with my first use - yummy spinach kichdi.

I just love this cooker for its
1. Fast and efficient cooking
2. Easy release of pressure
3. Ease of cleaning
4. Compact and less noise than a traditional pressure cooker
5. Ease of transporting. I plan to take it with me on my next major outing.

I would highly recommend this product.

Quinoa Sweet Pongal

Quinoa lends itself easily to any dish where traditionally rice has been used. So it was no real surprise that the chakra pongal aka sweet pongal came out well when rice was replaced with Quinoa. The outcome is a satisfying protein rich quinoa sweet pongal.

Recipe

1. 1 Cup Quinoa
2. 1/2 Cup Moong Dal (Small yellow split lentil)
3. 3-4 pods of cardomom
5. Jaggery 1 Cup
6. Cocount grated 3 tbsp (optional)
7. Evaporated milk/Milk - 1 cup
8. Ghee/Butter - 2 tbsp

1. Slightly shallow fry the quinoa and moong dal in 1/2 tbsp of ghee until the raw smell of the lentil goes away
2. Pressure cook the quinoa, lentils, with 1 cup of milk and 2 cups water. You could increase the amount of milk and reduce the water.
3. In a vessel, put enough water to actually cover the jaggery. Let the jaggery melt and mix up with the water. Let this jaggery water solution thicken.
4. Add the powdered cardomom seeds
5. Add the grated coconut
6. Remove the pressure cooked rice and add it to the jaggery syrup.
7. Let it mix up well. Add the remaining 1-1/2 tbsp of ghee. Mix well and remove from fire after 5-10 minutes in medium heat

Conscious Eating

This summer, my daughter, Sanjna has been going to a summer camp, which has swimming among other activities. I wanted to give her a break from her usual montessori school. She has been pretty happy trying to learn soccer. She gave me a few lessons too on that. One day casually on one of our car trips, she mentioned, she doesn't like this school. Reason being, they give too much junk food.
Wow, that was the sweetest thing I have ever heard.

Kale with Garbanzo beans

Curly Kale is so beautiful to look at. I, like most others have often shied away from this vegetable in the supermarket. However after incorporating the kale in soup and in this dish, and given the fact that this is packed with nutrition, we have grown to like this vegetable. Kale is much denser than spinach and is perfect to make this medley with garbanzo beans. Plus garbanzo beans is so forgiving that it requires enormous talent to screw up a dish with it.

Ingredients

Kale - 1 bunch
Garbanzo beans - 1 cup boiled
Red chillies - 2
Salt - to taste
Cumin seeds - 1 tsp
Mustard seeds - 1 tsp
Chana dal - 2 tsp
Turmeric powder - 1 tsp

Recipe

0. Soak garbanzo beans for 6-7 hours.
1. Put a 2 tsp of sunflower oil/olive oil.
2. Once the oil is warmed up, add some cumin seeds, mustard seeds and let it crackle.
3. Add the chana dal, red chillies, turmeric.
4. Chop the kale finely, rinse and add to the oil, cumin seed tadka.
5. Let it cook for 5-10 minutes.
6. Pressure cook garbanzo beans.
7. Strain the water, add the garbanzo beans to the cooked kale.
8. Add salt to taste.

Serve hot with rice or chapathis.