Simple and soothing rose milkshake :)

Ingredients:
Milk - 1 cup
Rose Syrup - 1tbsp
Sugar - 2 tbsp

Preparation:
Blend all the ingredients.
Top it with a scoop of any ice cream
I just want to give a try, how the Mac will turn out without its partner Cheese ;) but to give some company, I have added loads of veggies and a home made pasta sauce. Finally, it's yummo and guilt free to feed my hunger.

Ingredients:
Mac - 1 cup

For Sauce:
Onion - 1
Tomatoes - 4
Crushed Cumin - 1tsp
Crushed Pepper - 1 tsp
Mixed vegetables - 2 cup
Garlic - 4
Thyme - 1 tsp
Basil - 1 tsp
Olive Oil - 3 tbsp
Salt

Preparation:
Boil the water, add pinch of salt and allow mac to cook for 10 mins. Drain the water and keep aside.
Heat olive oil in a deep pan, add the garlic, onion, cumin, pepper fry till the onions turns golden brown.
Add the chopped tomatoes and salt, fry for few mins.
Add the vegetables, mix well with all ingredients and allow to cook till the raw smell subside.
Mix the thyme and basil.
Pour the hot sauce in to Mac and give a gentle stir.
Mac and Veggie is ready.
One of my favorite breakfast since childhood is French toast, that too baked one is really rich and delicious. I used the whole grain bread instead white. I usually marinate the breads overnight and bake them next morning at 350F. Seems little bit of work but it worth the wait next morning.

Ingredients:
Bread - as many as you can fit in your tray ;)
I used 6 slices.
Milk - 1 cup
Eggs - 3
Salt - Pinch
Butter - 2 tbsp
Cream Cheese - 2 tbsp
Sugar - 1/2 cup
Cinnamon and Nutmeg - 1/ tsp optional.
Pecans roasted - 2 tbsp

Preparation:
Chop off the corners if you want, Since I love them I kept it.
Mix all the ingredients except pecans and keep aside.
Arrange the breads in two layers, pour the milk-egg mixture evenly on top of it and in between the layers.
Cover it and refrigerate overnight.
Spread the toasted Pecans over the top.
Bake them next morning at 375F for 35mins.
Keep water in other tray inside the oven just to avoid the above layer from turning brown.
Serve with Maple syrup.
Another Indian Breakfast made less than 15 mins, it really nutritious and tasty dish called Poha served as breakfast or brunch. This is made with flattened rice, to get the extra spice it is served with mint chutney as a side. My taste is little weird when comes to poha, I like it with chilled rose milk ;)

Ingredients:
Flattened rice - 1 cup
Onion chopped - 1/2 cup
Cumin seeds - 1tsp
Channa dal - 1tbsp
Mustard seeds - 1tsp
Peanuts - 2 tbsp
Ginger garlic Paste - 1tsp
Green Chillies - 2
Turmeric Powder - 1/2 tsp
Salt
Lemon Juice - 1 tsp

Preparation:
Add water in flatted rice for exactly 1 min and drain them completely, keep aside.
Heat oil in a pan, add cumin, mustard, green chillies, channa dal, peanuts, ginger garlic paste.
Add the onions, fry till golden brown.
Mix turmeric powder, salt and Lemon juice.
Add salt.
Mix the flattened rice and gently mix well to blend all ingredients.
Garnish with chopped coriander.
Most of the Indians favorite breakfast or dinner could be Poori, Specially for kids! Me and my DH are not the exceptions. We love Poori with potato masala for breakfast, as it calls for deep frying and considering potato has loads of carb, we usually avoid @ dinners.

Ingredients:

For Poori:
Whole Wheat flour - 2 cups
Semolina - 1 tbsp
Water - 1/2 cup
Salt - 1/4 tsp
Oil for deep frying

Potato Masala:
Potato chopped - 2 cups
Onion Chopped - 2 cups
Cumin - 1tsp
Garlic - 3 pods
Mustard - 1tsp
Green chillies - 3
Channa dal - 2tbsp
Urad dal - 1tsp
Turmeric - 1tsp
Salt
Oil - 2tbsp


Preparation:
Knead the flour, semolina using water to pastry dough consistency. Using semolina will help the poori to puff while frying.
Divide them to equal parts.
Roll out to thick layers using oil, Do not use flour to remove stickiness.

Heat oil in a pan, deep fry the poori on both side (takes 30 secs)

Serve with Potato masala.
Preparation for Potato Masala:
Heat oil, add cumin, chillies, mustard, Channa dal, urad dal, garlic and onions.
Fry the onions till slight brown.
Add the potato's with 1 cup water, allow to cook well. Mash the 50% of the cooked potato.
Add salt and cilantro.
I am really not a big fan of messing with puff pastry dough, so I hardly made any recipe with puff pastry. The French Palmiers are super easy to make and taste no-less than délicieux. I adapted this recipe from Ina garten's recipe book. The palmiers are loaded with just sugar, each layer is pressed with a thick layer of sugar and baked perfectly to golden brown. You can get creative with the filling by adding (cinnamon, nutmeg,nuts, jam, cheese), but I kept it simple and traditional. Sugar on every layer gives a nice caramalization, it is crispy, glittery and slighty hard outside due to the sugar coating and very chewy and moist in the center. Oh! and this is my very first puff pastry recipe, certainly turned out to be a winner ;)

Ingredients:
Pepperidge Puff Pastry - 1 sheet (makes 16 Palmiers)
Salt - 1/8th tsp
Sugar - 1.5 cup


1. Spread the defrosted pastry sheet, spread thick layer of sugar evenly on top of it, press it gently with a roller.
2. Bring both the ends to the center, spread the sugar on top of it, give it a gentle press with roller.
3. Make one more fold on both the ends to meet the center of the pastry sheet, spread the sugar on top and press it with roller.
4. Now form a single layer by folding the two ends...

...spread sugar and give a gentle press.
5. slice them equally.
6. Arrange it in a baking pan with a foil paper on or with parchment. Brush the top layer with egg(optional).


7. Pre heat the oven to 400F and bake them for 12 mins and flip over to other side and bake for 5-6 mins.

8. Palmiers are so ready to indulge. Enjoy as a breakfast with hot coffee.

Soups are always so soothing .. specially I love them @ dinners, this French lentil soup is very healthy, almost fat free, and simple to make.
Ingredients:
French Lentil - 2 cups
Celery - 1/2 cup
Chopped carrot - 1 cup
Onion - 1
Tomato -2
Paprika - 1tsp
Cumin - 1tsp
Pepper - 1tsp
Ginger paste - 1tbsp
Garlic chopped - 3tbsp
Thyme - 1tsp
Basil - 1tsp
Oil - 1tbsp
Salt.
Preparation:
Wash and cook the lentils in a big pan with 4cups of water and keep aside.
Add oil in a pan, fry, onion, celery, carrots, with cumin, paprika, pepper, ginger garlic paste and tomato. Mix this in to the cooked lentil and heat for 3 mins.
Add the thyme and bail leaves and salt. If needed add some more water as desired.
let it cook for 2 mins.
Serve with whole grain bread.

This is the most loved road side(fast food) snack for all Indians specially for the people from Mumbai.
It has a very flavored and spiced potato filling with Gram flour coating, deep fried in oil..
these are utterly delicious indian style potato burgers and very hard to miss.
This is traditionally served with burger type buns with indian chutney.

Ingredients:
Filling:
Cooked -Mashed Potato - 2 cups
Green chillies finely chopped - 3 tbsp
Ginger garlic paste - 1 tbsp
Cumin seeds- 1tsp
Fennel seeds - 1tsp
Mustard seeds - 1tsp
Onion finely chopped - 1/2 cup
Turmeric powder - 1tsp
Salt.
Oil

For Coating:
Gram Flour/Chickpea flour - 2 cups
Water.
Salt

Preparation:
Heat the pan and add the mustard, cumin, fennel, green chillies,ginger garlic, onion, turmeric and salt. Fry till the raw smell subsides.
Mit with the mashed potato.
Make equal size small balls out of it and keep aside.
Take the gram flour or chickpea flour, add water with a pinch of salt.

It should be of slightly thin consistency, make sure it not too thin that it cannot cover the filling or not too thick that it forms a heavy layer.

Drop the filling ball and gently form a coating of flour using a spoon.
Filling should be gently covered with the gram flour.
Heat the oil in deep frying pan, drop the coated filling slowly in oil

Fry till it turns golden brown.
Enjoy with burger bun and some spicy spread(Chutney) of your choice.
You can name this as Nepalese Mo-Mo's or Chinese Dumplings, either ways its gonna taste divine.
Pros are: low in fat, very filling and great appetizer.
Cons: patience is required in preparing the shape of Dumplings(sort of a girly purse)

Ingredients:

To make Dumplings:
All purpose flour - 1 cup (makes up to 15-20)
Oil- 1tsp
Salt - pinch
Water- 1/2 cup

For Filling:
Onion - 1/2 cup
Mixed vegetables - 1/2 cup
Scrambled tofu - 3tbsp
Cumin powder - 1tbsp
Paprika- 1tsp
Garam masala - 1tsp
Salt - 1tsp
Pepper powder- 1tbsp
Oil- 2 tbsp

Preparation:
Mix well the flour, salt and warm water to dough consistency, keep it covered for 1/2 hour.


Fry all the Filling ingredients in oil without adding water, mash the 50% of the vegetable and keep aside.


Divide the dough in to small portions and Roll out to flat sheet. use very less flour if it sticks.


Place a spoon full of filling in the center, leaving enough space over the corners to cover neatly.


Gently run the pastry brush with water over the corners.





Bring all the Corners together and form a garlic shape ( looks like a purse)








Fill a medium size pot with few inches of water and bring to boil, grease a metal steamer rack and place all the dumplings in single layer, without touching each other. place this metal steamer on the pot and cover it, let it cook for 10-15 mins. Serve Hot with ketchup


Huh! Here comes Mr.Romeo, since he LOVES to roam around a lot we started calling him Romy. He is now 2 yrs old and lives with my parents in India. After Me and My brother moved to US, my parents brought him home when he was couple of weeks old just to beat their lonelyness. I bet its a best thing they did, it keeps them occupied so much.

Ever since my last vacation to india I been missing Romy a lot.. He is such a submissive guy and he obeys anything you say..His parents Mr.Simba, Ms.Nala and Sister Ms.Kiki are still living in a next door neighborhood and they almost have a get-togetther every single day. Romy loves to play with his dad than his mom and sis.

When ever I call home, mom used to put me in speaker, so that Romy can hear my voice..and mom says that Romy sometime gets closer to the phone and waves his tail while hearing my voice.. how sweet of him to acknowledge me!
Now, I am begging my parents to get him to US when they visit us next time :) I believe just to have a healthy mind all you need is a cute puppy, any sort of tension will vanish once you see them.

Isn't he Cute? For me, it's really not that easy to not to adore dogs!

My DH loves any veggie that's baked with a hint of olive oil. We loved this simple recipe of baked potato which was coated so well in herbs and oil and baked to golden brown for 30 mins.

Ingredients:

Potato Chopped - 2 cups

Thyme- 1 tbsp

Basil - 1tbsp

Rosemary - 1tbsp

Ground pepper - 1tbsp

Cumin powder - 1tbsp

Paprika - 1tbsp

Salt

Oil - 2 tbsp

Preparation:

Par-boil the potato and mix with all the above ingredients to form a gentle coating. Pre-heat the oven to 350F and let it bake for 20mins and give it a stir and again bake for 20 mins or till it turns golden brown. Serve it with your fav dip.