Weather is perfect outside and the time is right for gardening. We haven’t done much this year as far as gardening goes. We did get a patch ready and dropped in some salad green and radish seeds. Few days later we saw our neighborhood squirrels digging deep into our veggie patch. There were big holes in the carefully prepared soil bed. Despite all that some seedlings are popping up. Let’s see what happens.

These are lettuce from last year. Just dropped the seeds into some organic soil and we started harvesting them as soon as they were ready with few leaves. We transplanted a few into the patch and they grew to a decent size. Nothing like eating greens from your own garden.

The theme for click this month is Au Naturel. And this is my entry.

Sprouting Lettuce - Entry for Click

Spring 2008 is here…

The crocus are blooming….

Snow drops are showing their heads…

More snow drop pictures…

More pics as more blooms happen.

I have always known upma to be a little fluffy. When I started my hostel life, the upma served at the canteen didn’t look anything like the upma I grew up with. It was cooked into one big mass and you could took a scoop of upma rather than a spoonful of upma. I blamed the cook for not knowing how to cook but little did I know this is how upma is supposed to be for many others.

Even after 4 years of eating canteen upma, I couldn’t get used to it. I love my fluffy upma with a sprinkle of sugar and a banana.

How to make fluffy upma?

Oil/ghee- 1 tablespoon

Rava/sooji/semolina- 1 cup

Minced shallots/onions- 2 tablespoon, Ginger minced- 1 tsp, Chilies- 2 chopped, curry leaves- 1/2 sprig.

Water- 1.5 cups (approx)

Salt- to taste

Coconut shredded- a handful, Ghee- 1/4 tsp (optional)

Heat oil in a pan. When the oil is hot, add the mustard seeds. When they start to pop, add the onions/shallots, ginger, chillies and curry leaves. When the onions start to turn brown, add the rava to the pan. Keep stirring till the rava is slightly roasted.

Then comes the fluffing part. Sprinkle a handful of water into the rava and keep stirring. Break up big lumps. For one cup rava, you might need about 1.5 cups of water. The important tip is to add water in handfuls and to keep stirring. Towards the end, you can just close it with a lid for a few minutes to cook it through. Stir in shredded coconut and ghee. Serve warm.

This upma goes to RCI-Kerala being hosted by Jyothsna at Currybazaar.

Chembu is used widely in Kerala in a wide variety of recipes.This is a starchy vegetable and is quite delicious steamed, fried or smothered with seasonings. This is found growing in most homes in Kerala and thrive without any attention.

This is a simple recipe that goes well with rice.

Recipe:

Chembu - 1 cup ( Remove the skin and cut into small pieces)

Turmeric powder- 1/3 tsp

Salt- to taste

Coconut grated- 1/2 cup

Green chilies- 4 (Add more if you like it with more heat)

Cumin - 1/3 tsp.

Tamarind- one tablespoon. Mix well with some water to obtain tamarind extract. Discard the seeds.

Method:

Cook the diced chembu with the turmeric powder and salt with about 1 cup water, over medium flame.

While the chembu is cooking, grind the coconut, chilies and cumin to a smooth paste.

Once the chembu is cooked, add the coconut mixture to it and cook on low heat.

When the chembu curry starts to boil, add the tamarind extract and mix well. Turn off and keep covered for a few minutes.

In a seperate small pan, add oil. When the oil is hot, add mustard seeds.

As mustard seeds start to pop, add the shallots and curry leaves and fry till they turn brown.

Pour this over the curry. Mix well. Adjust salt.

Serve warm with rice.

Note:  Chembu  can get mushy if overcooked.

Enjoy your holidays! See you in the New Year.

As a kid, eggs were forbidden food due to my allergies. Eggs made me itch. Tasting cake batters left me scratching away at my tongue. I was left looking as my sister gobbled down her boiled egg every morning.

Somebody suggested quail eggs for an itchless egg experience. They worked. No allergies to that. Then my mom started to improvise. She would add a half egg to a whole onion and make an omelette. I could handle that. In small steps, I graduated to a whole egg by the time I was a teenager.

Its been a long time since my last food event, but eggs are close to my heart. So I clicked them and ate them. Join the Click event at Jugalbandi.

Eggs with sumac

Sumac is available in middle eastern grocery stores. Fry the egg as usual, sprinkle sumac. Add salt and pepper if you want. That’s it!

What is sumac? Here

My camera is a Canon Powershot.

It’s been a while since we did some real cooking. Or some real food shopping. The visit to the farmer’s market this weekend was such a joy for us. After some shopping, we enjoyed a light breakfast in the park. It was a few miles drive from where we live, but we combined it with other errands we had to do in the area.

This salad was inspired by the beautiful bunch of baby beets that came home with us. We also had some really great goat cheese from the market. The combination was inevitable.

For the salad:

The beets were roasted .

We left a bit of the tops on and peeled the skin after roasting. Make sure you scrub the beets well, if baking them whole. Also added some fresh thyme, rosemary, and a splash of balsamic vinegar.

Quarter the beets, combine with goat cheese and greens. Drizzle some olive oil. Salt and pepper, of course.

Enjoy!

It was really good and it is a great way to enjoy the real taste of beets.

Pain is no fun and cancer pain is especially bad. See the reality of pain management in some nations.

Here

Being pain-free is very important to maintain the human dignity and comfort at end of life. Many people spend their last days in pain, ignorant of palliative care. Awareness is the only way out of it.

Along with the mulberry that grows into our backyard, there is a grape vine that gave a very good yield this year. They taste delicious, sweet yet slightly tart.

For now, we are eating as it is. But it could also end up in a sorbet ’such as’ this one.

When we decided to make Singapore our destination, food was top on our minds. And it didn’t disappoint. The food draws heavily from the mix of the different cultures that make up the country - Malaysian, Chinese, Indian and Indonesian. Almost every day was a food adventure.

I was glad that I had family who live there and know the right places to go. I had great meals for less than $10 while my colleague laments about the S$4oo she spent on a two person brunch. Great food doesn’t have to be expensive in Singapore. Hawker centers abound with great food and make you feel part of the culture when you eat at these local places., while going easy on your pocket. See images of hawker centres here.

Otak-otak is made by mixing fish paste (usually mackerel) with a mixture of spices including chillies, garlic, shallots, turmeric, lemon grass and coconut milk. The mixture is then wrapped in a banana leaf that has been softened by steaming, then grilled or steamed. ( Link)

It is delicious! In my opinion, anything cooked in banana leaves taste divine. While I couldn’t eat more than one at a time, my fellow traveller ate plenty at a time.

An Otak otak vendor.

To see another vendor, click here.

The banana leaf packets are cooked atop a grill till the leaves start to char in the middle. Otak hot off the grill is sooooo good!