Grilled Garlic Chicken

I like to call myself a non-practising non-vegetarian. This is because I don't have a problem with meat per se, only with pork, fish and seafood, I hate the smell, and with beef and mutton, it's too chewy. But my biryani must be mutton, I love murg malai kababs, have adored the beef broth soups I ate in Colombia, and am generally happy to pick the meat out and eat. This of course leads people to look at me in shock and say 'you're vegetarian???' or mock me by calling me a fake vegetarian or asking me whether I am vegetarian today. Pffft to them I say ;)

Sundays with Joe: Puff Pastry

One week, 2B1M suddenly sent me a link to pasteis de nata, which she'd seen on pinterest or something, and then I grinned and sent her here. That was the weekend we'd planned on puff pastry, so it all dovetailed nicely, and we set out on this magical adventure. Which was totally worth it.

Sugar cookies!

Adapted from Annie's Eats

For the party we had to celebrate my job at a place I've always wanted to work at, Dragon and I had a party, themed and everything. So I made sugar cookies, in white, orange and black. (Okay, only the orange ones were orange!) The recipe I used needed icing, so while the chocolate ones turned out delectably chocolate, the plain ones were a bit sad, but the ones covered in orange icing were perfect. So I adjusted the plain recipe.

Lentil soup

Or, I'm sick of dal, and I can't be bothered to make veggies.

For pre-cooking and background, see this.

• 1/2 cup uncooked brown lentils (masoor dal), pre-cooked
• 1 tsp dried oregano
• 1 tsp oil
• 1 tsp garlic paste

You can also add any herbs you like, paprika and tomato would be nice, also rosemary or thyme if you like them.

Cook the garlic paste in the oil, add the cooked lentils and the spices, and salt to taste. bring to a boil.

To make this recipe more filling, you can poach an egg into the soup. Simply crack the egg into the boiling lentils, cover the pot and cook as long as you want.

Any dal (this one is awesome with arhar)

For pre-cooking and background, see this.

• 1/2 cup uncooked dal, pre-cooked.
• 1/2 tsp turmeric
• 1/2 tsp mustard seeds (big black ones)
• 1/2 tsp jeera powder
• 1/2 tsp ginger garlic paste
• 1 small onion, finely chopped
• 1 small tomato finely chopped
• 5-6 curry leaves (fresh if pos, dried also work)

Heat the oil and put the mustard seeds in. When they start to pop, add the rest of the spices, curry leaves (they will leap about if fresh) and the ginger garlic and fry for a bit. Add the onions till pearly, then tomato till juice runs, and then dal and salt. Bring to a boil.

Masoor dal

For pre-cooking and other background, see this.

This works with any dal actually.

• 1/2 cup uncooked dal, pre-cooked 
• 1/2 tsp turmeric
• 1 tsp dhania powder
• 1/2 tsp jeera powder
• 1/2 tsp ginger garlic paste
• 1 small onion, finely chopped
• 1 small tomato finely chopped
• fresh coriander (optional)

Fry the spices in the oil for a couple of minutes. Add the ginger garlic and cook for a minute. Add the onion and saute till pearly. Add the tomato and cook till juices flow. Add the dal, salt to taste and bring to a boil. Garnish with fresh coriander.

Simplest moong dal

For pre-cooking and background, see this.

• 1/2 cup uncooked moong dal, pre-cooked
• 1 tsp oil 
• 1 tsp jeera powder
• 1/2 tsp turmeric powder (optional)

Fry the jeera, and the turmeric if you're using it, in the oil nicely, so it smells all cooked. Like 2 min or so. Add the dal, and salt to taste, bring to a boil. And ta-DAAAAA(L)!

Chilka dal (masoor and moong)

For precooking and background, see this.

• 1 cup uncooked dal, pre-cooked
• 1 tsp oil
• 2 tsp dhania powder
• 1 tsp jeera powder
• 1 tsp kasoori methi (optional but totally worth it)
• 1 tsp ginger garlic paste

Heat oil in pan. Add ginger garlic and spices and cook for about a minute. Pour dal in, add salt and bring to a boil. Ta-DAAAA(L)!

Lentils

Pre-cooking Lentils
I have established a habit of pressure cooking dals on a regular basis. Now, I grew up in a house where we used a cooker whose entire top came off, and you put tiered vessels inside it with carious things in the vessels. This way we would cook rice, dal to go in the sambar, and the potatoes to make into curry all in one go. Many people in India I have learnt do not follow this system. They use what I refer to as the Hawkins system (ours is the Prestige one), where the lid fits into a hole in the top of the cooker and you can only cook one thing at a time. The other major difference is that the whistle of the Prestige cooker comes off while that of the Hawkins doesn't. More on that another time. Having grown up like that it really feels like a waste to run th cooker and not cook more than one thing in it at a time, so I usually make two batches of lentils at a time, or chana and rajma together, etc. Which means I end up with a lot of cooked-and-awaiting-seasoning dal in the fridge and boy do I get sick of it sometimes, though I am glad that often I need only five minutes to make it.

Ok, I'm rambling. The point is, here you go easy dal recipes! The oil is based on a minimum of half a cup of raw dal, which should do 2 people at one meal. I don't eat chillies, but you can always add chilli powder/green chillies to taste. You can dilute the recipes to any thinness you want - generally yellow dals tend to be thinner than the other ones.

Chilka dal (dal with the skins on)
Take your dal, green moong or brown masoor.
Dal: water = 1:3
2 bay leaves
A medium onion in chunks
15 minutes on the Prestige; 3 whistles on the Hawkins

Yellow dal (moong or masoor)
These guys cook much faster, even in an hour or less on the stovetop without a cooker. Do not confuse them with yellow tuar or arhar dal, which needs 15-20 min in the cooker. Masoor is in fact orange but once cooked turns yellow.
Dal:water = 1:3
10 minutes in Prestige, 2 whistles in Hawkins

Yellow dal (tuar/arhar)
Dal:water = 1:3
15 minutes on the Prestige; 3 whistles on the Hawkins

Down to Earth

Looking at the cooking, and talking to people about it recently, I discovered that I had forgotten why I started this blog in the first place. It has become about perfect baking mostly, while it began as a repository for easy and satisfying recipes. To make up for that, I've got my most basic cake recipe here. It's a ratio that is based on eggs, and you can scale it up as much as you like. I promise you, it's yum. x is the number of eggs, so if its one egg then x=1, and you need 25 g butter, 50 g sugar etc.

x eggs
25x g butter
50x g sugar

50x g flour

x tsp baking powder

50x ml milk
0.5x tsp vanilla essence

Beat eggs, with whisk or beater. Add sugar. Beat till mixed, or arm hurts. Melt butter. Pour into egg-sugar mixture and beat till well combined. Add flour and milk alternately till its all mixed in and you can see little air bubbles forming. Beat in the baking powder. Alternatively, you can mix it into the flour. Bake in a greased and floured pan at 150C/300F for 40 min or so. Test with knife to see if it's done.

To make this into chocolate cake, substitute the 1/4th of the flour with cocoa powder.

Well before I began baking to recipes and the like, this was my standard, foolproof, failproof cake recipe. Enjoy!