Appe is one of the very popular breakfast loved by adults and kids alike. We make different kinds of appe like urad dal appe, boiled rice appe, sugarcane juice appe all of which a little planning ahead. My sister-in-law makes these sweet appe with sooji which can be made instantly. This is a nice and quick breakfast when you need to come up with something for breakfast quickly. Grinding or fermentation is not required for these which makes it easier for even beginners. They taste great when eaten immediately.
Pictorial: Mix all the ingredients in a bowl. Make appe.
Few months ago, I had invited some of my friends for dinner at home. Like always, they insisted on having a potluck so that I don’t have to cook so much. One friend said she will bring rava khichdi. The name itself brought back so many memories. I could almost taste it. She didn’t know I was looking forward to it and she brought something else that day. Usually I don’t say anything, but that day I shamelessly told her I was really looking forward to eating rava khichdi and she needs to make it for me. Poor girl, she felt so guilty, she made a huge batch of rava khichdi and mint chutney next day and brought it to my home!. Oh it was so good, just like I wanted. I ate that for 3 days(yes, she had brought a lot!) and the best part was even V and Ishaan loved it. Ever since then, I have prepared this couple of times and every time I fall in love with it a little more. I feel it is a fancy name to a vegetable upma, but it is so much more flavorful especially when served with chutney.
Ingredients: 1 and 1/2 cups rava/sooji 1/2 cup onion 1 and 1/2 cup vegetables – green beans, capsicum (bellpepper), green peas, carrot 1 tea spn chana dal 1 tea spn mustard seeds 1 tea spn urad dal 3 green chillies 1 tbl spn chopped(or grated) ginger 1 tbl spn lemon juice (optional) 4-5 curry leaves A pinch turmeric Oil Salt
Method: Dry roast rava till a nice aroma comes out and keep it aside. Heat oil (use a little more oil than you would normally add for upma) and add chana dal, urad dal, mustard seeds. When mustard starts popping, add curry leaves, ginger, green chillies. Fry for a minute and then add onions, turmeric. When they turn translucent, add all the vegetables and mix everything well. Fry for a minute, add about 1/2 cup water and cover the lid, let the vegetables cook. When they are almost half done, add rava, about 2 cups water, salt. If needed add more water. When all the water is absorbed and rava is cooked, sprinkle lemon juice and mix everything well. Serve hot with mint chutney.
Mint Chutney : Grind together A big bunch(about 1 cup) of coriander leaves along with stems 1/4 cup mint leaves 2 green chillies 1 tea spn cumin seeds 1 tbl spn lemon juice 1 garlic clove 3-4 curry leaves (optional) 1 tbl spn fresh/frozen coconut Salt
There are many recipes that are passed on from one generation to another generation. However there are few out of them, which are not liked by this generation… at least at my house. None of my immediate relatives like smell of Shepi(Dill leaves) and hence this one is hardly prepared and would have lost from our contemporary radar but for my wife. Now this one is prepared by my wife for breakfast and she brings this recipe in, from her mother. I do like this dish but not my parents or any other immediate relatives. I have heard from Aayi that some of our relatives who are contemporaries of my grandfather still prepare this. But at my ancestral house, as no one liked, it was never prepared. This may also because Shepi(dill) leaves are not easily or regularly available in coastal area. We do prepare this now at Bangalore, when we don’t have guests. So over a period of time, a breakfast dish has become sort of ‘temporary’ instead of staying contemporary!!! This will have strong smell(and for me it is fragrance!!) and I wonder why Dill leaves have not won many Dil(hearts)s !!!
Ingredients:
2 cups dill leaves
1 cup rava
4 tbl spn jaggery
1 cup thin poha(flattened rice)
1 cup fresh/frozen grated coconut
Salt to taste
Method: Soak poha in water for couple of minutes. Do not leave it in water as it becomes soggy.
Mix all ingredients except rava. Grind them to make smooth paste.
Mix rava and ensure that no lumps are formed.
Pour in to idli molds and steam for 20 minutes(or microwave for 5 minutes).
My love for the popular Maharashtrian dish Thalipeeth started in Belgaum. They are healthy, very delicious and the best part is, they are easy to make. As much as I love the thick bhakris and thalipeeths, V is not such a big fan. I have been trying to make different types of these bhakris/thalipeeths lately in the hope that he will start liking them some day. That would also give me loads of easy options for breakfast.
One of my favorite ingredients to experiment with is vermicelli. Somehow I keep reaching to the vermicelli jar. I make simple upma, vegetable upma, idlis etc with it. Recently I tried this thalipeeth with vermicelli and it turned out delicious. The best part for me was, the child loved it.
Ingredients: 3/4 cup vermicelli 3/4 cup sooji/rava 1/2 cup rice flour 1/2 cup wheat flour 1/2 cup chopped onion 2 tbl spn chopped coriander leaves 1/4 cup fresh/frozen coconut 1 tea spn chili powder 1 tea spn cumin seeds 1/4 cup yogurt Oil/Ghee Salt
Method: Heat a little oil and fry vermicelli, sooji till they slightly turn brownish. Keep them aside till the mixture cools down to room temperature. Add rice flour, wheat flour, onion, coriander leaves, coconut, cumin seeds, yogurt, salt, chili powder to the vermicelli mixture. Pour in a little water to make a thick mixture.
Heat a tava and spread some oil/ghee on it. Then with your fingers, spread a thick thalipeeth on the tava. Close a lid and let it cook. Then turn it upside down and spread little more oil/ghee near the sides (optional, this makes it crispy). Serve hot.
I have been requesting my brother to post some recipes here for last 8 years. He is a complete foodie – who loves to eat, loves to cook. Finally he agreed and here is his first post here. This is also the 1000th post on this blog (yayy!!!). Now over to my brother Naveen. – Shilpa
To give a brief but much deserved break, from several years of relentless work of Shilpa, I decided to contribute to this site with few and really few recipes, she has missed so far. As I am her brother, all her relatives by birth, whom she owes credits of learning so many wonderful recipes, remain my mentors as well.
I tasted this Misal Pav first, at my Pachi’s house in Balgaum several years back. Apart from its appealing way of serving on dining table, it redefined my understanding of usage of left hand. At my house, left hand is never used while having food and that is what we were taught. Misal pav is first dish that I saw everyone using left hand, for holding Pav in left hand(Pav also means foot but here I mean bread Pav).
Right hand is used for spoon, either for having Misal or for helping with farsaan(a namkin), coriander leaves or chopped onions. This fiery Kolhapuri recipe is at its majestic best when gravy is spicy and hot.
Though this dish is very traditional and a regular one at breakfast, recipe presented here is not in its most authentic version. Nevertheless, its a shortcut to that perennial bliss called fiery Misal Pav.
Apparently Pachi has learnt this from one of her friends from Kolhapur. Apart from her house, I have also tasted this dish at few restaurants in Belgaum, Opal restaurant of Kolhapur and Rajvardhan foods in JP Nagar of Bangalore. If you have never tasted this, dare to taste this, only with few glasses of water readily available. Believe me, you will cherish this taste and its associated style for a long time.
Ingredients: 8 pairs of pav buns Butter to roast Pav 1.5 cup Matki(Moth beans) 2 Potatoes 2 Tomatoes 3 tbsp Chilli powder Salt
For masala: 1/2 Coconut (approx 1 cup) grated 3 tbsp coriander seeds 1 tbsp cumin seeds(jeera) 6 cloves 1 star anise (badam phool) 1 inch cinnamon (dalchinni) 1 tbsp white sesame seeds (til)
For seasoning 2 tsp mustard seeds Pinch of hing(asafoetida) 1 tsp chili powder 10 cloves of garlic
For serving One large onion finely chopped 1 cup farsaan(mixture or namkin) 1/4 cup chopped Coriander leaves 1 Lemon cut into small wedges
Method: Wash matki till you get clear water, soak and keep it overnight. Next day drain the water and leave it moist for another half day to get sprouts. Pressure cook matki and potatoes for one whistle. Fry coconut and other ingredients for masala, grind them in to paste. In a pan, heat 2 table spoon of oil. Add mustard seeds and once they start spluttering add pinch of hing. Then add crushed garlic. Fry garlic till it turns brown and then add chili powder. Ensure that none of the ingredients get burnt. Then add chopped tomatoes and fry. Add parboiled matki along with its boiled water and chopped cooked potatoes. Mix coconut masala and stir well. Add salt and cook for around 10 minutes on low flame. Pour sufficient water and bring it to boil. If you do not see red color on top, prepare for separate seasoning. Heat a table spoon of oil and add a spoonful of chili powder. Pour this over curry to get fiery authentic look. If you are health conscious use very minimal quantity of oil while preparing dish however garnish with oil seasoning towards end to get that appearance of ‘kat‘. Serve with pav, coriander leaves, farsaan and onions.
Serves : 4-5 Preparation time : 45
PS: As mentioned earlier, this is authentic dish but recipe is not authentic. Here traditional goda masala or garam masala is not used. Ingredients for garam masala are used in least possible quantity. Also in traditional version, Usal and Kat are prepared separately and mixed only just before serving. However if your focus is on end result, you have same Misal pav with this recipe and irresistible dish in much shorter time.
Breakfast in my house is usually a typical Indian spread – either uppittu/upma/dosas/idlis. I cook both lunch and breakfast in the mornings. V tells me to take a break once in a while when we can just eat cereals. But breakfast for me has to be something hot and savory!. Since he loves waffles, I bought a waffle iron last year. I made waffles a couple of times, then it sat in one corner (Thank god for lot of cabinets in my kitchen – but they are all overflowing now!). Yesterday I thought Ishaan would love these and I wanted to bring out the waffle iron. Anything that looks interesting is a hit with the kid. He looked at it and he was super excited. (He hates all kinds of sweets, so he didn’t eat much! I am planning to make a savory version soon for him). These came out super delicious. I follow easy way out and just mix everything in one go. It took less than 10mins to prepare the batter. You can increase the amount of flax seed powder, I was worried that the smell of it would be too strong for us.
Ingredients: 1 and 1/2 cups wheat flour 1 and 1/2 cups all purpose flour 1/2 tea spn baking powder 1/2 tea spn baking soda 1/4 cup grated zucchini 2 tbl spn butter 2 tbl spn sugar A pinch salt 1 egg 1 and 1/2 cups buttermilk 1 tbl spn flax seed powder
Method:
Mix everything well. Spray a waffle iron with some baking spray. Then pour the batter on it. (Follow the instructions on the waffle iron to make them). Serve with maple syrup.
I studied engineering in Belgaum. There I got my first introduction to many Marathi dishes. Among all, my favorites were sabudana khichdi and vada. I would just gobble down these whenever I got a chance. I stopped making these in last few years as V is not a big fan. Last week I was craving for these vadas, I did not want to deep fry them, but wanted them to be crispy. So I rolled them in bread crumbs. They came out wonderful.
Click here Pallavi’s recipe for Marathi sabudana vada. I used the same ingredients and slightly different method.
Ingredients: 1 cup soaked sabudana (tips for soaking) 1 cup boiled and mashed potato 1/2 tea spn cumin seeds 2 tbl spn chopped coriander leaves 1/2 cup peanut powder 3 finely chopped (or crushed) green chillies Oil Salt 1 cup breadcrumbs
Method: Mix all the ingredients except oil and breadcrumbs in a bowl. Make small balls from the mixture. Roll into breadcrumbs and shallow fry them. I fried them on my cast iron pan.
Few months ago, one of my friends asked me if I can cook for a function in temple. I had to make a large tray of Chole. I said yes, but I had no idea how much chickpeas were needed to make that. I bought 8lb of chickpeas and soaked about 6lb. But I used about 4lbs from it. Remaining, I froze to use later. For next two weeks, I prepared few dishes with those frozen chickpeas.
I wanted to try Falafel for a very long time now. But I hardly deep fry, so it never happened. Finally I tried it. I did not follow the traditional Falafel recipe, but followed my own recipe. They tasted great.
Method: Grind chickpeas without adding water. Add all other ingredients except oil. Make small balls from the mixture and deep fry them. Serve hot. They taste great on their own.
Mandakki or Churmuri or puffed rice is loved all people. It is used to prepare various dishes depending upon the individual taste. My mother used to prepare this masala mandakki. We used to love this. Mandakki recipees are very easy to prepare and consumes very less time. It makes for a very quick and tasty snack. Mandakki is a preparation of full satiety value but less calorific value.
Ingredients: 2 cups mandakki (puffed rice/chirmuro) 1/4 cup onion chopped 1/4 cup tomato pieces 1 tbl spn Coriander leaves 1 tea spn chilli powder Salt Oil Lemon juice
Method: Mix onion pieces, tomato, coriander leaves, chilly powder and salt. Add mandakki to the mixture. Add oil and lemon juice and serve immediately. Mandakki becomes soft if it is not consumed immediately.
During my childhood, aayi was always there for us when we returned home from school. She had a set of dishes that she made for breakfast and another set of dishes that were evening snacks. My brother and I threw a big tantrum if she switched between the two. Vermicelli dishes like upma, idli were mainly prepared for evening snacks. We demanded different snacks every evening.
Now for Ishaan, I try to make something fresh for breakfast, lunch and dinner. But I don’t make anything for the evening snacks. I keep breakfast very simple and sometimes even make these simple dishes for lunch. One such dish that I make for breakfast and lunch is this upma. I have tried different variations of these, but he seems to like this version the best.
Ingredients: 1 and 1/2 cups vermicelli 1/4 cup carrots 1/4 cup green peas 1/4 cup green bellpepper(capsicum) 1 and 1/2 water 1/2 tea spn garam masala 1/2 tea spn sugar 1/2 tea spn mustard seeds 1/2 tea spn urad dal 3-4 green chillies 4-5 curry leaves A pinch asafoetida Oil/Ghee 1 tbl spn fresh/frozen coconut (optional) Salt
Method: Heat oil/ghee and fry vermicelli till it turns brownish. Take it out on a plate, keep aside. Heat a little more oil, add mustard seeds, when they start popping, add urad dal, green chillies, curry leaves. Add the vegetables and fry for few minutes. Add little water (a couple of table spoons), cover and cook till all water is absorbed. (I do this so that vegetables soften a bit, they get completely cooked with vermicelli later). Add garam masala, vermicelli, salt, sugar, fry for few minutes. Add remaining water, cover and let it cook completely. Garnish with coconut(if using). Serve hot.
My love for the popular Maharashtrian dish Thalipeeth started in Belgaum. They are healthy, very delicious and the best part is, they are easy to make. As much as I love the thick bhakris and thalipeeths, V is not such a big fan. I have been trying to make different types of these bhakris/thalipeeths lately in the hope that he will start liking them some day. That would also give me loads of easy options for breakfast.
