F-R-I-T-T-A-T-A A A

Oh eggs! Oh so versatile eggs! From the time I saw Curtis Stone make frittata, I have been dying to make and eat it! Then I found these muffin shaped frittata and that's it, the deal was sealed. They look so adorable and are so delicious.
Here I have used spinach, parmesan and herbs. You can use anything from kale, goat cheese to mushrooms, bacon. Be as creative and impress everyone, including yourself!

For this you will need -
8 Nos - Eggs
2tspn - Olive Oil
2 pods - Garlic (fine chopped)
1/2 - Red Onion (fine chopped)
A handful - Chopped Spinach
1/4 cup - Milk
Salt and pepper as you desire
A couple of spoons of dried herbs
Grated parmesan as a garnish
2 tspn - Butter 

Muffin pans

Method -

Heat olive oil in a skillet. Add the chopped garlic, sauté a bit. Then add the chopped onion. Fry till it is pink and then add the spinach. I didn't add any salt to this. Sauté for a minute.

In the meantime, whisk eight eggs, salt, pepper and herbs. Don't add too much salt as parmesan is salty too. Pre heat the oven to 350deg F.

Also, grease the muffin pans with the butter.

Whisk the eggs really well. Add the milk and the veggies. Pour this mixture into the muffin pans, not filling more than half. They rise quite a bit.

 

 

Garnish with parmesan. And bake at 350deg F for 10 - 12 minutes. Take it off when it turns golden brown. Serve these hot but they are great to reheat and eat too. As breakfast, as brownbag lunch, as snack! Delicious!

 

 

This recipe makes about 20 of them.

Meringue Cookies with Strawberry Whipped Cream and Fresh Strawberries

This is the most gorgeous, sensuous, sophisticated dessert I have ever made! Hands down, it wins! The French are well known for their  sophistication and superior techniques and flavor combinations, so when my French friend served these at her house, I was blown over! So delicate and so enticing. I had to try them!

They are quite simple to make and contain the least of ingredients. But when I initially read the recipe on different websites I was a bit nervous because these can be ruined easily too. I don't know if it was beginner's luck but they turned out perfect! Here's to perfection every time! Chin-chin :)

Meringue is basically egg whites and sugar, slow baked to perfection. It can be used as a base for many different desserts especially fruit flavored. Remember, I promised to post more fruit recipes, here's a show stopper!

For the meringue cookies you will need
4 - Egg Whites
1 cup - Sugar (very fine or powdered, if using granulated)
A pinch of salt
1 tspn - Vanilla Extract

Method -

Separate the whites from the yellow when the egg is cold. In case any fragments of the shell fall, fish it out with the shell half itself and not with your fingers. Apparently the oils from our hand can ruin the meringue! Also make sure that all the vessels you are going to use are completely dry, no moisture whatsoever! Now, let the whites stand for half an hour, till they reach room temperature.

Once that is done, start beating at low to medium speed just till the begin to froth like this.

 

At this point, add a pinch of salt. It helps stabilize the whites. Now keep on beating, till you get soft peaks like this.

 

It's time to start adding the sugar.

That's how much I added. But I think a tad less is better. It was quite sweet!

Add the sugar, spoon by spoon. Add one spoon, beat for a few minutes, then add the next, more or less ensuring the sugar has dissolved at every stage. Beat till you get stiff peaks and the whole mixture turns shiny. (Oh-so-divine looking!)

 

Now add the vanilla and give it a good mix. You will know the meringue is done, when you take a pinch between your fingers and rub it. It shouldn't feel grainy. If it does, beat some more till it feels smooth between your fingers indicating the sugar has dissolved.
Prepare a cookie tray by lining it with parchment paper.

You can either pipe out the meringue or spoon out like I did, using two spoons.

 

 

Bake at 200deg F for about an hour or hour and a half. You will know it is done when the cookies easily lift off the paper. If they are sticking bake a little longer. Once done, these can be stored in airtight containers at room temperature for many days. Yes, these little puffs of cloud, so light, that crack on the outside and are soft and gooey inside!

 

For the strawberry whipped cream -

Approx. amount of whipping cream

A tspn vanilla extract

A tspn sugar if you want

Couple of strawberries blended

 

Method -

Keep whipping the cream till it begins to thicken. Then add the mashed up strawberries and vanilla. Beat well till you get stiff peaks and the color turns into that rose pink like the sky at dawn!

 

 

Now fill this in a piping bag or scoop it in a spoon on to the meringue cookies.

 



 

Top it with strawberry slices and serve immediately. Dress these up just before serving, else the meringue will get soggy. You can use different berries or mangoes or any fruit that has a tart taste.



Herb-crusted Salmon

Aromatic, pink, succulent and flavorful - that's what you are aiming for in every mouthful! Tempting enough?

For this you will need -

2 - Big chunks of Salmon
3 Tblspns - Mixture of herbs like parsley, basil, rosemary, oregano (Sold as Italian herb mixture)
1 Tblspn - Bread Crumbs
Salt and Pepper as you desire
Wedge or Slice of Lemon

Method -

Mix the herbs, bread crumbs, salt and pepper. Adjust the flavor after tasting. Now wash the fish, lightly dry and coat the fish chunks with the mixture. You can dip it in cornstarch water or egg mixture but I don't like a thick coating because it takes away the flavor from the fish, according to me. So just plain old water does the trick. Bake in preheated oven at 350deg F till the center is light pink and hence perfectly cooked.
Serve with lemon slice and if you want a simple mayo-mint dip!

 

Brinjal/Egglant and Tomato Appetizer

Tomato, mozzarella and basil is a combination made in heaven. Add the flavor of roasted eggplant and you will be transported to a place above heaven! :)
So what are you waiting for. The assembling of this dish takes five minutes and the roasting happens in the oven in only fifteen!

For this you will need -

1 - Eggplant (The big, fat variety)
1 - Tomato
1/4 - Green Pepper ( fine chopped)
Chunks of Mozzarella
Salt
Pepper
Herbs like basil, oregano, parsley, rosemary (I used a mixture of dried herbs but if you get fresh ones, then just use any one, preferably basil)
1 tbspn - Olive oil

Method -
Grease the pan with the 2 tspns of olive oil. Assemble the veggies, herbs, salt and pepper as shown and drizzle the rest of the oil on top. Bake in a preheated oven at 400deg F for 10 - 12 minutes or till veggies shrink a bit. Take out and top with chunks of mozzarella. Bake for another 3-4 minutes, till the cheese melts and slightly browns.

Serve hot and your main course can be some delicious pasta!
 

No brainer Pistachio Cookies

So, I bought a big bag of salted pistachios when Aarvin was in the phase of enjoying those. After a few weeks, he lost the fad and the bag just remained! Neither Roshin nor me wanted to eat so many of them and that's how these cookies were born.

For this you will need -

225 gm - Butter
150 gm - Sugar
275 gm - Flour
1/2 cup - Powdered Pistachios

That's it!!

Method - Make sure the butter is at room temperature. Since I used salted pistachios, I rubbed them on a kitchen towel to take off the excess salt and then powdered them fine in a blender.

Beat the butter on low speed till light and airy. Then add sugar little by little and keep beating.

Now add the pistachios and give it a good mix. Finally add the flour, little by little. You will get a powdered mixture something like this.

You can put that on a rolling surface, make a dough and wrap it in a plastic wrap. This can be refrigerated for about 20 - 30 minutes. But I didn't have the time to do that and my son, who was my assistant, kept gobbling this powdered mixture. So I had to start quickly making cookies!

 

I made round and oval shaped ones. But is you refrigerate and then roll out the dough, you can make as many different shapes as you like.

Bake at 170deg C or 350deg F for 20 - 25 minutes.

 

 

Oatmeal with berries and almond

This is almost a silly recipe! But I insist on posting it because I have decided to incorporate fruits and nuts in our food and this is a simple beginning. So, from when I was little, I have not shared the fascination and craving for fruits that I have for veggies. The main reason being that it is really hard to get the perfectly ripe fruit which taste like heaven but even a bit under or over ripe is so hard for me to eat. I am extremely sensitive to sour-ness and this makes me a real fussy girl when it comes to eating fruits. Now, here in the US, I am getting to try so many new fruits but most I don't like to eat on their own. Solution, I realized that cooking them cuts their tartness and they add a splendid flavor! I have tried apples and nuts in salads and now berries in oats and "sajjige" ( semolina pudding). Icing on the cake is my son loves it this way too. So next few recipes will be dedicated to fruits mainly and nuts too. Nuts for my son as he doesn't enjoy crunchiness in his food. So I have to come up with innovative ways to feed him nuts.
Oatmeal is Aarvin's favorite breakfast. To make it rich and delicious, I have added black berries, raisins and almonds.

For this you will need

1Cup - Oats (I have used traditional rolled oats)
A pinch of Cinnamon powder
5-6 - Blackberries
10-12 - Raisins
Two Spoons - Almond Powdered/ 4-5 whole almonds
3/4th Cup - Milk

Method
Heat the milk with the oats for a couple of minutes. Add all the above ingredients. I cut the berries so the whole porridge turns pink. Both Aarvin and me love colors in our food! Cook for about 8-10minutes and serve warm. For the little one, I add honey, generously on top!



 

Sakkare Pongal (Sweet Rice-Lentil Pudding)

So yesterday was Sankranthi and my Facebook wall was full of posts of people wishing each other and more importantly of pictures and words describing the yummy delicacies prepared during this festival. This is a harvest festival and although no one I know is a farmer, it is celebrated with gusto by techies, doctors, marketing professionals and even teachers and lawyers :) That is a glimpse of India and it's ancient rituals for you!

Anyway, festivals and celebrations always mean only one thing for me, food! So with all these pictures and posts, I couldn't stop thinking about the sakkare pongal sweet and drooling about it. I decided I am going to make it and eat it NOW!

For this you will need

3 tbspns - Moong Dal (Split and unskinned green gram)
1/2 cup - Rice
3 1/2 cups - Water
1/2 cup - Whole Milk
3/4 cup - Jaggery
3-4 tbspns - Ghee
Cashew Nuts
Raisins
A pinch of nutmeg powder
A pinch of cardamom powder
A pinch of salt

Method -

Soak the dal for 15 minutes and drain all the water. Put a spoon of ghee in the pressure cooker and sauté the dal for about 2-3 minutes. Now, add the rice, salt and the water. Close the lid and give 4 whistles.
In the meantime, melt the jaggery with a tablespoon of water, nutmeg powder, cardamom powder and keep aside.
Once the pressure is off from the cooker, remove the lid and mash the rice dal mixture with the milk. It should be watery as the milk will get absorbed. To this add the flavorful jaggery water and stir on low flame. Add the ghee little by little till you get a porridge like consistency. If required, you can add a bit more of milk and grated jaggery to adjust the consistency and sweetness. Switch off the flame when it is still porridge-y!
Sauté the nuts and raisins in ghee and add to the pongal. Serve hot.
Once it cools, it will harden, so reheat in microwave with a spoon of milk before serving.