Semolina and Vegetable Cutlets

I always quite liked the idea of making food appealing for children. And in doing so, I hope to also let A appreciate a wide variety. To that end, I am quite particular about not making him a paruppu saadam tayir saadam child. (No offense meant to anyone. I just don't believe that food has to be rice and roti.) I would like him to learn that these dishes are food as are many others. By and large, he eats what we eat and I don't have to cook separately for him. From the age of 1, A has wanted to feed himself. I try to give him things that he can hold in his hands and eat. But since he does not want to be fed, I have to ensure that these foods are not mere snacks.

Cutlets are one such item. I remember eating a semolina and vegetable cutlet many years ago at Adyar Bakery's Shakes & Creams. I thought that it would make a good meal for A.

1/4 cup Semolina

2 tbsp Carrots, finely chopped

2 tbsp Beans, finely chopped

2 tbsp Butter Beans, cooked and finely chopped

2 tbsp Onions, finely chopped

1 tbsp Oil

1/4 tsp Turmeric

1/4 tsp Paprika

a pinch Garam Masala

Salt to taste

¼ cup Bread Crumbs
2 tbsp Flour
Oil for frying (deep or shallow)

Steam the carrot and beans until tender. You could place them in a microwave safe bowl and add a little water and microwave on high for 2-3 minutes.

Heat the oil. Fry the onions and fry for a couple of minutes. Add the semolina and roast for 2-3 minutes. Add the carrot and beans along with the butter beans. Add the paprika, salt and turmeric. Add 1/2 cup of water and cover and cook on a slow flame for 3-4 minutes. Add the garam masala and stir well. Turn off the flame and allow the mixture to cool.

Meanwhile, mix the flour with a little water to make a batter. Place the bread crumbs on a plate. Heat the oil for frying.

Make small balls of the mixture and flatten them. Coat them with the flour batter and then roll them in the bread crumbs until they are evenly covered.

I tried making these by deep frying as well as shallow frying and both methods work very well. To deep fry, slide each cutlet into the hot oil and fry on each side until brown. To shallow fry, place the cutlets on a greased pan and cook on both sides, adding a few drops of oil as necessary.

Drain on absorbent paper. Serve with tomato ketchup.

Now that I have made these, I think even left over vegetable upma would make very good cutlets.



Sweet Potato Pesto Cutlets

The new year is here. And my only wish is that it is a good year for each and everyone of us. We began 2010 with friends at a hill station and hoped that the year would have a lot of travel. I must admit, I felt a little cheated in this regard. Not only did we not travel all that much, the few trips that I did have planned, I had to cancel for different reasons. Yet, even on that front, I did travel to my favourite cities in India: Bangalore, Madras and Hyderabad. And eventually moved to settle down in my second most favourite city in the whole world. So, while I do feel a little cheated, on the whole, the year turned out just fine.

Coming to this post. How do you like to spend your weekends? My ideal weekend would be one where I wake up at leisure and find breakfast ready whenever I do. I like to laze around more during the day and just have different meals magically appear at different times of the day. But we all know that is not how most weekends of mine turn out (or any for that matter).

On days when we wake up closer to lunch time, I try to make a full south Indian meal for the first meal and then like to make something "snacky" for later in the day. The decision about dinner is usually left for later. Here's one such snack idea. It is perfect as a snack and can even double up as a meal.

2 Sweet Potatoes, boiled and peeled

1 Potato, boiled and peeled 

2 slices Bread, crumbled

1/4 cup Soya Granules, prepared according to the instructions on the pack

2 tbsp Parsley Peanut Pesto
1/4 tsp Chilli Powder
Salt to taste

Oil for frying

Mash the sweet potatoes and the potato together. Add the crumbled bread slices and the soya granules and mix well. Add the other ingredients. Make small balls of the mixture and flatten each to form a cutlet.

Heat a frying pan and place the cutlets in the pan. Add a few drops of oil around the cutlets. Cook for 2-3 minutes on one side. Turn over and cook the other side for a couple of minutes, adding a little oil if necessary.

Drain on absorbent paper and serve with some tomato or chilli sauce.

This was the first time I cooked with yellow sweet potatoes. We enjoyed the cutlets and I'm sure I'll be making these babies again.

Happy and Healthy 2011 all of you!

Beetroot Patties

I have a colleague and cabmate, S, who has a colleague and best friend, D. D's mother is, like my colleague P's mother, an excellent cook. Since I leave for work very early, and since I cook our breakfast and lunch in the morning before leaving for work, I end up eating breakfast at work because there just isn't any time. Very often, S and D have their breakfast at the same time in the office cafeteria. Every once in a while, I taste D's breakfast and I must say that her mother makes the most unusual dishes.

Last week, D brought these beetroot patties for breakfast. I had one bite and found that I couldn't stop myself from taking the second... and the third. S gave me the recipe on the way back home that evening and I was all set to try it out this weekend. All I can say is that I will make these again and again, all through this winter.

1/2 cup Beetroot, grated

1/2 cup Carrot, grated

2 tbsp Roasted Peanuts

1 tbsp Oil

1 tsp Ginger Paste

1 tsp Garlic Paste

1 tsp Green Chilli Paste

1/2 tsp Chilli Powder

1/2 tsp Amchur (Dry Mango Powder)

1 tsp Cumin-Coriander Powder

1/4 tsp Garam Masala

2-3 slices of Bread

Salt to taste

Cornflour to coat the patties

Oil for frying

Heat the tablespoon of oil and fry the ginger, garlic and green chilli pastes for a minute. Add the beetroot and carrot and fry for 3-4 minutes. Add the peanuts along with the salt, chilli powder, amchur, cumin-coriander powder and cook for another 3-4 minutes. Add the garam masala. Crumble the bread slices into the beetroot mixture and mix well. Take off the flame and allow to cool.

Form small balls of this mixture and flatten them slightly. Coat them in the cornflour and shallow fry on a pan until crisp on both sides. Serve with a salad on the side (or some tomato ketchup).

Please do remember that there are only two days left for the Tried and Tasted event. Do hop over to Sunshinemom's blog and pick a recipe that you've always wanted to try and send it over to me.

Chhole Tikki

Instead of a big lunch or dinner, our meals are small and spread out during the entire day. Very often, I run out of ideas for snacks. A fruit box, sundal, or a salad sometimes doesn't make the cut. And I have very little time to actually cook something for our snack box. I had some leftover chhole in the fridge. I decided to use it to make these tikkis. Incidentally, I also found a couple of cooked potatoes in the fridge. I put everything together and then allowed these patties to cook on a skillet while I got the rest of our lunch going. If you don't have chhole, I'm sure cooked chickpeas will work just as well, with a teaspoon of chhole masala.

1 cup Chhole

2 Potatoes, cooked and peeled

1 slice Bread

1 tsp Chilli Powder

1/2 tsp Coriander Powder

Salt to taste

Oil for frying

Blend the chhole in a mixer. Transfer the mixture to a vessel. Add the potatoes and the slice of bread. Add the chilli powder, coriander powder and the salt. Mash everything together and form 5-6 balls. Flatten each ball.

Heat a skillet and spread a little oil over it. Place the flattened balls on the skillet and cook them on both sides. Serve with ketchup or chutney. This is a perfect afternoon snack and helps keep hunger pangs away for a long time.

Kidney Bean Green Chickpea Patties

Snack time. If I'm not prepared for it, I dread it. I dread not having something substantial in my lunch bag. I dread having to reach out for "just about anything" to kill those hunger pangs. It's not fair that the cafeteria downstairs serves samosas, bread pakodas and bread pizza just when the last bit of lunch bids my stomach farewell.

This makes for a great snack. With a salad on the side, it would make a great lunch too. But for now, let me relish it at snack time.

1/2 cup Kidney Beans, soaked overnight and cooked

1/2 cup Green Chickpeas, cooked

1 Potato, cooked and mashed

2 slices Bread

1 tsp Chilli Powder

1/4 tsp Turmeric Powder

1 tsp Ginger Paste (optional)

1/2 tsp Garam Masala

1/2 tsp Paneer Tikka Masala (optional)

Salt to taste

Oil for frying

Place the kidney beans, chickpeas, potato and bread in a bowl and mash until you get a homogenous mixture. Add the ginger paste, turmeric powder, chilli powder, garam masala, paneer tikka masala and salt. Shape the mixture into patties. (I got about 6-8 patties from this mixture.)

Heat a skillet and smear a little oil over it. Place the patties on the skillet. Cook on both sides until golden brown. Your perfect snack for those post lunch pangs.