Bottle gourd-Channa dal curry Last week, while leafing through a handwritten recipe file, I unearthed a notable recipe that involves Sorakaya aka bottle gourd. Time had come to re-create it and savor the forgotten taste. Channa dal and cubed bottle gourd are slowly simmered in a tamarind based masala gravy until soft on bite. Deliciously [...]

Regular readers will notice that a few recipes featured here call for ‘blanching’ of vegetables. Many of my dear readers have left comments asking ‘how to blanch onions and tomatoes’. Blanching is partially cooking vegetables in boiling water for a short period and immediately plunging them in cold water to stop the cooking process. Blanching [...]

Prawns are our family’s favorite sea-food. A few readers emailed me requesting for more sea food recipes since they find very few recipes featuring fish, prawns and crabs. The reason there are hardly any sea food recipes is because, I usually prepare sea-food for dinner (I buy the fresh catch that arrives after 2 pm) [...]

Today we have an unassuming, simple stir fry prepared with very familiar everyday vegetables, Potato and Brinjals. In this vepudu recipe, the potatoes are cooked until fork-tender while the cubed brinjals tend to lose shape with the fleshy pulp melding with the spices to bring out sharp caramalized flavors. Isn’t wonderful how two down-to-earth vegetables [...]

Tomato Paneer is a pleasantly pleasing creamy paneer curry that makes a great side with rotis or naan. Though tomato is the main player here, the magical ingredient is ginger-green chilli paste that sets things off while fresh cream and cashew nut paste play up to give a nutty sweet flavor. Dry kasuri methi lends [...]

Mamidikaya pappu aka Mango dal is Andhra’s treasured classic pappu kura (dal). The recipe featured is a family favorite and its as simple as it can possibly be. Mango and tuvar dal are a magical combination. They are lovely on their own, but together, they are a match made in heaven. The tang of the [...]