Today we are celebrating Ugadi, the Telugu New Year Day, which is the first festival of our Telugu calendar and the first big festival that comes after Sankranti. Our Andhra festival is known by different names in different states of India like “Gudi Padwa” in Maharastra and “Ugadi” in Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka. Whatever the [...]

Over the weekend, I cooked a very simple, visually appealing, wholesome, comforting, nutritious meal with loads of vegetables and which didnt take in too much of cooking time. I really wasn’t in an adventurous mood and decided to play safe with the ingredients used in making a Indo-Chinese fusion meal, comprising of a vegetable stir [...]

Summer time conjures up memories of big cool earthern pots of churned buttermilk kept in the open verandah of my tatayya’s (grandfather) farmhouse and those visiting him being offered a glass of cool refreshing ‘majjiga’ (Telugu term for buttermilk) -the quintessential summer drink. I reminse the good olden days of sharing some great moments with [...]

Well,summer is officially here in India.Its getting hot and as we reside in a coastal area of Andhra Pradesh,the humidity levels are pretty high.Inspite of the sweltering heat,this is the time of the year I look forward to barbecues, watermelons,sweet juicy ripe mangoes,corn on the cob,lemonades and healthy fresh fruit drinks.Summer offers a wider variety [...]

Green Eggplant or green brinjal, (aubergine, vankaaya, baingan or badinjan), is one of the most common vegetable which is grown all year round in Andhra Pradesh,the state I belong. They are round to oval in shape with a thinner skin unlike the purple eggplants. The small purple variety of brinjals are used to prepare the [...]

Sesame flavored rice or Nuvullu Annam is a light flavoured rice delicacy, enriched with nutrients from seasame seeds and Indian spices.This dish is simple unlike a pampered biryani..:)in the fact that the main ingredient is only sesame seeds with the infusion of spices like curry leaves and mustard seeds in the tempering. Sesame seeds have [...]

Yet another Tuesday and its time for Sweetnick’s Antioxidant Rice Foods 5-A-Day.The earlier recipes I submitted for this event were Cauliflower Tomato Curry ,Uthappams and Bisi Bele Bath which is a rice dish with loads of vegetables.Actually I have started looking forward to this event as it really encourages me to think of recipes which [...]

No festive meal is complete without the classic dish ‘garelu’ or ‘garellu’ in most Andhra homes, be it for Sankranti, Ugadi, Ganesh Chaturthi or Diwali. Infact during Sankranti,our major harvest festival, on Kanumu day, the sons-in-law of the family are treated to delectable delicacies and one savory dish prepared is garellu served with meat curry, [...]

Utappams or thick dosas are South Indian vegetarian tiffin variety made from rice and lentil batter, fermented overnight making the batter slightly sour and then used to prepare thick pancakes like dosas which are light and porous. Uthappams are topped with chopped onions, green chillis and vegetables like tomatoes or carrots but can be eaten [...]

It would be no exaggeration if I said that one of India’s culinary glories is its comforting street food which offers a myriad of flavours with almost every street corner lined with mobile food vendors (or shall we say restaurants-on-wheels) selling sumptuous snack delicacies.Infact the mushrooming snack joints speaks volumes of how street food is [...]