Tuesday 13 January 2015

Palak Paneer/Spinach with cottage cheese


This is one dish which is present in almost every restaurant menu.But somehow both of us never prefer to have paneer dishes outside because we dont like the taste of paneer.So while preparing this recipe I was sceptical whether at all we would like it or not.But to prove me wrong, this recipe turned out simple delicious and I could not believe myself that YES-palak paneer is indeed very tasty when cooked with the right ingredients and ofcourse the home-made touch is always there :)

Ingredients-
paneer(1cup)
spinach/palak(14-15leaves)
onion(1big)
garlic(1small piece)
ginger(6-7 cloves)
green chillies(2-3)
tomato(1small)
turmeric/haldi powder
red chilly/mirchi powder
coriander/dhaniya powder
cumin/jeera powder
Fresh cream(1tbspn)
salt

sugar
oil

Method-
Wash the palak leaves thoroughly.
Add some water and blanch them. ie- either boil the leaves or pressure cook them for one whistle.
Keep it aside till it cools.
Once done grind the blanched leaves in a mixer to a fine paste.
Cut the paneer into small cubes.
I have used home-made paneer as it is much more tasty as compared to the store brought one.
Chop the onion,green chillies,tomato fine.
Make a paste of ginger and garlic.Again you can use ready-made ginger-garlic paste, but home ground paste is always my choice.
Heat some oil in a non-stick pan.
Fry the paneer cubes till golden brown.
Remove the cubes, now add the chopped onion.
Saute the onion, then add ginger-garlic paste and green chillies.
Fry for about 2 min, then add chopped tomato.
Add the masalas -haldi,mirchi,dhaniya,jeera and salt.
Let the masalas cook.Add a pinch of sugar for taste.
Add the palak paste,fried paneer cubes and cook for about 2-3min more.
Just before turning off the flame, add fresh cream and give it a stir.
This is optional, but since I regularly make ghee so I always have it ready and believe me it gives a nice-creamy texture :)
Thats it ! serve hot palak-paneer with phulkas or roti :)


Monday 5 January 2015

Kalakand Parathas


This is a dessert/sweet wishing everyone a very Happy New Year !! We had this paratha once at "Not Just Parathas" Gurgaon and fell in love with it. I could not believe myself that such a lip-smacking paratha with the kalakand melting... could be made at home with such ease :)You just need to get kalakand from a sweet/mithai shop and have this unique dessert at home.Try it once and am sure you would not forget it ever :)

Ingredients-
wheat flour/atta
salt
water
kalakand

Method-
Knead the flour with a pinch of salt and water and prepare the dough.
Refrigerate the kalakand for half an hour.
Make equal sized balls out of the dough.
Place the kalakand stuffing inside each one of them.
Roll out and make parathas.
Fry on both sides with ghee.
Serve delicious kalakand parathas hot :)