MEC - Protein rich foods roundup

First of all, Thanks to one and all who participated in the event. Here goes the dishes.

Priya was the first to come up with tasty and healthy oats halwa in microwave. I had always liked innovative dishes in oats as they are a rich source of fiber.


Lata from Flavours and Tastes with a very interesting dish, Pappadam canapes, I loved the way she has used sprouts with papads, do check it out.

Jayashree has presented Rajma pulao where she has mentioned canned rajma can be used while doing it in microwave.



Radhika from ticking palates has come up with yummy mattar panneer which is most of them's favorite I believe.




Srivalli rushed with a last minute entry but never the least, it is the traditional thirattu paal in microwave.




And finally comes my cheese veggie packets

Cheese veggie packets

This goes to my MEC event, Protein rich foods. I have used lot of vegetables, cheese with minimal oil making it more healthy.
Here goes the things I needed to prepare this:
1. Mixed Vegetables - You may prefer to buy buy frozen chopped vegetables or choose the vegetables n chop them into small pieces. You may use carrot, beans, peas, cauliflower and corn.
2. Cheese - 2 Slices
3. Coriander leaves (finely chopped)
4. Red Chilli powder - 1/2 tsp
5. Jeera/Cumin seeds - 1/4 tsp
6. Garam Masala powder - 1/4 tsp
7. Turmeric powder - 1/4 tsp
8. Salt to taste
9. Lemon juice - 1/4 tsp
10. Oil - 2 tsp
11. Spring roll pastry sheets/ Hand made dough( Use all purpose flour, 1/2 tsp il, salt and water and knead well & let it stay for 1 hr, Make square sheets of them once you start preparing this)


Method:
1. Add little oil in the glass bowl, add coriander leaves and cumin seeds and heat them in Microwave high for 1-2 min. You will notice the colour change of cumin seeds n smell the fragrance of coriander leaves. Transfer them to a bowl.
2. Boil the chopped vegetables in a microwave oven or glass bowl with water enough to wet the vegetables and heat in Microwave high for 8-10 min with little salt.
3. Drain the water from the boiled vegetables. You may add pepper n salt to the water and drink it considering its nutritional value.
4. Add the vegetables to the bowl(where u transferred fried cilantro n cumin seeds) and add the powders 4,6,7,8.
5. Sprinkle lemon juice and mix well. This is our stuffing.
6. Grate the cheese or cut it into small pieces.
6. Rub oil thoroughly over the spring roll sheets one by one and add our stuffing onto it, add some cheese and fold into packets and microwave for 1 min. You can cook 3 or 4 per min(differs from one microwave to other).
7. Look for the brownish color change n serve them with Tomato ketchup/chilli sauce.

An event to enrich proteins in our diet - Protein-Rich foods

Nowadays we are all aware of cooking healthy food. Eating a little high protein food at each meal helps reduce the appetite plus the body uses energy to convert protein to carbohydrates. So Come on folks, let your imagination fly and come out with tasty, innovative protein rich recipes which would pamper our taste buds.

Ok here you go with the rules of our event!

1. Cook any dish rich in proteins(you can use nuts, grains, legumes, meal maker & dairy products such as milk and cheese) and post on your blog with a link back to this announcement and Srivalli's MEC post.

2. The entry can be any course of the meal and any meal of the day, I request you people to stick to pure vegetarian recipes(No eggs also please). You can send in multiple entries but all posted on your blog from now on till July 31st.

3. Since its a Microwave easy cooking event, please make sure the entire cooking needs to be done in the microwave and linking your post to Srivalli's MEC is mandatory. You can of course use food processor & other electronics for grinding stuffs, but no stove top please.

4. Recipes submitted to other events relevant to this theme are also welcome.

5. I would also appreciate if you can include the logo along with your recipe.

6. Once your dish is ready, you can send in your entries to rohirums@gmail.com with the following details:
Subject: MEC: Protein Rich Foods
Blogger name
Post URL
Recipe name
Picture

7. Recipes from archives can be accepted Only if they are updated as current posts.

8. Non-bloggers can also mail your recipes with the picture to rohirums@gmail.com.

I hope you will all be thrilled to make some delicious foods rich in taste and health. Awaiting your entries!

I thank Srivalli for giving me this opportunity.
Cheers:)
Ramya

Rasamalai

This is my all time favorite sweet. In fact, I should say its my family sweet.. Everytime we go for any get together we dont even go for a second thought and order this sweet. Everyone likes it. So I have tried it for pajaaka's event.

Cooking time : 45 min
Makes 6-8 balls

Ingredients:
For Malai:
Milk - 1/2 litre (For best results use full cream milk)
Lemon juice - 3 tablespoons
Sugar - 1 cup
Milk powder / plain flour - 1-2 tablespoons
Water - 2 cups

For flavoured Milk:
Milk - 1/2 litre
Sugar - 1/2 cup or as required
Cardamom powder - 1 teaspoon
Saffron - 1/4 tsp (soaked in warm water/milk)
Sliced Nuts for garnishing (Almonds, Cashew, Pistachios, etc)



Method:
For Malai:
1. Take a thick bottomed pan and boil the milk well.
2. Reduce the flame, add lemon juice slowly, stirring the milk continously.
3. As the curdling process begins, continue stirring.
4. When all the milk turns curd and water separates out, immediately add ice cubes to stop the curdling process further(this is an important step to avoid hardening of malai).
5. Use a clean muslin/cotton cloth to extract the solid parts. This is called paneer or cottage cheese.
6. Run cold water thoroughly from outside in order to avoid the lemon's smell in the dish.
7. Drain the water fully and knead it to make a smooth dough. If needed, sprinkle milk powder or plain flour to get a smoother consistency.
8. Make them into small balls and flatten them with your palm and keep them aside.
9. Heat sugar and water in 1:2 ratio and allow it to boil.
10. As it starts boiling, reduce the flame and add the flattened cakes one by one slowly.
11. Let it cook for 10-15 minutes. Once the balls puff up and start floating on the surface indicating it is cooked, you can take them out and keep them aside.

For flavoured milk:
1. Boil milk in a heavy bottomed pan.
2. Stir it continuously until the volume reduces to half and becomes thick.
3. Add sugar, cardamom powder, saffron water/milk and stir well, until sugar dissolves (5-10 minutes).

Put off the flame let it cool for sumtime and add the cheese balls one by one.
Garnish it with nuts and allow it to cool completely.
Refrigerate and serve chilled.

Macaroni Pasta

Ingredients:
Prego Traditional Italian sauce - 5 tsp
Macaroni pasta - 200 gm
Water - 1 litre
Tomato Ketchup - 2 tsp
Capsicum - 1(chopped)
Oil - 1 tsp
Salt to taste

Method:
Boil macaroni in water for 10-12 min.
Drain the water and transfer to a bowl.
Add oil in a skillet and fry the capsicum.
Add Prego sauce and tomato ketchup to the pasta.
Add the Capsicum and mix thoroughly.
Add Salt to taste.
Macaroni Pasta is ready.

Channa masala

My brother always tells me his friend's mom is a great cook, she cooks so many varieties for hs friend and packs for lunch. My bro said tat guy s too proud of his mom n makes others envy for her cooking. So i decided to get her number n talk to her. She was also showing off initially..but I got my job done. She gave me this idea of making gravies in cooker as its time saving , uses less oil and tasty too. From then i follow her recipe for cooking in the mornings. Channa can be replaced by vegetables, paneer, peas / cauliflower. Here goes the recipe:
Ingredients:
To Grind:
Onion - 4
Tomato - 2
Cashewnuts - 5
Fresh Ginger - 2/3 pieces
Fresh Garlic - 5
Cloves(optional) - 2
Cardamom(optional) - 1
Cumin seeds - 1/2 tsp
Green chilli - 1
Red Chilli - 1
Kasoori methi(optional,mandatory ingredient for panneer butter masala) - few leaves


Powders:
Turmeric powder - 1/4 tsp
Red chilli powder - 1 tsp (according to taste)
Garam masala powder - 1 tsp
Salt to taste

Oil - 2 tsp
Channa - 1 cup(Boiled)
Coriander leaves(for garnishing)


Method:
* Grind all the items under To Grind section nicely.
* Heat oil in a pressure pan.
* Add turmeric powder.
* After 2 min, add the mixture, thereby adding the powders except turmeric.
* Add channa to the gravy and close the cooker.
* Let 3 whistles after placing weight.
* Open the pan and garnish with coriander leaves.
* Channa masala is ready.

Cabbage-Peas Pulao

Ingredients:
Basmathi Rice/Long grain rice - 1 Cup(Boiled)(Rice:Water - 1:11/2, when rice soaked for half an hour, otherwise ,1:2)
Cabbage - Half, finely chopped
Onion - 2 (finely chopped)
Peas - 1 cup(Boiled)
Green chilli - 2(sliced across vertically)
Cloves - 4
Cinnamon - 1"
Cardamom - 2
Cashewnuts - 7/8
Coriander - few leaves
Ghee - 2 tsp
Salt to taste

Method:
1. Heat ghee in a kadai.
2. Add cloves, cardamom, cinnamon & green chilli and saute for 2 min.
3. Add onions and saute till golden brown.
4. Add chopped cabbage and sprinkle some water, and add salt to taste.
5. Saute till the cabbage is soft and add bolied peas to the mixture.
6. Add this mixture to the boiled basmathi rice.
7. Heat little ghee , fry the cashews till golden brown and add to the rice.
8. Garnish with coriander leaves.
9. Cabbage peas pulao is ready.
10. Serve hot with some gravies like channa masala / vegetable kuruma.(Believe me, it tastes like star restaurant's dish)


Sending this to EC's Mixed Rice Varieties event