Ghee Rice

What you need:
One cup Basmati/sona masoori/Regular white Rice
Green Peas
2 Cardamom/Elaichi/Yelakki
2 Cloves/Lavang/Lavanga
1 Onion,
1 inch ginger
1-2 cloves of Garlic
3 Green Chillies
5-6 tbsp of Ghee
1 cup Milk or Coconut Milk
Salt to taste

How to make:
1) Grind green chillies+Onion+Ginger+Garlic into a fine paste
2) In the Cooker, heat Ghee and then add Elaichi and Cloves
3) now add the ground paste into the cooker carefully and then immediately add Green Peas.
4) Add salt and allow it to fry for another 3-4 minutes.
5) Add one cup Rice followed by one cup Milk(or coconut Milk) and one cup of water.
6) Allow it to cook for 3 whistles for a khushuvala ghee rice :D


It tastes best when you have it with: Vegetable Kurma
Enjoy madi :)

Vegetable Kurma

This is a side dish which you can eat along with Chapati, Poori, Ghee Rice, Jeera Rice, etc.

What you need:5-6 Green Chillies
Vegetables such as Potato, Green peas, Beans, Carrot , Tomato (1) and Onion(1)
one cup grated coconut
Coriander/Dhania Powder 1.5 tsp
Groundnut/vegetable Oil 5tbsp
2 Cardamom/Elaichi /Yelakki
2 Cloves / Lavang /Lavanga
salt to taste


How to make:

1) Cook all the vegetables except Onion and Tomato and keep aside
2) In a pan, fry the green chillies without oil (stand a little away from it)
3) grind the green chillies along with grated coconut and keep aside
4) Heat Oil in a big pan. Add Elaichi, Lavang and let them fry.
5) Next, Fry the Onions and when they get slightly golden brown, add the ground paste.
6) after 3-4 minutes of adding the paste, you can add Tomato and boiled vegetables.
7) Immediately, you can add dhaniya powder and salt and mix them well.
8) keep mixing it time to time for another 5 minutes in medium heat
Your dish is ready :)

Khara Pongal

I never could get the consistency in pongal right. My mother is from Mangalore and there, people are not used to eating/making pongal. After she moved to Bangalore, she'd learnt the recipe from her friends but somehow it wasnt all that great. At Hero's house, his mom makes pongal every 3 days once for breakfast. So, I got a good hold of it :)

what you need -

1 Cup Rice

1/4th cup Moong Dal (Hesaru bele)

few Cashew nuts

1 tea spoon Jeera
1 tea spoon pepper

1 tea spoon chopped ginger

a few curry leaves

a pinch of asafoetida

salt to taste

How to make:

1) Take Rice + Dal + 3 3/4th cup of water (3 times that of rice and dal together) along with salt in the cooker and allow it for 3-5 whistles. [it should be a little more soft than the regular rice].

2) Heat ghee in a pan, then add jeera, pepper, cashew nuts and hing.

3) When the cashew nuts start turning golden brown, add chopped ginger and curry leaves.

4) When the curry leaves are roasted, take away the heat and add this onto the cooker and mix well.

Pongal is ready and you can eat it along with coconut chutney.

Coconut Chutney

A side dish which you can eat with idly, dosa, poori, upma, shavige bath, actually.... anything :D

What you need:

1 cup grated coconut

2 table spoons of hurigadale (kadale pappu/Dalia split)

1/4 inch of ginger

4 green chillies

very smal piece of tamarind

1 tea spoon of oil

1/2 tea spoon of urid dal

1/4 tea spoon mustard seeds

few curry leaves

salt to taste

How to make -

1) Grind the coconut, green chillies, ginger, tamarind, hurigadale and salt with some water.
2) In a small pan, heat the oil, add mustard seeds and urid dal and curry leaves together.

3) When the urid dal is golden brown, take away the heat and mix it with the chutney.

Some Variations:

- you could add coriander leaves along with the above ingredients while grinding.
- you could add onion/garlic and reduce the coconut.
- you could do plain coconut chutney without adding hurigadale into it.
- if you are worried about cholestrol, you can totally avoid the coconut and make this chutney with more of hurigadale alone.
I've tried and tested all of them :)

Ginger Tea

One of my biggest addictions in life is Tea. I can NOT survive without at least 2-3 cups of Tea a day. I wasn't having any plans of posting the Chai making steps here, but my sweet friend insisted it should be my first post. so here it goes :)

what you need -

3/4th cup milk
1/4th cup water
1.5 tea spoon of sugar
1.5cm length ginger
1 tea spoon tea powder

How to make -

In a small vessel, take milk, water and sugar and allow it to boil. Once its done, you can add Tea powder along with ginger (chopped into small pieces) and simmer it for 2-3 minutes and allow it to absorb the flavor. Then you increase the flame and let it boil once again. Now you can drain the tea powder and serve hot hot Tea :)

Cheers bit!....muah!