This Hyderabadi Chicken curry is a hot and spicy chicken curry that lives upto the promise of everything that Hyderabadi cuisine offers. Haven’t I told you earlier that my mom and I have very different food habits? My mom likes non messy, dry curries like this chili chicken. I obviously like chicken
Is the onakodi for your family ready? Have you finalized your Onasadhya menu yet? Have you finished buying your vegetables, marked out the banana leaves that are going to be your organic plates for tomorrow or found out which shops sell banana leaves in case you are a pravasi malayali? Need I remind you that a sadhya is a sadhya only if you are able to produce atleast 20 vibhavangal to crowd those banana leaves? Needless to say, I am all excited that it is Onam tomorrow. For me, apart from draping my kasavu sari and decorating my hair with jasmine flowers, Onam is that one day of the year when vegetarian food shines in all its glory, each urulla of rice resulting in an explosion of flavours that are sweet, sour, spicy and tangy. My favourite part of the meal remains the payasam or sweet pudding. Kerala boasts of a wide variety of payasams such as adapradhaman, chakkapradhaman, paal payasam, ari payasam, semiya pasayam, payar payasam etc. Some are sweetened with jaggery and are dark in
It’s been a long time since I blogged, and I would like to thank my millions of considerate readers for not bothering me with emails and comments inquiring about my well being, though I am sure you were worried to tiny bits. Inspite of the long break, I have to start my post on a bitter note. All b
We Indians are big on entertaining at home, with the motto Adithi Daivobhava (Guest is God) held close to our generous hearts. Once the guests are invited and a time and date is fixed to suit everyone’s convenience (the time being just a formality, since guests are expected to arrive atleast an hou
“A twist on ghee fried plantains? Really? That would so not work. Ridiculous!”. These were my first thoughts when I glanced at the pictures of “Stuffed Plantains” in Vanitha. My skepticism was fully justified because fried plantains was a classic that required minimum effort and nobody in their right minds would try and improve on a classic. I actually felt a teeny weeny bit insulted by the recipe. So, I decided to try it out just so I could prove my point, you know? But incredibly, astonishingly I was proved wrong! Yes, ladies and gentlemen, I must admit (grudgingly so) that the “Stuffed Plantain” is in fact a couple of notches better than our good old Fried Plantain.
This is quite a simple recipe to put together. You just warm up freshly grated coconut along with raisins and nuts and sprinkle in some sugar and spices. This would be our filling. Spread out the filling over plantain slices fried in ghee. Roll them up and secure with tooth picks.
I have met many people (non Keralites, mostly) who on learning that I am Christian ask me if I booze regularly, live on a diet of chicken, rabbit and other fluffy creatures (something I wouldn’t mind practicing), and express unbridled surprise that I am not dressed in a frilly frock. The Goan charac
August has been a very good month, holiday wise. With four holidays and a couple of long weekends, a lot of non vegetarian cooking and eating happened in my house (my parents did the cooking on my request, and I did most of the eating). The Eid weekend had me dreaming of the wonderful Hyderabadi Du
Go to a restaurant with a group of girl friends and you are going to have a really tough time deciding what to order. There will be people who want to stick to the tried and tested stuff, others who are adventurous and want to order the weirdest sounding dishes, yet others who are undecided whether they want soup and dessert and keep changing their minds. Just as difficult is deciding how much to order (with some declaring, “I am SO hungry”), and fitting it in with everyone’s budget (with others declaring, “I am SO broke”). On one occasion that my friends and I decided to treat ourselves at Nelko, a restaurant frequented by most of my college mates, we ordered Mughlai Chicken and roti (after spending a ridiculously long time discussing (read arguing) various options). Not everyone was happy with this decision because Mughlai chicken was something we had never tried before, and was therefore a “risky” choice. And their worst fears were confirmed when the dish was brought in; on the plus
Saturdays and Sundays are the most boring television days of the week, except, if you want to catch the repeat telecasts of all the shows and serials run during the weekdays. You have probably watched all of them already and sacrificed a major chunk of your beauty sleep and quality time with family in doing so.
Why watch TV on weekdays, why not do it during the weekends, some may wonder. Easy for them to say, how are you supposed to go to bed without knowing what transpires between Castle and Kate, or Prof. Jayanthi’s (of Kumkumapovu) reaction when she comes to know her illegitimate daughter has donated her a kidney and saved her life. Even worse, what if the husband plans a weekend outing, and you miss the repeat telecasts? Has he ever witnessed Prof Jayanati’s plight, or tried to understand Dexter’s need to kill? No? Then he cannot be expected to realise why it is important not to miss even a single episode. Instead he thinks they are all a waste of time (!), and that you can easily
Men in our country are in general male chauvinists. When a woman demands that her husband treat her as an equal, a friend, (with some romance thrown in, ofcourse), would she be asking for too much? Well, if the demand is made of a man with an inflated ego (there would be no need to make such a demand of a reasonable man in the first place), it would definitely be asking for the impossible. But I do wonder if women are not to blame to some extend for this social setup. So many mothers expect their daughters to help with the house work, while their sons are allowed to play, watch TV or do school work. In many homes, parents are willing to dole out plenty of money on a boy child’s education, while that of a girl child is neglected or not given the same importance. Aval padichu collector agumo (Why spend on her education, she is not about to be a collector), would be the appropriate dialogue at this juncture. (Yes, I do watch a lot of Malayalam movies ;)). Yet again, the same mothers sear
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