Kadalaparuppu Pradhaman

Payasam is an integral part of any sadhya/feast.  When it comes to Onasadhya, the payasam has to be something special.  Pradhaaman is considered the king of payasams and is a Kerala speciality. In the land of coconuts, its no wonder that the earlier generations made use of bountiful of coconuts. Milk, in those days, was not available in packets and no refrigerators to increase the shelf life. But now things have changed. Both milk and coconut milk are available in plenty, in ready to use tetra-packs. So making payasam is not that difficult. When it comes to coconut milk, the freshly squeezed milk is any day better than the store bought ones.  With the mixer grinders, extracting milk is not that difficult job either. The basic ingredients for a pradhaman is a main ingredient - rice/chakka varatti/dal/wheat, jaggery, coconut milk - in various thickness. Having said that, the main ingredient determines the taste of the pradhaman and I assure you, each is unique in its taste and there is no way to compare them. This Onam, it was kadalaprauppu/chana dal pradhaman.

I missed the festive atmosphere in Kerala. Also the fresh flowers from garden for the pookalam. Here is the small pookalam made on the Onam day.

And this is the Onasadhya we had - Menu included Parikkai/Bitter gourd thayir pachadi, kaalan, aviyal, elissery, thoran, chips, sharkkaravaratti upperi, pappadam, payasam, sambhar.

You need

• Chana dal/Bengal gram dal/Kadalaparuppu - 1/2 cup
• Powdered jaggery - 1 cup, heaped
• Coconut - 2 medium sized
• Cardamom powder - 1/2 tspn
• Coconut bits - 1 tblspn
• Ghee - 2 tspn

Method

Wash and pressure cook the dal till its well cooked. After the cooker is opened, lightly mash the cooked dal. See to that it doesn't end up in a paste form. We need few bits of the dal to give some texture to the pradhaman.

Grate the coconut and grind it in the mixer using very little water. Take the ground coconut on to a cheese cloth. Squeeze the ground coconut to extract the milk. This is the first, thick milk. Repeat this for two more times to extract the second and third milk. We need 3/4 cup of first milk, 1 1/2 cups of second milk and 2 cups of third milk.

Take the jaggery with half cup of water in a bottom thick vesssel or kadai. When the jaggery melts fully, filter it to remove any impurities. To the filtered jaggery syrup, add the mashed dal and thin, lastly squeezed out coconut milk. Cook this mixture, till it thickens. Then add the second coconut milk extract and continue to cook till it thickens again. By this time, the dal and jaggery mix would have absorbed the coconut milk well. Bring the mix to a boil. Add the first extract of  coconut milk and switch off the heat. Keep stirring for 5 minutes, till its blended well. Stir in the cardamom powder.

Heat ghee in a seasoning ladle. Add the coconut bits. Saute till it starts browning. Add it to the prepared pradhaman. Serve it warm.

Sending this pradhaman to Kerala Kitchen, hosted by Divya.

Lauki Kheer - Sorakkai Payasam

Blogging marathon is pushing my limits. The recipes I post as part this edition of marathon is prepared the day it is posted except the first recipe.  And today I decided to make kheer using bottle gourd and planned it for dessert post dinner. One or the other things came by and it was time for dinner. I cook all three meals separately. Most of the days I start my cooking for dinner around 8:00 and it will be ready on the table by 8:30 p.m, our dinner time. I started the kheer post dinner and it got done in 20 minutes. 

You need

Grated bottle gourd - 1 cup, tightly packed

Milk - half litre

Ghee - 1 tblspn + 2 tspn

Sugar - 1/3 cup (increase to 1/2 cup if you want it very sweet)

Cashew & Raisins - 1 tblspn

Method

Heat a tablespoon of ghee in a kadai or thick bottomed vessel. Add the grated bottle gourd. Saute till the raw smell disappears. Add the milk and continue to cook till the bottle gourd absorbs the flavor of milk.  Add sugar. Let it dissolve and let it simmer for few minutes till it thickens to the desired consistency.

Heat 2 teaspoon of ghee in another kadai. Add cashews to it. When cashews start browning, add raisins. Add the roasted cashews and raisins to the kheer. Serve warm or cold as desired. Since the weather is cold here, we had it warm. 

Do check out what my fellow marathoners are cooking for BM#6

Carrot Kheer/Payasam

Red, juicy carrots are in season and these varieties are prefect for Gajar ka halwa. And the weather is best for warm desserts. Another warm dessert is the delicious kheer. Its very easy to make and no grating involved as in halwa. It gets done with minimal effort. Here is how I make it.

You need

• Carrot - 4, long ones
• Milk - 500 ml
• Sugar- 1/2 cup
• Ghee - 1 tspn
• Raisins,Cashews - 1 tblspn
• Cardamon powder -1/4 tspn

 

Method

 

Wash and peel the carrots. Cut into half inch thick roundels. Cook the carrots with 1/4 cup of milk in the pressure cooker. Leave the cooked carrots to cool. Puree the carrots not so very fine. Boil the milk and stir in the carrot puree. Cook till the milk+carrot mixture thickens. Add sugar and it will thin the kheer. Boil till it starts thickening. Add roasted cashews, raisins and cardamom powder. Remove from fire. Serve warm or chilled as you wish.

 

P.S - Grinding some cashewnuts along with carrots will give a more rich and creamier kheer.

 

 

 

Pongal Special ~ Ven Pongal & Chakkarai Pongal

Wishing all my readers a very happy Pongal/Sankaranthi. Like every year, I made Ven Pongal, Chakkara Pongal and Vadai to celebrate the occasion. For a change, Husband wanted Uzhundu (urad dal) vadai  instead of the paruppu vadai, which is usually made for Pongal. I could not get fresh turmeric so tied the dried ones to the pot.

Chakkarapongal

You need

•  Raw Rice/Pachharisi - 1/2 cup
• Moong dal - 1/4 cup
• Jaggery - 1 cup
• Boiled Milk - 1/2 cup
• Ghee - 2 tspn
• Cashew - 10 nos
• Raisins - 10 nos
• Cardamom powder - 1/2 tspn

 

 

Method

Roast rice and dal separately. Pressure cook with 2 1/2 cups of water. Melt jaggery with 1/4 cup water. Filter to remove any impurities. Bring jaggery syrup to boil and stir in the cooked rice and dal. Cook on low flame till the jaggery is well absorbed by the rice,dal mix. This will not take much time and will get done quickly. Do keep stirring to avoid the mix getting stuck to the bottom. The color of the rice and dal will change to brown on cooking. Finally stir in the milk and cook for a minute or two for it blend well and remove from fire. Don't cook for longer time once the milk is added to avoid curdling.

 

Roast cashew nut and raisins in ghee and add it to the pongal. Finally add cardamom powder.

 

 

 

VenPongal

You need

 

• Rice - 2/3 cup
• Moong dal - 1/3 cup
• Turmeric - a small pinch
• Hing -1/4 tspn
• Water - 3 cup
• Ghee - 2 tblspn
• Cumin seeds - 1 tspn
• Peppercorns - 5-8 nos, crushed
• Few curry leaves
• Cashew nuts - 10 nos (optional)

Method

 

Dry roast rice for less than 5 minutes or so. Roast moong dal till you can smell the aroma of roasted dal and the dal would have turned light brown. Wash rice and dal together. Add 3 cups of water to rice+dal  mix. Add a pinch of turmeric and hing to it. Pressure cook till it is soft. After pressure cooking, the rice and dal would have cooked soft with no traces of water in it.

Mash it lightly with the ladle.

Heat a pan and add ghee. When ghee is hot, add cashews, cumin ,crushed pepper and curry leaves. When cashews start browning remove and add the seasoning to the rice dal mixture.

Mix well and serve hot. Coconut chutney goes well with pongal.

I shall post the vadai recipe in the next one. Until my friend, who is a follower of this blog, messaged me that she was expecting a post on pongal recipes, I didn't realize that I haven't posted the recipes here. Thanks Anu, this is specially for you.

Wishing all my readers a lovely day of celebrations with friends and family.

Arisi Thengai Payasam - Rice Coconut Payasam with Jaggery

I have settled down well in my new place. Navarathri was the first festival after our move. I kept three steps of Bommai. I got only the small bommais here. Navarathri, here is very quiet since we don't have people visiting golus here. We did the poojas and made payasam in the morning and chundal in the evening. I could not transfer the pics from my camera, since I broke the battery recharger. Yet to buy a new one. There are loads of pics to be transferred and shared with you all. Meanwhile, I have quite a lot of pictures in the drafts, to feed my blog. I thought I will share a recipe of sweet with you all. I have already posted a payasam with coconut and rice, where sugar is the sweetener. This version is similar with jaggery as sweetener. I liked the jaggery version better.

You need

• Raw rice- 2 tblspn
• Grated coconut- 1/2 cup
• Grated jaggery - 3/4 cup
• Boiled milk - 1 cup
• Cardamom powder - 11/4 tspn
• Water - 2 cup

 

 Method

 

Soak rice in water for an hour. Drain and grind rice coarsely . Add coconut and pulse to form a coarse paste. No need to add water.

 

 

Boil 2 cups of water. When it starts to boil, stir in the ground paste. Take care not to form lumps. Cook till the rice is well cooked. By the time the rice cooked, it would have got a thick porridge consistency. 

 

Meanwhile liquidize jaggery in 1/2 cup of water. Add the jaggery syrup to the cooked rice+coconut mixture. Cook till the flavor of jaggery is well absorbed. Add hot milk and switch off the heat. Stir for a minute or so for the mik to be well incorporated into the cooked mixture. Sprinkle cardamom.Serve warm or chilled as desired.

 

Note : Milk tends to curdle when boiled along with jaggery. That's why boiled milk is added at last and no further cooking is done after the addition of milk to avoid curdling.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Mathan Pradhaman - Pumpkin cooked in jaggery syrup and coconut milk

Before I move on with posting the other recipes in my drafts, let me finish off the dishes that I made during the festivals in the last week. Last week, for two days together, it was festive lunch on account of Onam and Avaniavittom. For Onam, I made paladapradhaman. While I was chatting with my cousin over phone, who is a great foodie himself, asked me the payasams I am planning for  the oncoming festivals. I had decided paladapradhaman to make from scratch and I was contemplating on various options for another payasam. It was then he suggested about mathan paradhaman. He reminiscenced that our grand father had prepared this for grihapravesam after my parents wedding. And then, no one could find out the ingredient in the pradhaman. Recalling those instances were enough for me to decide that I will make this for Avaniavittom, provided I get ripe pumpkin.

You need

• Cooked and pureed pumpkin - 1 cup heaped
• Powdered jaggery - 1 1/2 cups
• Coconut milk - 3 halves of coconut
• Coconut bits fried in ghee - 2 tblspn
• Dry ginger powder -1/2 tspn

Method

Chop pumpkin into cubes. Pressure cook with just enough water to cover the pieces for 2 whistles. You can cook on stove top also till it is mashable. Drain the water and mash the pumpkin pieces till smooth. Alternatively can pulse for few seconds in the mixer grinder. The drained water can be used in soups.

Extract three sets of milk from freshly grated coconuts. I have written here about extracting milk.

Melt jaggery in a cup of water and strain for any impurities. Heat the melted jaggery syrup in a thick bottomed vessel. When the syrup thickens, stir in the pumpkin puree. Continue cooking till it thickens to a flaky consistency so that the pumpkin must have absorbed the sweetness very well. Add the third, thin coconut milk and keep stirring. When it reduces to half in volume, add the second, slightly thick coconut milk and continue cooking till it reduces to almost half in volume. Switch off the heat and stir in the first, thick coconut milk. Heat ghee in a pan and fry the coconut bits till brown. I did not have any coconut left so fried cashews instead. Add dry ginger powder. 

My husband and mother-in-law and friends who tasted this payasam could not guess the ingredient as pumpkin. It was very tasty and creamy, similar to parippu pradhaman.

P.S Watch out for the review of  a cook book, which contains recipes from a leading restaurant chain in India.

Palada pradhaman from scratch ~ Kerala Special

Hope all of you who celebrate Onam had it in a grand way. This Onam, I wanted to make the most favored payasam of Kerala - Palada pradhaman. Now a days making palada isn't a big affair when you can have ready made ada packets off the shelf from stores. But I wanted to try it from scratch i.e prepare ada at home.

Traditionally the batter is spread on banana leaf and is rolled and tied with the string from the leaves itself. Then these rolled leaves are dropped in boiling water and cooked. The adai is peeled from the leaves and cut into pieces. I was thinking of doing it the same way. But I haven't seen this myself and all I have is the theoretical knowledge of it. Just before making, called my amma to clear my doubts. My sister picked up the call and I said the reason for my calling and she was like I am enough to clear your doubts. And she told she she has made ada twice from scratch. She suggested me to use the vadam stand which will be easier to manage.

Preparing the ada

You need

Raw rice flour - 1 cup

Salt a pinch


Method

Soak rice for 5 hours or overnight.Grind to a smooth paste with a pinch of salt. The batter should not be very runny. While grinding the rice, take care not to add to much water and end up with a runny batter.
Spread the batter slightly thick on the greased plate.

Steam for 10 minutes. Remove the ada from  the plate and cut into four.

 Score into strips and chop into tiny bits.

By this time, the ada would have dried a bit and it will not be sticky. Transfer the bits to plate.

Repeat the steps with the remaining batter and store the ada in the refrigerator if you are not using it right away. If you have good sunshine, you could sun dry it and store in an air tight container for a long time. 

The ada measured to 1 cups heaped.



To prepare the palada pradhaman

You need
Ada - 1 cup heaped

Sugar - 2 cups

Milk - 2 litres


Method

Usually, the ada is cooked in  a mix of water and milk , till it turns soft. Then milk is added in installments and cooked till it is thick and then sugar is added to it and it is further cooked to attain a creamy consistency. All this will take loads of time. So I tipped all the ingredients to my 7 litre  cooker and pressure cooked for one whistle and kept the heat in lowest flame and continued for another 15 minutes. By then the pressure had build up inside and milk started coming out of the pressure vent along with the whistle. I switched off the heat and left if for half an hour.

Opened the pressure cooker and went on to cook till it had a creamy consistency which took nearly an hour on medium heat. Cooking in the pressure helped to get that pink color which intensed on further cooking and could cut down the cooking time and constant stirring. Leave it for an hour or so to let the pradhaman mature the flavor further.  The test for doneness is when you pour a ladle of the pradhaman on a plate and draw a line it should not join immediately.

Tasting just one spoon of the luscious pradhaman will make you forget all the work that went into it.

Chakka Pradhaman- Jackfruit & Jaggery cooked in coconut milk

I wrote in my last post, that I used up the chakka varatti. Yes, I prepared chakka pradhaman as neivedyam for the first friday of Aadi/Karkidakam. I usually make only neipayasam on all fridays. This time I made an exception. If you have chakkavaratti and coconut milk in hand, then making this pradhaman is a breeze. In Kerala, payasam is referred to as pradhaman when coconut milk is used. Now you might think, then how come palada pradhaman where milk is the ingredient. In earlier days, Ada pradhaman was made with jaggery and coconut milk. May be later on, with the availability of milk in abundance, some chef might have come up with this version.

As in all pradhamans, you need 3 sets of coconut milk- thick, medium thick and thin. The first extract from the coconut is the thick milk and subsequent extracts are the medium thick and thin, which are called as first, second and third milk in the order of extract. Coconuts used are not very matured ones. While selecting coconut for milk extraction, look for the coconuts which doesn't have dark brown shell. The ones which has shades of cream are good. Sorry, I forgot to click pics of the coconut. It would give a better idea.

For 1 cup of chakka varatti, you will need about 2 medium sized coconuts. Take the amount of chakka varatti and coconut milk given here as an indication. You go by your instinct and it cannot go wrong. Little less or more of any quantity may not effectthe end result in a big way. So here comes the recipe

 

 

 

You need

•  Chakka varatti - 1 cup, packed
• Three sets of milk extracted from 2 coconuts.
• Chukku podi/Dry ginger powder - 1 tspn

  

Method

 

Grate the coconut. Pulse the grated coconut with very little water. Add water just enough to ease the grinding. Squeeze the milk out with the help of a muslin cloth lined on a strainer. For the successive extract, you can add around half cup of water. Keep each set of milk separately.

  

1) Take a thick bottomed vessel or kadai. Dilute the chakka varatti in a cup of hot/warm water.
 
 

 
2) Then add the third milk. Bring to boil. Simmer for 10 minutes.
 
 

 
 
3) Add the second milk and simmer in medium low heat till it thickens. You can smel the flavor of jackfruit and jaggery as it thickens.
 
 

 
Once you add the first milk, no more cooking is done. So it will dilute the payasam. keep that in mind and let it thicken well. Finally add the first milk and remove from heat. Don't leave it on heat once you add the first milk, since there are chances of curdling. Add a teaspoon of dry ginger powder. Serve hot or cold.
 
 
 

 
You can add cardamom in place of chukku podi. Chukku/dry ginger will aid in digestion and probably thats the reason why it is added.

Microwave Jackfruit Cashewnut Kheer

I was regular with the Microwave Easy Cooking event, started by Srivalli, for sometime. Then later on, my interest in event participation came down and did not bother to cook exclusively for the event. But I didnot want to miss this month's theme of celebrating fellow bloggers hosted by my namesake and dear friend. I had few recipes bookmarked in my mind. But could not get around making anything. When I had few jackfruit bulbs left from what was shared by my neigbour, I immedately decided to make this kheer.  I had tasted cooked jackfruit only with jaggery as sweetner. So I wasn't sure how the kheer with sugar is going to taste. I decided to go ahead. I adapted Priya's recipe. I replaced almond with cashew and used fresh jackfruit. The kheer is very simple gets done in 5 minutes in a microwave. 

You need

Fresh jackfruit bulb - 10 nos  (around 1/2 cup of chopped pieces)
Cashewnuts - 10 nos
Milk - 1 1/2 cup
Sugar - 3 tablespoon
Saffron & Cardamom Syrup - 1 tspn

Method

Soak cashewnuts in warm milk for 10 minutes. Else MW half cup of milk and cashew together for 1 minute. Leave it to cool. Blend cashew along with milk and jackfruit to a smooth puree. Add rest of the milk and sugar. Microwave for 4 minutes. Add saffron and cardamom syrup and mw for 30 seconds. If you like, you can serve it warm. I liked it chilled. It tastes like a pudding. Depending on the variety of jackfruit the kheer can turn very creamy and thick. You can adjust the amount of milk to suit your consistency. Also adjust the sugar according to the sweetness of the fruit.

Paruppu Kanji ~ Shivarathri Special and Diet Chart Week#1, Day~1

Paruppu kanji is synonymous with Sivarathri. I remember its made only on the Sivarathri day at home and I too continue that tradition, inpsite of it being a simple, no fuss recipe. I guess, this simple, lighter version of payasam/kheer is more special since its made only once in a year. That special appearance in the menu helps to retain the charm. The paruppu referred in the name is moong dal and kanji means porridge. Paruppu kanji is usually prepared in the evening of Sivarathri day. Usually, for Sivarathri, a dawn to dusk fast is observed. May be to break the fast, this kanji is made.

Its not a complicated recipe. Jaggery is added to cooked moong dal and cooked again to blend and finally boiled milk is added to dal-jaggery mix.  If you have cooked dal ready, then it is very simple to put together.  Its a healthy drink to keep yourself warm during winter.

You need


Lightly roasted moong dal - 1/2 cup

Jaggery -1/2 cup.

Boiled Milk - 1 cup

Cardamom powder - 1/2 tspn


Method

I usually roast moong dal before storing. Lightly roast the dal till you can smell the aroma. Wash and pressure cook in two cups of water. Lightly mash the cooked dal for a creamier consistency of the kanji. Add jaggery to the cooked dal along with the water its cooked with. Give a stir once in a while. The jaggery will melt and blend with the dal. Finally add a cup of milk and bring to a boil. Don't boil too much after adding the milk. Add cardamom powder and serve hot. You can bite into bits of the dal, though its almost liquid in consistency. Amount of jaggery and milk can vary according to your  preference.

Diet Chart Week #1 Day~1



For a long time, I wanted to go on an healthy diet atleast for few days in a month. But I was undecided as to

where to start with. Also could not come up with a healthy menu to follow. Then I decided to go off on sweet/deep fried on 2 days in a week. My husband was also ready to join in. We did that successfully for 3 months. Then the month of December saw many relatives visiting and various festivals. We fell back to our

old days. I was thinking of restarting that again and I saw Srivalli's diet program. Srivalli had charted the menu with help of her doctor father. And that was the kind of pointer I was looking for. It was easier to follow hers, since she too is a South Indian vegetarian. For the time being, I have planned to follow alternative weeks for a month and then later for two consecutive weeks. As for the first day, it went fine with out much trouble.  Though I did feel slight discomfort in the form of headache. But it was manageable. Thanks Srivalli for the inspire. Here is my chart for Day1.  My day starts at 5:15 a.m

6:00 a.m - 1 tspn ajwain/omam + 1 glass warm water

7:00 a.m - 3/4 cup coffee + 1/2 tspn sugar

9:15 a.m - 2 slices of wheat bread, toasted + 1 cup of moong sprouts+ cabbage salad

(MW sprouts and shredded cabbage for 4 minutes and added a dash of lime and pinch of salt)

11:15 a.m - half cucumber

1:00 p.m - 2 phulkas, Yard long beans/payar thoran/stir fry,radish sambhar and a glass of buttermilk

3:45 p.m - half cucumber and a glass of buttermilk

4:15 p.m - 3 slices of pineapple

5:45 p.m - 1 cup of tea with half tspn of sugar

7:15 p.m - cauliflower +ashgourd soup

8:30 p.m - 2 phulkas +snake gourd stir fry , tomato+onion salad, buttermilk

9:45 p.m - watermelon

Through the day, I have had 9 glasses of water (update - 2 glasses of lemon juice with honey) and 3 glasses of buttermilk.


I decided to blog the diet plan for future reference and also if it might be a motiviation for any of my readers to begin with. And since I have announced it here, that will be another reason for me to stick with the plan.

Paal Payasam and Vadai for Saraswathy Poojai

Day ~9 Saraswathy Pooja

We keep the books on 8th day night for pooja. Though pooja for the books are done on 9th day morning. It is customary to make paal payasam and Vadai for nivedhyam. As kids, we used to look forward to this day, since this was the only day, when we are asked not to study. When our books are kept for pooja, we never used to read even newspaper or any thing on that regard.

Paal Payasam

Instead of doing the traditional way of making, I have opted the easier route, which results in equally good payasam. So why slog extra time in the kitchen. Let me tell you, this method works good for small quanitities. Let me give the recipe first

Ingredients

Broken raw matta/brown rice - 1/4 cup

Milk - 1 litre

Sugar -1 1/4 cup (Can reduce to 1 cup if you want don't want it to be too sweet)

Butter - A teaspoon (optional)

Wash the rice and add all the ingredients in a cooker. Make sure the ingredients come only to 1/4 of the cooker capacity. Later, on cooking, the milk will rise and it will start coming out of the steam vent. This is the reason I said the method suits only to small quanitities. I used my 5 litres cooker. Still during the last few minutes, milk came out through the vent on the top. After first whistle, set the flame to the lowest level. Let it cook for 20 minutes. Switch off the gas and leave it for another 30 minutes. Open the cooker to find creamy, pinkish pal payasam. Add a dab of butter if desired. I don't usually add cardamom powder since I like to retain the creamy milk flavor.

Isn't it easy to cook this way? And doesn't it look like the famous Ambalapuzha Palpayasam. As I have mentioned in my earlier post, husband doesn't eat this payasam. So its the only occassion that I make this payasam.

Vadai

I have posted the recipe earlier.