Swings & Roundabouts

Poha Aloo - beaten rice flakes with potatoes

Things needed
Poha / Aval / Beaten rice flakes, 2 cups
Onion, 1, sliced and diced
Potato, 2 medium, diced

Dessicated coconut, 1 spoonful

Mustard seeds, 1 tsp
Channa dal, 1 tsp
Urad dal, 1 tsp
Asafoetida, a pinch
Turmeric powder, a pinch
Dried red chillies, 3
Curry leaves, a sprig
Salt, to taste
Oil, 1 tbsp

Wash the poha in cold running water for a couple of minutes. Strain and keep aside.
Peel and chunk the potatoes and cook them in the microwave for 3 minutes
In a thick-bottomed pan, take a spoonful of oil. Once it gets hot, toss in the channa and urad dal.
Roast them golden. Then add the chillies and curry leaves.
Finally add the mustard seeds.
Once the seeds stop spluttering, add the turmeric and asafoetida.
Next, add the onions and fry them translucent.
Once the onions are done, add the cooked potatoes and salt and mix well.
Cover and cook for 2-3 minutes.
Mix the contents of the pan well and slowly add the poha.
Mix gently, test for salt and serve hot.

Buckwheat Pancakes

For a filling, yet healthy breakfast item, there’s nothing to match buckwheat pancakes.

 Ingredients
Milk, 275ml
Egg, 1
Salt, a pinch
Veg oil, 1 tsp
Atta (Wholewheat flour), 55g
Buckwheat flour, 55g
Olive oil, 1 tsp

Method
In a large bowl, take the milk, egg, salt and oil and mix well.
Sift the atta with the buckwheat flour in a separate bowl.
Add these to the milk mixture gradually, stirring non-stop till you get a smooth batter with no lumps.
Put it aside for thirty minutes.
To make the pancakes, add teaspoon of olive oil to a hot pan, ladle in some batter and cook until golden on each side.
Serving sugggestion: Serve with a dollop of plain yoghurt and drizzle honey all over for a sumptuous breakfast.

Piping hot idlis

Idli – soft, fragrant, melt in the mouth rice-and-lentil cakes are the perfect South Indian breakfast items. Served with chutneys and/or onion sambhar, they can set you up for a great day. Making idlies can never be a spur of the moment thing – the rice and lentils have to be soaked for 4 hours+, ground fine and then fermented till the batter ‘rises’ for perfectly, fluffy idlies.

Ingredients

Boiled rice or idli rice – 6 cups
Whole urad dal – 1 cup
Fenugreek seeds – 1 tsp
Salt – to taste

Wash and soak the rice in warm water for 6 hours.
An hour before grinding, soak the dal and methi seeds in hot water.
Grind the rice and dal separately, adding enough water till they are ground fine and you get a thick, wet batter.
Mix the two together with your hand, adding enough salt.
Cover and keep in a warm place and allow the batter to rise.

Idlies in the molds

Once the batter has risen, oil the idli molds and ladle the batter onto the molds.
Steam for around 12 minutes, till the idlies are cooked through.
Sprinkle cold water on top of the idlis and prise them out.
Serve hot with chutney / sambhar.

Serving Suggestion: Idlies with coconut chutney, tomato thokku

For a quick and tasty breakfast, you can do no wrong with this choice!

Ingredients

Bread slices, 2-4

Egg, beaten, 1

Milk, 5 tbsp

Butter, as required

Salt, to taste

Sugar, 1 tsp

Preparation

Beat the egg well, adding milk and salt. Add the sugar if you prefer.

Dip in the egg mixture

Cut the corners of the bread slices, cut into smaller pieces and dip nicely in the egg mixture.

Toasting in butter

Heat butter in a thick-bottomed pan and drop the eggy slices on to it. Cook well on both sides.

Your French toast is ready!

Take it off the griddle and serve hot.

Pancakes are my son’s favourite breakfast dish. Though the flavour of the moment is generally labelled as ‘favourite’ by him, giving him pancakes for breakfast, lunch, tea or dinner is a surefire way to make him clear his plate. So, here’s a ‘child-friendly dish’.

To make the pancakes, you would need the following items:
Plain flour (maida) – 110 gms (sieved)
Egg – 2
Milk – 200 mls
Butter – a tablespoonful
Salt – a pinch
Sugar – a spoonful
Ghee, for cooking

For the filling, round up the following bits
berries, chopped – 1 cup (go for strawberries, raspberries, blueberries or blackberries – any or all, as you wish!)
banana – 1, chopped
maple syrup – as required
powdered sugar – as required

Now that you have the above mentioned things, you are ready to get started. To make the pancakes, all you’d need is a flat bottomed pan (a tawa) and a spatula.
First, crack the egg and beat it till it is well mixed. Next, comes the tricky bit, you might need to rope in your helper for this. Add the sieved floor to the beated egg slowly, all the while trickling in the milk. Keep the whole process slow and fluid so as to not get lumps in your batter.

Now, add the knob of soft butter, salt and sugar and stir everything in. The consistency of the batter should be that, it must be thick enough to coat the back of a spoon neatly. If it is too runny, add some maida. Too think, trickle in some more milk.
Your batter is now ready.
Heat the tawa, put a spot of ghee in the middle and give it a good shake.
Pour a ladleful of the pancake batter and coat the tawa with it by holding on the handle.
Let it cook a bit.
If you can, shake it loose and toss it. If you are apt to decorate the ceiling with it, coax it out with a wooden spatula and flip it over.
After a few more seconds, transfer the steaming pancake on to the plate.

Now is the most fun bit – your helper would love this. Plonk the fruits onto the middle portion of the pancake – go crazy and add however much you want. Once you are done, roll it up. Drizzle some maple syrup over it and finish by dusting some icing sugar over it.
Ta-da! Your pancake is now ready for your tastebuds.

Chef’s tip: This is a good dish to make with your children. They can help beat the egg, trickle in the milk, fill the pancakes etc. As they helped you out so much in the creation of it, they would be more amenable to helping you in demolishing it as well!

Submitted for May’s WBB#11 Summer Fruits as well as Trupti’s Spring Fling 2007: Family & Friends in the kitchen.

Get your grubby mitts on the following:
Berries (your fave kind – I’ve gone with strawberries here) – 1 cup
Vanilla yoghurt – a generous dollop
Banana – 1, medium
Wheatgerm powder – 1 tbsp

All you have to do to enjoy a tall and healthy glass of smoothie is chuck all of the above together and blend. Voila! A filling and fun breakfast is now served. Add a sprig of mint to the glass to make it a bit classy. If you find the above mixture a mite thick, loosen it up a bit by adding some skimmed or soya milk.
And relax!

One of the easiest items to make for brekkie is good ole upma. Whenever my gran asks me what tiffin I want, my ever-ready answer is upma. Rava, aval, samba rava, rice – whatever it is, I love upma in any shape or form. Of all the various forms of the item, bread upma is, in my opinion, is one you can dish up in a real jiffy.

So, what do you need to make this delicacy?

Fairly obviously, bread – 5 -6 slices

Onion – 1, sliced

Tomato – 2, chopped

Peas – 2 tbsp

Potato – 1, diced

Carrots / cauliflower / capsicum – 2 tbsp, diced

Green chillies – 2, deseeded and diced

Oil – 1 tbsp

Mustard seeds – 1 tsp

Channa dal – 1 tsp

Urad dal – 1 tsp

Turmeric – 1 tsp

Curry leaves – handful

Coriander leaves – 2 tbsp chopped finely

Salt – to taste

Now, get ready to start cooking by getting out the ever present kadai. Heat the oil for a minute and add the mustard seeds and let it splutter. Once that is done, add the dals, roast, add curry leaves, then drop in the sliced onions. Once that turns a pink shade, add the green chillies to the pan. Saute for a few minutes.

Add the tomatoes and cook for a while. Add turmeric powder to the cooked tomatoes.

Now, add the chopped veg – you can add as many or as little as you want. If you have stuff like left-over potatoes or cauliflower sabzi in the fridge, chuck that in as well. Mix well, add some salt and let it all cook well.

Meanwhile, toast the bread slices in a toaster, in a browning setting. After that, cut them into cubes.

Now, add the cubed bread to the veg in the kadai, adjust salt and mix well. Garnish with coriander and serve hot with ketchup.