It was another of those fridge cleaning moments -you know, the time when you see bits and scraps of assorted vegetables which cannot be made on their own. But together, they create magic (provided you don’t try too much of weird experiments like me ). I was also in my pantry cleaning process, so was wondering what I can do. Umm..Lets check the fridge – carrots, peas, tomatoes, kale and some Triticale Bread. I checked the section where I store legumes and aha, cannellini beans! Of course – Ribollita!

Ribollita is a Tuscany white bean and bread soup. The term “Ribollita” means “Reboiled” (...)
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Post tags: bay leaf, cannellini beans, carrots, Kale, olive oil, onion, Parmesan, potato, rosemary, tempeh, tomatoes

What does a kid do at the sight of an Ice cream? What do geeky men do at the sight of a latest Gizmo? How do women react to super duper sale in their favorite store? That smile, that surprise with their pupils dilating with unexplainable delight is sure a sight to see, isn’t it? Well, a bread fresh out of the oven does that to me. Not shopping, not shoes, not clothes, not chocolates but fresh home made breads. People feel down if their pets get sick, I feel horrible if my breads don’t puff up or end up like bricks! But nevertheless, I am always experimenting with some bread or the other. Its no wonder that you find lots of breads in this site and I am sure this is just the beginning (hopefully my passion remains consistent!)

I have talked before about Triticale in my Eggless Triticale and Currant scones. I have tried so many recipes with it and this is one of them. Its a rustic bread just like any wholegrain bread. Its a little dense although the texture is much better than the photos here. Well, the mistake is mine. You are supposed to cool down the bread before slicing it but if I am crazy about baking fresh home made breads, my better half is fanatic about consuming fresh home made breads. So, I had just finished baking and I wanted to take photos. But with him around it was getting to be impossible.

Him : I am waiting, waiting , waiting ……….
Me: I know…One sec..one sec….one sec…

Him: one second went by like a second ago…I am waiting , waiting…(...)
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Post tags: Active yeast, bread flour, brown sugar, milk, triticale, wheat flour

One of the best things about cooking is making soups. Ahem – if you said, “What’s so great in making soups? Its darn easy?” – I would say ,” EXACTLY”. They make my life so much easier. There have been umpteenth lunches that have been made possible thanks to soup! I have a bad habit of working with a bowl of soup nearby while I am typing away to glory at my comp. But Shhhhhh! Dont tell my better half about it! He will go ballistic “Keypad and warm soup?????”!!! Don’t want to give him any more fodder for blaming me for every conceivable issues with the keyboard or computer! His imagination can get pretty creative, much worse than mine!

Anyways, almost anything can be made into a soup and I like them all. If my mother is reading it, her eyebrows will travel all the way to her forehead! The number of tantrums I have thrown for drinking soup till some point in my life has been legendary and probably will go unsurpassed It would prove to be a hindrance esp. during family get together when we all go out to eat. They all order myriad soups for the first course and there I am, sitting (...)
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Post tags: fennel/sweet anise, heavy cream, onion

If you are a regular reader of this blog, you would be aware of my new strategy of emptying out my pantry before I buy anything new. My recipes are also mostly those which help me in this regard. I have a list of about 58 recipes which make use of various stuff in my pantry. I am checking them one by one. It also sometimes happen that for certain events, I have no choice but to buy new ingredients. Like for example – I had to buy Sweet rice flour and Tapioca Starch for making these gluten free Graham Crackers. So one of the recipes for making use of Tapioca starch which I had made note of were these yummy looking Pao De Queijo which are classic Brazilian cheese rolls.

Because of this New Year resolution of reducing the ingredient explosion in my freezer + Pantry, I am not cooking specifically for events now. But if it meets/matches one which helps me in this regard then its all OK! And that’s precisely what happened with this cheese bread. When Canela y Comino announced this months Bread Baking Event theme to be Latin Breads I was relieved:) Participating in BBD is like a must for me since I love breads but for some reason or the other I have been absent for last few themes. But not this time

Pao de Queijo is Brazilian cheese bread made of flour – sour or sweet plus eggs, salt, milk, lard, pork, oil and vegetable cheese from cow’s milk. The eggs is for the color and richness, the fat (here I use Butter and vegetable oil instead of lard) is for texture and Cheese is for…Oh well..Do you need reasons to add cheese to anything?? The flour  used is Tapioca which is similar in texture to that of Cornstarch. I used this recipe from southamericanfood.about.com where the measurements were way off! Only in the middle of making this recipe did I realize that something was terribly wrong. Coming back to verify if I copied down wrong instruction I came upon this review where it described the same issue I had. The consistency turned out to be like a broth than that of dough! Makes me wonder if its cos of the quality of Tapioca flour since few others did not seem to have problems. Anyway, I added few more cups of flour and it came out perfect. I have the corrected measurement – but you try it with discretion just in case the fault lies in the quality of Tapioca flour.

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Mix milk, salt, vegetable oil and butter in a pot, and bring to a boil.

As soon as it boils, remove from heat. Stir tapioca flour into the milk and butter mixture.

Stir in the eggs and the cheese, and mix well.

Let mixture cool for 15-30 minutes, so that it will be easier to handle.The recipe mentions refrigeration for 15 minutes. But if you see the picture below with the measurement they provided it was more of a bread broth

and when I added extra flour it became like this. Much better. The measurement I have provided makes it easy to roll into balls.But then as I mentioned previously add it with discretion.

Its still sticky but flouring your hands make it easier.

With floured (tapioca flour) hands, shape the dough into small balls.

and place them on a baking sheet.

Lets zoom out the camera now shall we? A reader of mine sent me a mail asking me if  my claim ‘about my kitchen being small’, was true then how come I manage to keep it so neat during cooking!  HaHaHa! Its a good thing I did not tell my house mate about this – he will laugh his hearts out – for at least 15 minutes Further he will get more fodder to tease me and say ‘You have been misleading your readers!’. Well see how the place, where I was shaping the rolls, looks? I usually tend to hide it with a good intention – I don’t want to distract your attention from the food (see what a good soul I am? ) . And also did you notice another important thing here? I finished the Tapioca Flour! Another ingredient done with!

Bake rolls for 20 to 25 minutes, until they are puffed up and are golden. They will rise slowly and puff up mostly in the last 5 or 10 minutes. You know they are done when there is amazing aroma wafting (tapioc’ish (#!#$?) smell?), the bread puffs up with lots of cracks (looks like some dinosaur egg hatching!) and it gets this v. slight yellowish glow with flecks of yellow here and there (cheese flecks?)

Serve warm.

Related posts:

1. Wholegrain Milk & Cheese Bread
2. Jalepeno & Cheese Cornbread
3. Ricotta Cheese Fritters
4. My Comfort Food : Mac n Cheese
5. Spinach Cheese Swirls
6. Blueberry Cheese Pancakes

© DK for Chef In You, 2010. | Permalink | 13 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: cheddar, eggs, milk, mozzarella, tapioca flour, vegetable oil

When I made Khaman Dhokla with amazing results, I had one reader Kavita interact with me about Khatta Dhokla! I promised her a recipe and here it is – 2 months later. Well its late indeed and I really apologize to many of my readers whose request is still in the queue. I assure you, its not cos I am slapdash about the request. Hell no! I am not! Its just that when I give you a recipe, I want to be first personally happy with the results. Like for example, I remember trying making the Khatta dhokla ages ago – so long ago that I really don’t remember what the result was. Only that – it was not a disaster. Then I tried out the recipe I had and well it was clear that I was thoroughly spoilt by the spongy Khaman Dhokla since the recipe I had did not give me that level of sponginess. The pores were missing and then it had a more hardened batter type texture than the spongy one I was looking out for.

Thus started experiments where I tried out at least 7 different recipes each with not very satisfactory results. (...)
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Post tags: black gram, Eno Fruit Salt, peppercorns, sesame seeds, yogurt

I have been on a Quinoa spree! Its quick cooking and so nutritious. All I have to do for my lunches is cook up come quinoa, add few vegetables and tada! – Quinoa Pilaf ready. Agreed, that health apart, I was doing it more so cos of sheer laziness, since I did not have to cook much. Of course, to my better half  ‘I am eating healthy baby!’ was all that I felt necessary to elucidate. I mean,’ eating better’ sounded, ah well, better than saying, ‘What to do, your wife is lazy!’ Who knew even such a silly thing as this could actually come back to bite the very same slothful bum of mine?

My TH in one of those ‘See, I am such a good husband. I wonder why you even think I don’t care for you?” moments, very graciously “gifted” with VIOLA – A 4 pounds (that’s like 1.8 Kgs!!!!!) of Quinoa; from where else but Costco! I mean who else sells such gargantuan sizes. He waited with a big smile , his hand held out holding this huge bag of quinoa when just a day ago, I was glad to have finished the last bit of quinoa I had. Of course I was shocked and speechless (yes, me actually speechless! That doesn’t happen often!) Few bickering later, with the husband grumbling – “Woman! One just cant understand them” and me grumbling “..and he expects me to cause famine in my kitchen with THIS?” I sat down in front of my Quinoa, both of us watching each other – eye to eye, each wondering how the heck they landed up with one another.

Now laziness apart, I simply could not bring myself to another of those pilafs..I was done with that, I came across this recipe I had written down in my recipe diary. Unlike many recipes noted down where I mention the chef/author from where I copied down, this recipe had nothing of that sort! I did not even recall writing the recipe down – but thought to give it a try since I had all the ingredients together and it had a unique twist to it. Quinoa was added to Arborio rice and cooked just like Risotto. The butternut Squash adds sweetness to this dish and that mind blowing color. The pumpkin seeds add a delightful crunch and nutrition. The whole dish is lightly sweet and hearty.

You might also be interested in other:
Quinoa Recipes: Baked Quinoa and Mixed Bean Croquettes, Quinoa Dinner rolls, Multigrain ( 4 cooked wholegrains) Spelt Bread
Risotto and Pilaf’s : Brown Butter Pumpkin Risotto, Barley and Butternut Squash Risotto, Kamut Pilaf, Wheat Orzo Pilaf(...)
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Post tags: Arborio rice, butternut squash, onion, pumpkin, pumpkin seeds, quinoa, sage, squash

A well rested break is both a boon and a bane. Obviously, Boon is cos you get to enjoy a different scenery from the usual routine which suddenly now looks so mundane, you get to treat yourself specially instead of feeling even lesser than a mule’s ass(!!), the very same ‘what-kind-of-stupid-life-i-am-leading’ starts looking much more meaningful and more importantly YOU DON’T HAVE TO COOK!

“Gasp!! Did we just hear you saying THE taboo food blogger line” – asks your vertically arched eyebrows.

Well Yes! you very well did. I sometimes get so weary of cooking that I can very well stay hungry than cook. I simply marvel at the energy of few bloggers who can maintain more than one blog and cook like its going out of fashion. Point to self – Steal some of their energy!

Anyways coming to the bane part. Now that one gets to indulge not only by way of having more time to do other stuff and forget the regular and to eat food cooked by someone else it becomes inevitable that one would overindulge. Oh well, at least I do and I very well did too. I ate too much of too many that I am sure its going to last me another whole year. To enjoy this at the end of this year, gotto get back to my normal routine which is what I did. Kick started it with earthy and simple foods the first of which was Caldo Verde, a wholesome uncomplicated Portuguese soup enriched with the nutrition of Kale.

(...)
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Post tags: Kale, potatoes, tempeh

What Indians refer to as Pav (as in Pav Bhaji) is probably the dinner rolls to the western world! The soft textured buttery rounded bread is a world of its own! There is something to be said about the pillowy texture of these rolls which makes me go totally crazy for them! They are so versatile – use them as starters along with your soups, they make great breakfast bread with some butter and jam or use them as a side for something very spicy eg. Indian Pav Bhaji

Its one of those rare baked goods which finds its way in without me tinkering it to add some wholegrains in it. Of course I have some healthy wholegrain versions too like this Quinoa dinner rolls but these are also most welcomed in my kitchen. I esp. love them with some butter and jam! Bliss!

They are v easy to make and don’t require lengthy or strenuous effort. They also make great presentation at your dinner table while entertaining. After I made them for the first time, I stopped getting the store bought ones. These are as good as any you can find and what more they are home made too! (not to say Fresh!). This is a basic dinner roll recipe.

You might also be interested in: Quinoa Dinner Rolls, Bulgar wheat Dinner Rolls, French Bread, Saffron Basil Breadsticks, Swiss Zopf Bread
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Post tags: Active yeast, bread flour, milk

During one of our vacation spots, we landed up in a place which was nearly anti-vegetarian. It was actually even worse for me since I don’t even eat eggs. If you can cheat me by hiding its taste, appearance and smell into something, then I am ready to be cheated, otherwise you will be treated to free ‘throwing up’ sessions! Which is what I pretty much did during that trip since no one could even contemplate from which planet we landed from and could not customize recipes! I think few people probably wondered secretly how I could look the way I did when I was practically eating ‘Nothing’ Vegetables are supposedly not food in their dictionary.

One conversation at a breakfast joint

Me: Can I have a vegetarian Burrito pls?
Waiter: Do you mean with lots of vegetables?
Me: Yes – no meat..
Waiter: Oh! No sausages then. Is Bacon ok ?
Me: (#$!#) No no Bacon, its meat too….
Waiter: Oh ok sorry about that – so trying to eat healthy ah? (winks!) Its always good! I know ppl trying to eat lots of fish nowdays. You know we have the best salmon here….
Me: umm…well no fish too – we don’t eat fish either..
Waiter: (looks shocked) No bacon, No fish! That’s really sad! What do you want us to put in there instead?????????
Me: Potatoes would be great!
Waiter: (scratching head) Oh ok! 2 ‘plain’ burritos coming up
Me: aah! One second – I have one more request..I cant eat eggs – can you skip that too for one of the burritos?
Waiter: (scratching head some more) Without eggs?????? Sorry then there is nothing on the burritos.
Me: but.. but there are vegetables in there. That’s what I want..
Waiter: Sorry we dont know how to make it without eggs…
(few more suggestions, no’s, arguments follows without any success for me ….)
The Husband: Its alright – just get us 2 burritos. We are starving!
Me: (grumble)(mumble)
(and we traveled happily after, with me throwing up of course!)
(...)
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Post tags: garlic, heavy cream, onions

There is something to be said for combining Spinach with feta and ricotta cheese! The sensation that it creates is amazing! The Greek do know how to eat! The creaminess of the ricotta, the saltiness of feta combine with earthy spinach to create a wholesome taste. Spanakopita is a Greek savory pastry belonging to the Burek family ( may be that’s where borekas come from??!!) enjoyed either by way of Pie or cut into triangles.

According to Wikipedia “Spanakopita is similar to torta pasqualina, a traditional dish from Liguria, that is very common in Argentina and Uruguay.” The world gets closer and closer in so many ways than just internet! Since I was planning to make it for a get together potluck, I thought of making it into triangles which makes it a great appetizer. Somehow making it into a pie gives me a main course feel! But if you want to make the pie version see this video (thanks to you tube) below.
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© DK for Chef In You, 2009. | Permalink | 13 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: dill, feta cheese, nutmeg, onions, Parmesan, parsley, phyllo, Ricotta, spinach