Recipe of the day: Chicken Popcorn

Hello lovely foodies! How are you all? I’m fine in this winter season; as winter is my favorite season! Today is the last day of 2015. I’m so busy in planning for the long weekend! Before some days, I learn a new recipe, which I will cook for the evening tea tomorrow. I’m going to share the recipe, you also can try it; it’s really awesome!

Chicken Popcorn

Ingredients

1. Chicken (boneless):                500 grams
2. Black pepper powder:             1 tsp
3. Corn flour:                             1/2 cup
4. Eggs:                                      1-2
5. Lemon juice:                           1 tbsp
6. Chili powder (if you like):        2 tsp Red
7. Maida (all-purpose flour):       1/2 cup
8. Cooking Oil:                            for deep frying
9. Salt:                                       to taste

Method:

 

Before Fry

• Wash chicken and cut into small pieces.
• Put the chicken in a bowl and season with salt, red chilli powder, black pepper powder, lemon juice and mix well. Marinate in the fridge for few hours.
• In a dish, take ½ cup corn flour, ½ all-purpose flour (maida), and combine them together. Add little salt and red chilli powder, mix and keep aside.
•   Whisk 1 or 2 eggs in a bowl and keep aside.
• In another tray, add all-purpose flour and put in the chicken pieces and coat well with the maida flour.
• Take the coated chicken pieces and drop them in the egg mixture and coat them well.
• Take pieces of chicken and coat them with the flours, mixed with corn flour and spices. Remove and shift them into a colander and toss them to remove the excess flour. 

• Heat oil in a pan on medium heat and when the oil gets hot, add the chicken pieces and deep fry till they get nice and crispy. The chicken pieces should get slight golden in colour.
• Remove, drain oil and serve hot with tomato ketchup.

Recipe of the day: Ghugni

Here is the most wanted recipe of Ghugni!

Ghugnia is a very popular snack in Bengal and in parts of Bihar and Orissa. It is made with dried white peas. Although, the dish Ghugni is like ‘Chole’ ofNorthern India; but it has its own Bengali flavor!

Ghugni

Prep Time:   20 minutes
Cook time:    20 minutes

Serve:          4

Ingredients:

1. Dried Peas:                       250gm.

2. Potato (diced):                  1 big

3. Onion (sliced):                  2

4. Ginger Paste:                    1tablesp.

5. Garlic Paste:                     11/2 tablesp.

6. Tomato:                            1

7. Bay leaf:                           1

8. Turmeric Powder:             ½ tablesp.

9. Cumin Powder:                   1/3 tablesp

10. Coriander Powder:           ½ tablesp.

11. Kashmiri Chili Powder:      1 tablesp.

12. Garam Mashala Powder:   ½ teasp.

13. Salt:                                 to taste

14. Sugar:                               ¼ teasp.

Method:

Ghugni - a famous street-food in West Bengal

·       Soak the dried peas with lots of water overnight and boil till it well cooked. If you use pressure cooker, of the heat after 3 whistles.

·       Heat oil in a deep pan. Fry the coconuts and keep it aside.

·       Put the bay leave in the same oil. When an aroma comes out, put the potatoes with salt and turmeric powder in the same oil, mix well and cook till it become golden brown.

·       Then add the onions in it and fry till it becomes golden brown.

·       Now add the ginger, garlic paste and tomatoes and cook 2-3 min.

·       Add cumin, coriander, Kashmiri chili powders and sugar in it. Add a little of water, mix well and cook until the oil separates from the spices.

·       Add the boiled pease and fried coconuts in it. Mix very well and cover with a lid.

·       Cook until the potatoes cook well. Add some water if need.

·       Add the Garam Mashala Powder just before off the heat.

·       Serve hot with Roti, Paratha. Mughlai Paratha or you can serve it alone as evening snack.

That’s all for today. Hope you like the recipe. Happy Diwali to all if you in advance! Enjoy with your all family. And, don’t forget to make your kitchen safe and cockroach-free with LAL HIT!

Recipe of the day: Mughlai Paratha

Hello hello hello lovely foodies! After a big round of festival, I am here for the next round! Hope you all have enjoyed Durga Puja and Dussehra. Now we all are waiting for the ‘Festival of Light’ – Diwali! Right?

In my childhood, in any festival, when I went to eat with my family or friends out, one liquorish name was very common and covetable – it is ‘Moglai Parota or Mughlai Paratha’! It was served with Potato Curry or Ghugni. I am going to make this childhood-love in this Diwali; and don’t worry! I’m going to share the recipe today, so you also can try it in home to surprise your family!

Mughlai paratha is a popular Bengali street food especially in West Bengal, India and Bangladesh. During Mughal period, the cuisine of Dhaka and rural Bangladesh was influenced by Mughal recipes.

Mughlai paratha is one of the Mughlai recipes that entered in undivided Bengal during the Mughal Empire. During British Rule, it became a popular tiffin snack in Calcutta.

Let’s go for it…………….

Mughlai Paratha

Prep Time:   2hours
Cook time:    20 minutes

Serve:          4

Ingredients:

For dough:

1. Flour/ maida:                           250 gm

2. Oil:                                          3 tablesp.

3. Baking Soda:                            a pinch

4. Salt:                                         a pinch

5. Water:                                     as required

For Stuffing:

1. Egg:                                          4 pieces

2. Onion (chopped):                       2

3. Green chilies (chopped):           as per taste

4. Coconut (cut into fine pieces):  1/3 cup

5. Peanut (roasted):                      handful

6. Salt:                                         to taste

7. Oil:                                           to fry

Method:

1. Make a soft dough withall the ingredients. Cover the dough with a moist cloth and keep it aside for at least 1 hours.

2. In a bowl, put chopped onion, eggs, green chilies, coconut, peanuts and salt. Beat very well and keep aside.

3. After resting the dough for 1hr, knead it again.

4. Now divide the dough in 4 balls.

5. Now roll a ball as thin as possible but not paper thin, else it will not hold the stuffing well.

6. Put the 1/4^th of egg stuffing in the middle. Spread little.

7. Now fold two opposite sides towards center.

8. Similarly fold another two ends so that it completely closed the filling inside. Make sure no filling has come out.

9. Heat a flat tawa with oil.

10. Places one paratha gently and fry until both sides turn to nice and golden brown.

11. Once done, take out on paper towel.

12. Serve hot mughlai paratha with spicy potato curry or ghugni*.

*The recipe of Ghugni is coming up in a while!

Celebrate Durga Puja with LAL HIT -#SayNoToFoodPoisoning

Hello foodies! Hope you all are doing well. I’m in a festive mood these days; because you all know that Durga Puja, the most glorious festival Bengal, is just around the corner. That, does make me a tad too excited.

Before Durga Puja, every Bengali ritualistically clean up their home. We buy new clothes as well as new curtains, bed linens, kitchen and dining linens – that means we Bengalis would go all out to give a total makeover to our houses before Ma Durga arrives. The Durga Puja festival symbolizes the battle of the goddess Durga with the shape-shifting, deceptive and powerful buffalo demon Mahishasura ,and the all-powerful mother eventually emerging victorious. My battle with the cockroaches in my kitchen at times gives me the same victorious feeling like Ma Durga - but that’s only because of the super-efficient weapon “LAL HIT” that I carry. It is not however easy to keep your kitchen clean and germ free during festivals with hundreds of other preparations going on simultaneously. Let me narrate a story to you …

Yesterday morning, I was busy in cleaning my kitchen. Suddenly I heard a shout, coming from my neighbors' flat. Ananya, a very sweet lady and mother of a kid, is my neighbor. I knocked her door to know why she was shrieking... she opened the door with a faded face and whispered ‘cockroach’!! She was dusting her kitchen and dining; suddenly she discovered cockroaches under the cylinder and shouted! She also told me that she put in her best efforts to deep clean the kitchen every month; but cockroaches often escape. Regular monthly cleaning is not enough to reach corners like under-the-cylinder, sink, cracks, and crevices; where the cockroaches hide. She is very worried about her daughter’s health; because cockroaches carry germs and bacteria, come behind the back, crawl on food and utensils, contaminate food and spread Food Poisoning. Kids are the first ones to get this infection. Family members and guests who commonly during festivals suffer, too. She asked me for suggestions to fight against cockroaches. I told her - it’s very important to eliminate, not just the visible ones, but the hidden cockroaches from the kitchen. The simple, handy and reliable solution is to apply LAL HIT each time when you deep clean the kitchen. 

I ensure that I deep-clean my kitchen every month and apply LAL HIT. LAL HIT is the only solution that can eliminate the hidden cockroaches. It comes with a Deep Reach Nozzle that can get onside deep corners, cracks, and crevices. Adopt this simple habit to protect your family from food-poisoning and other roach-related hazards. Also, LAL HIT now comes with a fresh fragrance, that gives your kitchen a real sensory uplift. Good news is that Ananya is happy now and started her LAL HIT regime from this morning. 

Well, now since we could happily settle Ananya and hopefully she never gets those cockroach nightmares back, I can (officially) share a recipe that Ananya had shared with me months back. So here we go - Puja style … and hope you enjoy this as much we relish this in our home too.

Fish-Egg Curry with Parwal

Prep Time: 15 minutes

Cook time: 20 minutes

Serve: 4

Ingredients

1. Fish-egg - 200gm.
2. Potato - 2 (small)
3. Parwal – 2-3 (small)
4. Onion - 2 (chopped)
5. Garlic Past – 2 tbsp.
6. Green Chillies - 3 to 4(Chopped)
7. Chilli powder - 1 tsp
8. Oil – 1cup
9. Salt - as per taste

Process

• Clean and cut the fish-egg in cubes & marinate with salt & turmeric.
• Cut all the potato, parwal and onion finely.
  
  
  
  
  
• Heat oil in a pan. Fry the fish eggs and keep aside.
• In the same oil, fry the parwals with pinch of turmeric powder and salt. Drain the oil and keep them aside.
  
  
  
  
  
• In the same oil, add potato and chopped Onion and fry till it becomes golden in color.
• Now, add garlic paste, green chilies and saute well.
• Now add the chili powder to the pan and mix very well. Add little of water, if need.
• Now, add the fried fish-eggs and parwals and mix well. Cook for 3-4 min.
• Add some water and cover it. Cook until the potato and parwals well cooked.
• Take the flame off when the curry becomes dry and separates oil.
• Serve hot with smoked Rice or Roti.

Well, wish you all happy Durga Puja in advance. Enjoy the festival with your family and don’t forget to use LAL HIT in your kitchen. Remember that health is truly the real wealth for your family and the root to lasting happiness. So, bring LAL HIT home and #SayNoToFoodPoisoning!