Masala Omelette

Eggs are a versatile ingredient. Your imagination and creativity can create wonders when you have eggs to experiment with. One can cook different dishes and make - appetizers, finger snacks, main course and even deserts. I am an egg lover, I can eat eggs as often for a meal and not feel bored. In fact I love omelettes and can have them at any time of the day. It is a quick fix meal and can be had for breakfast, lunch or dinner or as an in between snack. Omelettes are made by beating eggs and seasoning with salt and pepper. One may add different ingredients for making a delicious heavy meal. They are made differently across the world - folded or flat, and fillings could range from onions, mushrooms, cheese, ham et al. 

The recipe I have for you today is the one you'd find in a typical Indian home for breakfast or at road side eatery that is thronged by people looking for a quick bite. Indian omelettes are flat and typically contain onion, green chillies and coriander leaves and this is called - Masala omelette. I prefer a masala omelette for breakfast or as a side dish for dinner with dal or vegetable curry and rice. However, I also add tomatoes to my omelette. It's easy to make and for hard core non-vegetarians, an easy substitute for meat. 

Ingredients:

1. Eggs - 3 nos 
2. Onion - 1 small 
3. Tomato - 1 small
4. Green chilly - 1 no. 
5. Coriander leaves - 1 tbsp 
6. Ginger - 1tsp (grated) Optional 
7. Salt - to taste 
8. Turmeric 
9. Oil - for shallow frying 

Method: 

1. Chop the onion, tomato, green chilly and coriander leaves finely. Make three portions of these ingredients, including grated ginger. 
2. In a big bowl, break one egg, add salt, turmeric and one third of all the chopped ingredients. 
3. Beat all the ingredients well for a minute. 
4. Heat the pan and pour oil as required for shallow frying. Pour the egg mixture on to the pan. 
5. Egg cooks real fast and will set in about two minutes. 
6. Check if the egg is cooked and flip it to the other side. Let it cook on the other side as well for 2 to 3 minutes. 
7. Remove from the pan and repeat the same process for the remaining two eggs as well. 

Alternatively, all three eggs and all the ingredients can be beaten together and poured into the pan to make three to four omelettes.
  
Omelette tastes best with pau, or bread which is lightly roasted on the pan after the omelette is taken off the pan. A hot cup of tea (chai) with the meal or at the end of it makes the meal complete. 

Fried rice with bacon and carrots

There is a lot that one can do with left over rice. I for one, love to make different types of fried rice. I usually try and use ingredients that are already in stock, specially vegetables that are nearing their use by date. Most of the times french beans, carrots, peas, corn, peppers, baby corn do wonders in any stir fry preparation.

The fried rice recipe I share with you today is not a traditional Chinese recipe. It is essentially lots of ingredients tossed together, that turns into a delicious treat. Since this recipe is totally flexible, you could try different permutations and combinations. My only suggestion is that you use rice that has been cooked a day in advance. Enjoy!

Ingredients:

1. Bacon - 100 gms
2. Left over cooked rice - 2 cups
3. Onion (medium) - 1 no
4. Carrot (medium) - 1 no
5. Capsicum (medium) - 1 no
6. Garlic - 2 flakes
7. Soy sauce - 1 to 2 tbsp
8. Oyster sauce - 1 tbsp
9. Pepper - to taste

Method:

1. Roughly chop bacon, onions, carrots, capsicum and garlic.
2. Heat a non-stick pan, add the chopped bacon, fry till light brown. Add the garlic and onions. Let it fry for about a minute.
3. Now add the carrot, mix well and let it cook for about three minutes.
4. Add the sauces and pepper, let it mix with the ingredients in the pan.
5. Add the capsicum, and rice. Mix all the ingredients well. Let it fry in the pan and mix well. Cook for two to three minutes and take off the stove.

Notes:

1. I don't add oil and salt. Bacon releases a lot of fat and is salty. Also the sauces have salt.
2. You could add as many veggies as you like to this delicious concoction. Veggies I recommend are french beans, peas, corn, baby corn, peppers.
3. You could also use different types of meats. Chicken, cocktail sausage, beef or pork strips. Just season it with salt and pepper and fry it first.

Coconut beef – Mangalorean style

I started cooking quite late in life. Both my sisters for example loved cooking and had taken to pots and pans while they were still in college. In contrast, I started only a few years ago. I often wonder why I didn't start earlier as cooking can be very therapeutic and calming. It is also very satisfying to see your loved ones enjoying their meals and slurping and burping!!! One of the things that makes me extremely happy is to see my son happily eat what I have cooked. And this has been a great motivator to do better. Most mums will know what I am talking about and will agree with me. They say children are the best critics or worst depending on your outlook. So when my son asks for second and third helpings, I know I've done well for the day. Today's recipe is one such winner.

Coconut beef is my mum's recipe and I have grown up eating this for Sunday meals, or when we had visitors, or for Christmas or Easter. Typically all our special occasion meals had Pork Bafath, a spicy pork preparation, a beef or chicken preparation, a vegetable side dish or salad and plain pulao. This dish is quite loved at my home. You can have this with warm pau, a bread that you get in Mumbai or pulao and you will absolutely love it. The roasted and ground spices impart a unique flavor, specially the few grains of roasted methi (fenugreek) that you add at the end. Enjoy!

You can find the recipe for Pork Bafath here.

Recipe credit: Mrs Cecilia Sequeira

Ingredients:

1. Beef - 1 kg
2. Onions - 2 nos
3. Garlic - 1 pod (medium)
4. Ginger - 1 inch piece
5. Tamarind - 1 small lball (soaked in warm water)
6. Vinegar - use if needed
7. Coconut - 1 and half to 2 cups of grated coconut, try and use only the white part.

Dry roast and powder the below spices:

1. Coriander seeds - 2 tsp
2. Jeera - 3/4 tsp
3. Mustard seeds - 3/4 tsp
4. Cloves - 6 nos
5. Cinnamon - 1 and half inch piece
6. Kashmiri red chillies - 8 nos
7. Peppercorns - 8 nos

Methi (fenugreek) seeds - 1/2 tsp (roast, powder and keep aside)

Method:

1. Heat oil in a pan and add chopped onions, fry well, add chopped garlic, ginger and green chillies.
2. Add the meat and tamarind extract and the powdered ingredients.
3. Mix well and let it come to a boil and cook till done.
4. I cook beef in  the pressure cooker, as it takes a lot of time to cook. In case you are using a pressure cooker, take one whistle in the cooker and reduce the flame of the stove to low. Cook for 20 minutes. The time taken to cook beef usually varies depending on how tender the meat is. Use your judgment to gauge when the meat is done.
5. Once the meat is cooked, add the grated coconut and methi (fenugreek) powder. Check for seasoning and taste. If you think you'd like dash of vinegar you may add about 1 tbsp.
6. Give it a nice stir so that everything is mixed well and switch off the flame after about 2 mins. And coconut beef is ready to be served.
7. This goes very well with plain pulao or pau.

Tomato Saar (Recipe 1)

Tomato saar is known by different names across Southern India. It is a delicious tangy tomato soup that is generously poured over rice and slurped with much gusto. You may have heard of tomato rasam or tomato saalan, or tomato saar and they all basically mean the same, with slight variations in tang and spice levels.

When I was growing up my mum made tomato saar quite often to go with fried fish and or a vegetable side dish and rice. However, todays recipe is a cross between tomato saar and rasam. And this is my recipe that has gone through a couple of trials and has been finally perfected. As I always mention in all my recipes, please adjust the number of chillies as per your spice tolerance levels. This goes well only with hot steamed rice and a side dish of vegetable or fried fish.

Ingredients:

1. Ripe tomatoes - 5 medium sized
2. Garlic - 6 flakes
3. Peppercorn - 6 to 8 nos
4. Cumin seeds - 1/2 tsp
5. Dried red chilly (Kashmiri) - 2 nos

Tempering:

1. Oil - as required
2. Mustard seeds - 1/2 tsp
3. Curry leaves - a few
4. Onion - 1 small, chopped
5. Green chilly - 2 nos, chopped or slit
6. Turmeric - 1/4 tsp
7. Rasam powder - 1 tbsp

Method:

1. Make cross slits at the bottom of the tomatoes and place them in a pan with water that completely immerses the tomatoes. Place the pan on a stove, bring it to a boil and cook the tomatoes on low flame for 8 - 10 minutes.
2. After the flame has been switched off, add the peeled garlic, and dried red chilly into the hot water.
3. After it has cooled down, move the ingredients into a mixie jar and add the peppercorn and cumin seeds and grind to a smooth paste. Use water sparingly while grinding as tomatoes are already mushed. Reserve the water in the pan for later use.
4. Heat pan, pour oil, wait for the oil to heat up and then add the mustard seeds. Let the spluttering stop, and then proceed to add the onions and the curry leaves. Let the onins turn soft and translucent.
5. Add the green chillies and turmeric. Mix well. Add the ground paste, salt and rasam powder. Stir till all the contents have mixed well in the pan and it has started boiling.
6. Add the reserved water as required. Let it simmer for about 8 - 10 minutes. Check for taste and consistency and lastly garnish with chopped coriander leaves.

Pork bafath/bafad (Ground masala method)

Pork bafath is a classic and popular Mangalorean dish, served on all special occassions including birthdays, weddings, christenings, Christmas, Easter etc. I think all Mangaloreans, Goans and East Indians  have a special appreciation for pork preparations and we love our pork bafath, sorpotel, vindaloo, roast, choris (sausage) etc. I will be sharing all these recipes of course, but I'd like to start the Easter mood with my family favorite - Pork Bafath.

Every Mangalorean family has their own recipe for this preparation. Having said that, what I have observed is that, the ingredients for the recipe remain the same, the quantities of those ingredients change. For example: my sister's recipe calls for more onions, garlic and red chilly. Sometimes people prefer for the onion and garlic to be completely cooked and dissolved in the gravy, whilst some prefer to add the onions mid way during the cooking process, so that the onions are not completely dissolved. You can adapt the recipe to your tastes as long as you stick to the ingredients.

There are two variants to the recipe - the first one is where you grind all the ingredients and prepare the bafath masala (ground paste) from scratch, and the second variant is where the ready made bafath powder is used in which case you don't need to grind the masala. Bafath powder is easily available in Mangalorean stores and can also be used as a substitute for garam masala. You can try making it at home too if you are the adventurous sort. For today's post I am going to share with you the recipe where the masala is ground and made from scratch.

The recipe I share with you today is a recipe that was shared in our parish bulletin many moons ago. I am forever grateful to the dear old lady who shared this. Unfortunately I did not capture her name or any other details.

Ingredients:

1. Pork - 1 kg
2. Onions - 3 nos medium (Cubed)
3. Ginger - 1 inch (chopped finely)
4. Garlic - 1 pod (chopped finely)
5. Green chillies - 3 nos (slit)
6. Cloves - 6 nos
7. Cinnamon - 1 inch stick
8. Bay leaves - 2 -3 nos
9. Vinegar - to taste
10. Salt - to taste

The below ingredients to be ground with water:

1. Kashmiri chillies - 15 nos (Use your discretion while using chillies)
2. Peppercorns - 10 nos
3. Coriander seeds - 1 tbsp.
4. Cumin seeds - 1 tsp
5. Tamarind - 1/2 a lemon sized ball (soaked in warm water)

Method:

1. Cut the pork into 1 inch cubes. Wash well and drain excess water.
2. In a pan large enough to hold all ingredients, put the pork, add the ground masala and all ingredients. Mix well and switch on the gas.
3. Use water to clean the mixie jar and add it into the pan. Do not use any more water than that for the preparation.
4. Bring the meat to a boil, lower the flame and let it cook for 25 -30 minutes.
5. Continue cooking till dissolved fat appears on top or until the meat is tender. This could take anywhere between 45 mins to an hour.
6. Check for spice and salt.
7. In case, you'd like for the onions and or garlic to be less cooked, add them fifteen minutes after the cooking process has started. In this case, the onions will have a bite and will not have completely mushed into the gravy.

Notes:

• This is a fiery hot dish, in case your spice tolerance is low, use fewer red chillies, green chillies, garlic and ginger. Go a bit easy on spices like peppercorn, cloves and cinnamon.
• Pork tastes best after it has been cooked and allowed to rest for at least a day. The day it is prepared the gravy will be quite hot and spicy and not as much the next day.
• Pork bafath tastes best with sannas or pau.

Prawn / Shrimp Caldeen Curry

My blog has many Goan and Mangalorean recipes. I grew up eating a lot of different types of Mangalorean fish curries, while I don't eat fish, I absolutely love the red fiery curry. And after my marriage to a Goan, I got introduced to authentic Goan food. Caldeen is a very popular Goan curry, made with fish or prawns and if you'd like to mix it up you can add vegetables too to this delicacy. The recipe I share with you is very simple to make and if you are a vegetarian you can turn prawn caldeen into cauliflower caldeen. It is delish. This recipe is one of the first recipes I learnt and tried, and I've never looked back. I have seen many caldeen recipes that require many ingredients which in turn lengthens the cooking time and at times can daunt a novice.

The recipe I share with you is one of the easiest things to cook and is ready in a matter of minutes. This dish has very delicate flavors and coconut is the pre-dominant one. I always cook caldeen curry with shrimp and at times add either cauliflower or okra. It's a great combination, however unbelievable it may seem and is an excellent way to add vegetables to your meal without having to cook a separate vegetable side dish.

Recipe credit: Ms Rozita Coutinho

Ingredients:

1. Prawns - 200 gms (peeled, washed and drained)
2. Onion - 1 medium sized, chopped
3. *Green chilly - 2 nos, slit
4. Vinegar - 1/2 - 1 tbsp.
5. Coconut milk - 400 ml
6. Oil and salt as required

Spice mix:
Cumin powder - 1 tsp

*Pepper powder - 1 tsp

Turmeric powder - 1/2

*Caldeen is supposed to be a mildly spiced curry so use your discretion while using green chilly and pepper.

Method:

1. Add 1/2 tsp salt, a pinch of turmeric and half of the vinegar to the prawns. Mix well and set aside.
2. Heat oil in a pan, add the onions and fry till they are translucent.
3. Add the spice mix and fry well. Add the prawns, green chilly and the remaining vinegar, mix well. Let it cook for about a minute or two and then stir in the coconut milk.
4. Let the curry come to a boil, then lower the flame and cook for about two to three minutes.

Notes:
Prawns cook fast so donot cook the curry for too long.
In case you are adding any vegetables, cook the vegetables till almost done and then add the prawns.
Always add the vinegar before adding the coconut milk or the coconut milk might curdle.