Alu kabli/Alu Chat/Potato-Chickpeas Salad

As the spice adds the taste in your meal, tasty snack adds the spice to your daily life . Choice of snack everyday for me is a difficult job. Although we keep in home a lot of ready made snacks but nothing can compare with chat. The tangy and spicy taste literally waters mouth when ever we even talk about it. I make often dahi bara (lentil dumplings in yogurt sauce), papri chat, fruit chat, samosa chat, raj kachori and fuchka at home, but the easiest one is alu kabli or alu chat. This item is a healthy snack, too. This can be served as a salad item, too, in a lunch or dinner party.

 

Remember the tiffin time in our school days. We used to have a line of snack providers outside the school gate. Only two vendors were allowed to enter inside our school campus during the tiffin time. One was samosa seller and the other was the alu kabli seller. Though I never got a chance of buying any of those items during my school days as my parents being very strict did not hand over to us any pocket money but my friends being very generous and close to us used to share the tasty tangy alu kabli chat in a shalpata shell (one kind of container made out of shaal leaf) served with kathi/sticks. Those pieces of tangy salty and spicy potato and bites of chickpeas made our chitchat during lunch break memorable forever.  Till now everywhere in India out of all street food corners alu chat or alukabli is one of the hot selling chat item amongst all.

Ingredients

1. Boiled potato: 2 cups
2. Chickpeas: 1 cup
3. Tamarind date chutney: 1/4 cup
4. Black salt: as per taste
5. Green chillies : 3/4
6. Onion: 1 small
7. Ginger: 1 teaspoon (optional)
8. Cucumber: 2 tablespoon
9. Bhaja masla (roasted spice): 2 teaspoon
10. Lemon juice: 2 teaspoon
11. Jhuri bhaja : 2 tablespoon for garnishing

Steps:

1. Boil the potato. I boiled medium sized two potatoes. Don't over cook the potato. While boiling please add a spoon of salt into the water. This will actually help to let the salt enter inside the potato. Cool the potato before you make the alu kabli. Hot potatoes don't add the taste needed here.

2. You can soak chickpeas overnight or for 6-8 hours and boil it in water. Make sure they are soft but not mushy. This should also be cooled down completely before you make the chat. You can also use canned cooked chickpeas. You need to strain away the liquid from the chick peas, Wash it before you make the preparation.

3. To make the bhaja masla, dry roast cumin and whole red chillies. I used 2 whole red chillies and 3 teaspoons of whole cumin seeds. When you see the color of red chillies and cumin changes to darker shade and nice aroma comes out, take the pan out of heat immediately. Don't let it burn. Cool it and grind it in a mixer. I used my coffee grinder for this purpose. You can store this masala in an air tight container for future use.

4. Chop cucumber, onions, green chillies into fine/small pieces. Also finely chop ginger but this input is optional. If you do not like the taste of ginger, you can skip it. That does not differ the taste a lot.

5. You can make tamarind chutney fresh at home or you can also use regular store bought tamarind or tamarind-date chutney. I have used this time tamarind-date chutney of  Deep brand. I love this chutney. For chat preparation this ready made chutney saves a lot of time.  To make Tamarind chutney at home follow this steps:

    a. Soak 1 cup tamarind (without seeds) in two cups of warm water for half an hour.
    b. Extract pulp and strain to remove fiber.
    c. Take a heavy-bottomed pan, add the tamarind pulp and 1.5-2 cup jaggery .
    d. Cook on low heat.
    e. Add salt as per your taste.
    f. Remove from heat and allow to cool.
    g. Store in an air-tight container.

6. Now your job is to mix all the ingredients. In a bowl first add the potato, then the chickpeas or kabuli chana, then the chopped vegetables like cucumber, onions and green chilies. Add the lemon juice, black salt, and the tamarind chutney. Mix them well. Check for salt taste. Adjust as per your requirement. You might add chopped cilantro if you like. I did not add it, so I did not mention in the ingredients list.

7. Your alu kabli is ready to serve. Garnish it with some jhuri bhaja or bhujia.

Enjoy!!!!!

Narkel Nadu/Sweet Coconut Balls

Although the Puja days are gone, hang over is still on me. Still reminiscing the days of Puja this year and previous years. The last day of Durga Puja is known to us as Bijaya Dashami. Ma Durga returns back to Kailash with her children after a short 5 days trip to Mother earth and we give her farewell offering sweet and sindur (vermillion). Although we feel deeply disheartened at the depart of Devi Durga, but the sadness is balanced with sweets and savories for Bijaya Dashami. We used to visit all relatives and friend's homes nearby and offered pronams(regards) to our elders and best wishes and love to our friends and younger ones and were blessed to get plates of nimki, narkel naru (sweet coconut balls), dai borha (lentil dumplings in yogurt syrup), sandesh (sweet made of cottage cheese), chandrapuli (coconut sweet made in a special mold) etc. Our Puja vacation fun used to get doubled with the fun visit to many homes in evening with our parents to their friends' homes for Bijaya trips. Although there was a custom that only males can do kolakuli (hugs in a special way), the kids used to follow them. And in each home we used to get varieties of snack plates consisting sweets and salty snacks. But each plate surely used to contain narkel naru (sweet coconut balls) made of either sugar or jaggery.

Far off from home, we now follow the Bijaya tradition by calling our relatives and friends over phone or drop an email or by another smart way - updating Facebook status for all but that does not stop us to crave for the traditional Bijaya snack plate. And yes if there is none to serve you the plate then self-help is the wisest way. I made the ideal Bijaya dashami snack plate with ghugni (spicy peas curry), nimki (or namak paray), and two types of narkel naru. Let me share with you the recipe of narkel naru here.

Narkel Naru with Jaggery

Narkel naru is an essential part of our festive savory. We make it very often it on or off purpose. Although I love narkel naru made with sugar, my hubby's favorite is narkel naru made with gur/jaggery.

Ingredients:

1. Shredded coconut : 1 packet (I have used frozen shredded coconut, you can use fresh shredded coconut, too)
2. Jaggery/Gur: 2.5 cup (almost double the coconut amount)
3. Cardamom  powder : 1 teaspoon
4. Water: 1/4 cup
5. Ghee for making balls (optional)

Steps:

1. First you need to thaw the frozen coconut. I have kept the frozen coconut packet outside for more than 6 hours to thaw. If you are using fresh coconut, you don't need this step at all.

2. I have used date's molasses or  nolen gurh as the jaggery. You can also use normal jaggery or sugar cane jaggery for this purpose. You need to dilute the jaggery with water. To melt solid jaggery you can microwave it with little water (1/4cup approx.) for 2-3 minutes. Or you can directly pour mentioned amount of water in the kadhai and then the jaggery. You  can break the jaggery with little pressure through your ladle. When the jaggery melts, you can proceed to the next step.

3. Now add the shredded coconut and mix it well with the melted jaggery. Don't cook it on high heat. Always cook on medium heat and don't leave cooking unattended at all for a minute to stop the risk of burning.

4. Add fresh cardamom powder.  Mix it well with the coconut mixture. If you are offering it to God/Goddess, you can also apply some camphor dust with this mixture to get a special smell. When you feel the mixture is enough sticky to make small balls, switch off the heat. For me it took 10 minutes to get the desired consistency. Longer time the mixture on the heat makes the naru harder.You can keep on heat depending on how hard naru/ball you want to make. 

5. Cool it off for 5-6 minutes. Apply some ghee on your palm and make balls from the mixture.

6. Serve it and Enjoy.

Narkel Naru with Sugar

Although my mom used to make mostly jaggery version of naru but I have always liked the white narkel naru made with sugar instead of jaggery. To make it more tastier you can add khoya kheer/mewa/milk powder.

Ingredients

1. Shredded coconut : 1 packet (I have used frozen shredded coconut, you can use fresh shredded coconut, too)
2. Sugar: 2.5 cup (almost double the coconut amount)
3. Cardamom  powder : 1 teaspoon
4. Khoya kheer/milk powder/mawa: 1cup
5. Ghee for making balls (optional)

Steps:

1. First you need to thaw the frozen coconut. I have kept the frozen coconut packet outside for more than 6 hours to thaw. If you are using fresh coconut, you don't need this step at all.

2. If you are using khoya kheer/mawa block, shred it for use. In case you don't have khoya, you can substitute it with milk powder. 

3. Take a heavy bottomed pan and put it on a medium to low heat.

4. Add shredded coconut and sugar.  The sugar will start melting and coconut will change the color. Stir it continuously to mix it. Don't let it stick it to the bottom of the pan.

5. Add Khoya kheer to the pan and mix it well with the sugar-coconut mixture. Stir it until khoya melts and makes good bond with the mixture.

6. When you see the mixture dries up and no longer sticks to the pan, your mixture is ready for making balls. Do not over dry it other wise you can not form the ball. When you feel it is almost done, you can take a spoon of mixture and try to make ball to test the accuracy.

7. Cool it off for 5-6 minutes. Don't cool it completely. When the mixture is warm, make balls out of the mixture.

8. Store it in air-tight container and refrigerate it.

Durga Shosthi Special Luchi, Chholar daal, Begun Bhaja ar Alu Chechki/Puri,Chana dal, Fried Egg Plant and Bengali Potato Curry

Durge Durge Mangalo dayini 

Mahisasur Mardini Jai ma Durge

The biggest festival of the year is here. Today is Maha Shosthi. This auspicious day marks the beginning of Durgotsav. Every Bengali household is agog with warm enthusiasm to welcome Ma. Once in an article Bir Sanghvi has penned down correctly " You can take the craze of Diwali in Delhi, Christmas in London, Summer Carnival in Rio de Janeiro, Valentine's day in Paris and then add it to the month long madness of Olympic Games or the World Cup and cram all that into a span of 5 days and you still wouldn't know what you are missing if you haven't been in Kolkata during Durga Puja". Being far away from own city, street, till I can feel the madness, craze, and passion about this particular time over there. The unique rhythm of Dhak (one special percussion instrument), fragrance of Shiuli ful, Stholo Padma (flower grown on land that looks like Lotus), kash ful, Mahisasur Mardini recital by Legend Birendra Krishna Bhadra, people around all decked up in new fashionable clothes, accessories, puja special editions of favorite magazines, special editions of music albums by favorite singers, and what not. The number of such Puja special items goes on to infinite.

On each day of Durga Puja we eat special items. That starts from Mahashosthi itself. Especially all the mothers have to perform special puja for their children. I remember my mother used to put a big tip/bindi/tilak on my forehead of yogurt and turmeric powder mixture and also tie a thread soaked into the same mixture. I am following the same tradition. Although I presumed to have a strong opposition to apply the bindi on my son's forehead,  to my astonishment I found that my son asked me to make the bindi bigger on his forehead and proudly carried the same way to school. I love this little traditional instinct in my son.
On this auspicious day we are not supposed eat any rice item and also burnt or roasted items. Also we eat only vegetarian food. And Bengali vegetarian food means the food should be cooked with no onions and garlic. So the traditional way of shosthi platter would be luchi/puri, chholar dal (chana daal/ split black gram),alu chenchki (Bengali special potato curry) and makha sandesh (Handmade cheese ball) as desert.

Luchi/Puri

Ingredients:

1. Flour/Maida: 4 cups
2. White Oil: 4 tablespoon for the dough
3. Salt: 1.5 teaspoon
4. Water: 1 and 1/4 cup
5. White oil for frying

Steps:

1. Take flour/maida in a deep bowl. Add salt and 4 tablespoons of oil and mix in together with your hand. The amount of oil in the dough is very important to make good quality luchi/puri. After a lot of experiments I have discovered that 1 cup flour : 1 tablespoon of oil makes good soft luchis. Also Bengalies make luchi only with maida, not mixed with ata (wheat flour) or only ata (wheat flour).

2. Add water slowly in the bowl and mix it well. Pour water as and when needed. Depending on the variety of flour the water amount varies. I have checked this time it took 1 and 1/4 cup of water. Knead it well untill the dough stops sticking to the wall of the bowl.

3. Heat oil in kadhai. You need to put enough oil so that you can deep fry the flattened balls.

4. Divide the dough into equal sized round balls. We call it in Bengali "lechi". With my dough I could make around 30 lechis/balls.

5. With the help of a rolling pin/belna flatten the balls into smooth round discs. Use little oil to roll it on. Many people use flour to dust the surface. I have seen my mom to use oil to flatten the balls to discs, so I have followed the same. Another reason is that the surface remains clean and mess-free with oil compared to using flour. I do not use chaki to flatten on, use counter top, only. I have flattened 5/6 lechis to discs at a time and then fried them and started to flatten the next batch. You can flatten all the balls into discs at once but make sure they do not dry up.When you are frying in large quantity, batch by batch rolling and frying can give you better result.

6.  The temperature of the oil is very essential to get white luchis. What should be the perfect temperature of oil you can understand by experience I say. I can not mention the exact temperature in degree measurement, as I do not have cooking thermometer. But one hint is that the oil should be hot enough but the smoke should not come out. Also when oil is hot, reduce the temperature to medium and then fry.

7. Put the disc into kadhai/pan from side, use a frying ladle or jhanjhri to continuously stir and press the disc from sides so that it pops up. When one side is done, turn it to the other side and fry. Take it out of the oil and serve.

 

 

Chholar Daal

Chholar daal/Chana daal is one kind of lentil/daal that we eat on special occasions mostly. In our home we used to eat chana daal on Durga Shosthi or Maha Ashtami day. Although today I did not cook it but have clicked the pictures some days back and had been thinking to post but somehow it did not materialize. But today since I made luchi, I thought of sharing with you the ideal meal that can not be fulfilled excluding chholar dal.

Ingredients:

1. Chana daal/Split Black Gram/Chholar Daal: 3  cups
2. Whole Garam Masala: 1 cinnamon stick, 4 green cardamom pods, 5/6 cloves
3. Bay leaf: 3
4.Green chilli: 2
5. Raisin: 8/10 (soaked)
6. Turmeric powder: 1 teaspoon  
7. Ginger crushed: 1 tablespoon
8. Cumin powder: 1 teaspoon (optional)
9. Asafoetidia/hing: A pinch
10. Dried Red chilli: 2
11.Shredded coconut: 2 tablespoon
12. salt as per taste
13: Sugar: 2 teaspoon (as per taste)
14. Oil/Ghee/Clarified butter:1.5 tablespoon


Steps:

1. Boil daal with approximate double amount of water with 2/3 green cardamoms, 1 bay leaf, 2 cloves, half of a cinnamon stick, 1/2 teaspoon turmeric. You may use a pressure cooker to boil it faster. I have used pressure cooker. Mostly after 10 minutes of cooking the steam would be built up and when you can hear one whistle turn the heat off. Take the pressure pin out and let the pressure slowly release the steam. By then the daal should be soft, tender yet not mushy. If you find it is not cooked properly, cook it little longer but be cautious of not over cooking it. 

2. Heat oil/ghee/clarified butter in a kadhai/pan. Add the remaining whole garam masala, bay leaf, red chillies whole in to the pan. I have cooked it with white oil and added 1 teaspoon ghee at the end.

3. When the nice aroma comes out, add freshly crushed ginger and remaining 1/2 teaspoon turmeric powder and cumin powder(optional). Fry well and add asafoetidia/hing and green chillies and also shredded coconut into the pan. Don't let the masala burn.

4. Add the boiled daal and let it simmer 3/4 minutes. Add salt and sugar at this point.  Stir to mix well.

5. Add water and also pre-soaked raisins to the pan. Mix well. Let it simmer and boil for sometimes. The daal would not be very much liquid, mostly would be thick.

6. Turn the heat off. If you have not cooked it with ghee ,at this point add the ghee and cover. Wait for 2/3 minutes and you can serve it with luchi/Puri, Pulao, Fried rice.

Alu Chenchki/Bengali Simple Potato Curry

Alu is an everyday food of all Bengali. Being diabetic, I have to discard alu now from my daily meal. But whenever if by chance I am having the taste of atleast one piece cooked potato, I feel like I am in heaven. Now I realize the need of this item more than before. When ever we cook luchi at home my hubby wants me to serve it with  his favorite alu chenchki. It is cooked with least spices and supposed to be served white in color. Although there lies little controversy in the proposed color and varies family to family.

Ingredients:

1. Potato/Alu: 3 big
2. Onion seeds/Kalonji/Kalojeere: 1.5 teaspoon
3. Asafoetidia/hing: A pinch
4.  Salt: As per taste
5. Sugar: 1 teaspoon
6. Oil: 2 tablespoon
7. Green Chillies: 4

Steps:

1. Peel and dice the potatoes into small cubes. 

2. Heat oil in a kadhai. Add the kalojeere/kalonji/onion seeds and slit green chillies in the oil. Let them sizzle and reduce the heat.

3. Add the diced potatoes, stir them well so they get coated with oil and then cover the kadhai and let the potatoes simmer.

4. Add salt, give a stir again and then cover. I try to always cover and cook. I try to use less water to make things tender unless mandatory. It helps to keep the taste of the spice and vegetable/item intact, not getting diluted with water.  

5. When the potatoes are soft, add little sugar.  To make gravy add 1/2 cup of water. Let it boil and then break the potatoes with the laddle in the kadhai. This curry will be not watery, rather dried  sabji. 

6. The color of your sabji/alu chenchki would be white. Goes very well with luchi/puri. You can also serve it with chapati/roti. If you want you can add turmeric powder but I prefer this sabji to be white only.

Begun Bhaja

Do you all remember the Dhara mustard oil advertisement long back. They used to display begun bhaja/ fried egg plant pieces that made me feel hungry instantly. Bengalies signature includes this simple item and common in every household. Although we taste it very often but we want more. "yeh dil mange more". So when I am making luchi, why should not I make my favorite begun bhaja. Yes my heart wanted it and I made it. Also my son is a fond of this item.

Ingredients

1. Egg plant: 1 big
2. Salt : 1.5 teaspoon
3. Turmeric powder 1 teaspoon
4. Sugar: 1/2 teaspoon
5. Oil for frying

Steps:

1. Cut the egg plant into thick (roughly 1/2 inches thick) round shapes. The bigger rounds can be halved.

2. Rub the pieces with salt, turmeric and sugar and set it aside for 10 minutes.

3. Heat oil in a nonstick pan and shallow fry the egg plant pieces. Egg plants absorb a lot of oil. After one side is cooked, don't add more oil. Turn the eggplants to other side. Cover the pan and cook. It will slowly release the oil it has absorbed. Check in between so that they don't get burnt. If needed add 1/2 teaspoons of oil. 

4. Switch off the heat and serve it with luchi or ruti or even rice.

Alu Potol die Machher Jhol/Carp Cooked in a Potato-Pointed Gourd Gravy

I have been off for quite some time due to my ill health. I have been recently diagnosed with diabetes. That makes me feel sick for on and off. Although I am on a very strict diet and medication, my negligence towards my health is forcing me to highly pay off. Uhhh..Now I understand why the yearly check up is so important for us.

Puja is knocking our door. All of your puja shopping must have been complete by now. The matching accessories and jewelry must have been added to your stock, too. Those like us who are far from our home country now rely a lot on online shopping. Some are fortunate to be close to a few Indian shops. Some rely on the good recent trips to own country and bring a lot of special clothing and accessories to use in the special occasions like Durga Puja, Diwali. This year I had been planning to visit India which some how did not materialize. I had planned to buy some sarees from a few boutiques in Kolkata but that did not happen. So I was little morose. But I had no idea how Durga Ma has stored surprise for me. The last week end we visited Diwali Mela in DC. There were many stalls carrying varieties of clothes and sarees, and jewelries. I found there one and only Bengali stall carrying the sarees of my choice. I got one and felt really blessed.  After 3 years I am going to wear a new saree in Durga Puja.

Now lets come to the food part. Certainly we will be engaged in tempting, mouth watering, rich aromatic food during this festive season. So before the Puja starts I thought of cooling the body with simple machher jhol and bhat. It can make your stomach ready for the upcoming ceremonial food varieties. I got good big pointed gourds during my last visit to local Indian grocery store. I have not made fish curry with potato and pointed gourd for some years as we don't get the good sized potol or pointed gourd here very often.  Whenever I got them, I have made several other recipes than this. This time I did not leave the chance of making this simple every day delicacy of all Bengalies.

Ingredients:

1. Carp/Rohu/Katla fish: 6 pieces
2. Alu/Potato: 1 big
3. Pointed Gourd/Potol: 8
4. Ginger paste: 1 tablespoon
5. Tomato: 1 medium
6. Panch Foron: 1 teaspoon
7.Randhuni/Carom seeds: 1/2 teaspoon
8.Slit green chillies: 4
9. Coriander powder: 1 teaspoon
10. Cumin powder: 1 teaspoon
11: Turmeric powder: 1 teaspoon  (additional required for marinating fish)
12. Red chilli powder: 1/2 teaspoon
13. Salt as per taste
14. Hot Water: 2 cups
15. Mustard oil


Steps:

1. Marinate the fish with salt and turmeric for 10-15 minutes. Add little mustard oil on the fish and rub before adding it to Kadhai/pan. That helps less oil spluttering while frying the fish.

2. Heat mustard oil in kadhai. When the smoke comes out, reduce the heat to medium and the fish pieces to the pan. I have fried the fish until they browned from all the sides. You can fry it to your desired level.

3. Meanwhile you can cut the potato and pointed gourd to longitudinal pieces. You need to peel the potato and then cut them into vertical pieces. We have been following this particular way of chopping potato for any jhol/soup cooking for generations. Really I have no reason of following this pattern of chopping other than to maintain the tradition.

4. Peel the ponited gourd in way that it has some ridges left on the skin. You can actually peel off every alternate strip. 

5. Rub the potato and pointed gourd with salt and turmeric.

6. Make a paste of fresh ginger. Since I am not using a lot of spices, I have not used any store bought ready made spices. That really varies the taste. I do not use at all ready made ginger garlic paste from stores. Specially for this kind of simple dishes, the taste varies a lot with fresh ingredients.

7. Add Cumin powder, Turmeric powder, Red chilli powder and Coriander powder in a bowl. Add little water to it and make a mixture of spices and set aside.  I prefer to make fresh coriander and cumin powder at home as I don't like the store bought ready made powders that does not contain any flavor.

8. Heat 2 tablespoons of Mustard oil in a kadhai. I have used a fresh kadhai to make the jhol/gravy. I have not used the same kadhai or the oil left over after frying the fish. Since I am not using any onion or garlic in the recipe, the oil left after frying the fish would still contain the smell of fish. I have discarded the left over oil. You can save it and use it later to fry next batch of fish in future. When smoke comes out, turn the heat to medium.

9. Add  panch foron, carom seeds/randhuni (optional) and slit green chillies in kadhai. 

10. Add marinated potato in the kadhai. Fry it from all sides. Then add the pointed gourd pieces and fry them, too, also for a while until they change color. 

11. Add finely chopped tomato and fry it until the the red skin melts well in the oil. 

12. Add the spices mixture to the kadhai and fold it in well coated with the vegetables. Keep stirring to make sure the spice and vegetable does not stick to the bottom of the kadhai. When the oil oozes out of the spice, add the salt. 

13. Now heat 2 cups of water and add the hot water to the kadhai. When the gravy starts boiling, add fish pieces to it.  Cover and cook for 3-4 minutes.

14. Serve it hot with steamed white rice.

Enjoy