Home -made Cappuccino with instant coffee

Cappuccino as we all know is consists of an espresso, on which the the hot foamed milk is being poured, resulting in a thick milk foam on top. Well like many of you I too am a big fan of cappuccino, but the only thing is I make very bad coffee. So I never tried to experiment this at home. Moreover I have been thinking that as it is I don't have a coffee brewing machine so this is like a big no-no for me. During the day after I send my husband & daughter to office & school, I start my routine work at home and once I finish doing all I make a nice cup of tea. Today when I was entering the kitchen for making my tea , I saw the coffee packet lying in the cupboard. And I suddenly thought of cappuccino somehow. I started searching in net if I can make it without any machine and espresso. And yes it is possible and that too super easy to make with instant coffee. So I checked the process and without wasting much time I started making this. Trust me a real fun it was. And the result .. that you can see in the pictures. Do try this at your home. Now I am waiting for PB to come home so that I can make one for him :)

I referred this :
http://allafiorentina.com/food/recipes/cappuccino-without-espresso-machine/

Ingredients:

These measurements are for 1 cup only.

Instant coffee: 1/2 tsp
Sugar:1 heaped tsp (I like my coffee sweet, you can minimise the quantity)
Cocoa powder: less than 1/2 tsp (optional/ I just added it to see how the taste comes out)
Milk: 1 cup (use full fat milk to get a better result)
Some more Cocoa powder : for dusting on the cappuccino

Process:

Warm the milk in a saucepan.
In your coffee mug , take the coffee powder, cocoa powder, sugar. Add approx. a tablespoon of warm water and mix them well

Now take the hot milk in a mug and whip the milk with the help of a whisk keeping it in between the palms of your hand and whip it continuously till you get the desired thick froth.

Swirl the mug in a circle to condense the foam together. Repeat the process until the foam looks nice and creamy.
Finally pour the milk into the coffee in the other mug. Allow the foam to come out by shaking your wrist side to side while pouring the milk. Or you can use a spoon to take out the foam and place it on the top of the coffee. Dust some cocoa powder on it. You can actually sprinkle some choco chip as well if you want. I just forgot to try it this time whereas I had a full packet of choco chip at home :( .
Gonna do it for his cuppa.

And your instant cappuccino with instant coffee is ready to be served. Enjoy !!

 

Chicken Afghani

Afghani chicken is a delicious dish mildly spiced recipe of chicken with lot of curd and few spices. I just love the tanginess of this dish because of the use of lot of curd and lemon. This was the first time that I have cooked afghani chicken. If you search on net you will get hundreds of ways to prepare this afghani chicken. I was reading the newspaper on a particular sunday when I saw this recipe there and found this quite easy & interesting and I followed the same. This dish has gravy version as well as grilled. If you wish to grill then go for boneless chicken. I used chicken with bones as I wanted to make it in gravy form.
We had this with some paneer paratha and onion slices dipped in vinegar. However PB suggested me that this was not going very well with the parathas, so I am thinking the next time we should have it with rice or some plain roti.

Ingredients:

Chicken: 1/2 kg
Onion: 1 large sized chopped finely
Curd: 1 & 1/2 cups
Garlic coves: 20
Crushed black pepper: 1 tsp
Oil: 3 tbsp.
Salt to taste
Lemon juice: 3 tbsp.

Method:

Clean and wash the chicken pieces and keep aside. Keep 4-5 garlic cloves aside and thinly slice rest of the garlic cloves.

Heat oil in a pan.  Fry the chopped onions till it turns into golden brown. Now add the sliced garlic cloves and fry. Add chicken , mix them well, cover with lid and cook the chicken keep checking in between. Finally add the black pepper, salt, lemon juice, curd and mix everything well and cook till tender. Add some water at this point of time and let it thicken a bit. In another pan saute the remaining garlic cloves and add it to the chicken. Serve hot with rice or roti.

 

Finger-licking Chicken Biryani in a simple & easy way

 

Sometimes I feel lazy to cook a proper meal and I try to find an easy way to make a filling dish. Last sunday when I saw some chicken lying In my refrigerator I somehow had a  craving for biriyani. But then biriyani Is again a long process I would have to follow. Without much of a thinking I decided to make it in a simple easy way with whatever ingredients available at home that day. Heres how it came out. Look wise taste wise it really came out to be great. I have cooked biryani before also but this time PB just loved it and complimented without me asking for it.
I made a simple pineapple pomegranate raita to go with it and that tasted awesome as well.


Ingredients:

Basmati Rice: 1 cup
Chicken: 500 gms
Onion: 1 medium sized finely sliced
Garlic cloves: 10
Ginger: 1 medium sized
Potato: 2 medium sized cut into two (optional)
Egg: 1 hard boiled cut into two halves (optional)
Cinnamon stick: 1 medium sized
Cardamom: 2
Cloves: 3-4
Mace: 2-3
Biryani Masala: 2 tsp
Chicken Masala: 1 tsp
Chilli powder: 1tsp
Turmeric Powder: 1 tsp
Juice of one lime
Curd: 1 cup
Salt to taste
Saffron: few strands soaked in 2 tbsp. warm milk in a small bowl
Fresh Coriander leaves : roughly chopped handful
Mint leaves: roughly chopped handful
Ghee:  2 tbsp.
Refine oil: 2 tbsp.
Water as required to cook rice & for  chicken gravy

Method:

Soak the rice in water for at least an hour or so.

Make paste of ginger and garlic.

Clean and wash the chicken pieces. Add half of the ginger garlic paste, salt, chilli powder, 1/2 tsp turmeric powder, curd and mix everything well. Keep it in refrigerator for about an hour or so. I kept it for only half an hour as I had less time in my hand.

Heat oil in your biryani making handi. I used my non-stick deep bottomed pan with lid. Fry the sliced onions till they are golden brown and keep them on tissue once done. Now fry the potato pieces till golden brown and transfer to the tissue paper. In the same oil add the remaining ginger garlic paste, saute them. Add the chicken masala & biriyani masala, fry them for few seconds. Now add  the marinated chicken ,mix everything well. After some time add about half cup of water to it and half -cook the chicken.

At the same time, boil water in a large saucepan to cook the rice. Add the cardamom, cinnamon, cloves, mace, salt and bring the water to boil. Add the rice and remove from gas when its half cooked. Strain the water through a strainer. Add a spoon of lemon juice to the rice and mix gently so that the rice does not get stick and looks fresh.

Once the chicken is half done put the flame off. Don't make the chicken complete dry , let it be in a gravy form. Transfer half of the cooked chicken to a bowl. Layer half of the rice on the chicken on the pan, add the potatoes, add half of the fried onion, sprinkle the chopped coriander & mint leaves. Layer the remaining chicken on this, egg and then the remaining rice. Now sprinkle the rest of the fried onions, coriander & mint leaves and the ghee. Take the lime juice in a bowl and add the remaining 1/2 tsp turmeric powder and mix well. Now make holes on the rice layer and pour in the saffron dipped in milk and the lime juice-turmeric powder mixture. Cover tightly the pan with the lid ensuring no pressure gets releases. Let it be on a low flame for about 20 minutes.

Serve this hot biryani with some raita of your choice and enjoy. 

 

Sweet potato gulab jamun

Gulab Jamun is definitely a delicious and popular dessert in india. Back in home I remember mom used to make jamuns with sweet potatoes. This is one particular sweet I have seen almost every house in Assam makes during our festival bihu.  An easy and quick recipe of jamun other than the normal gulab jamun recipe where we have to use paneer /khoya. Soft and light and no compromise on the taste. Do try this once I am sure you wont be disappointed.

Ingredients:

Sweet Potato: 3 medium sized
Plain flour:  3 tbsp.
Milk powder: 2 tsp
Soda bicarbonate: a pinch
Salt: a pinch
Sugar: 1 cup
Water: 1 cup
Cardamom powder: 1/2 tsp
Saffron: few strands
Rose essence: 1/2 tsp
Oil for deep frying

Method:


Wash the sweet potatoes properly. Cut them and pressure cook upto 2 whistles.
Once done transfer into a strainer and let the them dry. Now peel off the skin and put them in a bowl. Mash with a help of a spoon or fork. Add flour, soda, salt, milk powder and combine them all well. If you find the mixture a bit sticky , you can always add some extra flour. And if it gets dry add few drops of milk. After mixing them well to a smooth texture, make small portions out of the mixture and make balls.

At the same time make sugar syrup by boiling sugar in water in a saucepan until it is a bit thick. Add cardamom and saffron & rose essence in it.

Heat oil in a deep bottomed kadhai/pan for deep frying the jamuns. Slide down the jamuns one by one into the hot oil keeping the flame low to medium. Fry 4-5 jamuns at a time. Keep turning them while frying till they are golden brown. Repeat the same process for rest of the jamuns. Transfer them to the paper napkin.

Once the jamuns are cold add them into the sugar syrup. Let the jamuns get soaked in the syrup completely. Allow the jamuns to stand in the syrup for an hour or so before serving. This will help to get the typical sweet potato smell out of the jamuns which you may not like while eating them.

Enjoy !

 

Corn Pulav

Few days back I was searching for some pulav options where I got to know about this sweet corn pulav. As corn is something that all three of us like to eat so I thought to give it a try yesterday for our dinner. It is a easy and quick flavourful recipe , a delicious indian recipe served as main course. I made makhni paneer as side dish with the pulav, a nice combination altogether and we all loved it.

Ingredients:

For the masala:

Onion: 1 medium sized
Garlic: 4-5 cloves
Ginger: one small portion
Cashew nuts: 5-6 soaked in water for 10-15 mins
Black pepper corns: 7-8 number
Cinnamon: 1 stick
Cloves & cardamom  : 2-3 of each


Other ingredients:
Basmati rice /or any other rice with nice aroma: 1 1/2 cups
Sweet corn: 1 cup
Milk: 1/2 cup
Water: 1 cup
Green chillies: 1 or 2
Salt to taste
Mint and coriander leaves: handful
Bay leaves: 1 or2
Cardamom: 2-3
Oil: 2 tbsp.

Method:

Soak the rice in water for about an hour or so.

Make a smooth paste out of the ingredients mentioned under ingredients for the masala.

I cooked the pulav in pressure cooker. If you wish you can make it in handi as well.

Heat oil in the pressure cooker. Add bay leaves, cardamom, chilli and let it splutter. Now add the masala paste and stir fry. Add the corn and mix everything well and fry for about a minute or so. Add the milk , keep stirring for another minute or two and bring it to boil. Add rice, salt, coriander and mint leaves , combine all well and add water. Give it a nice stir and pressure cook upto 2 whistles.

Once done, let the pressure gets release on its own. Transfer the pulav to a serving dish and serve hot with any side dish you wish to enjoy with this delicious pulav.

 

Holi special Thandai

Whenever we hear about Thandai we connect to the festivals like holi or mahashivratri. A chilled  milk based drink with strong flavours of almonds, fennel seeds, poppy seeds, black pepper. Awesome in taste and it cools you down. This holi I decided to make thandai at home only and it was liked by all. As the original way of making thandai don't mention to reduce the milk , however I did it as ii wanted that natural yellowish colour of the milk that we get once the mil gets reduces and thickens after simmering for a long time. You can avoid this step of reducing the milk as its quite time consuming. I did use few strands of kesar/saffron for the aroma and colour too.

Ingredients:

Milk: 1 & 1/2 ltr full fat milk
Sugar: 5-6 tbsp. (you can increase/decrease the quantity as per your taste bud)
Almond: 10-12 numbers
Cashew nuts: 7-8 numbers
Poppy seeds: 2 tsp
Fennel seeds - grounded into powder : 2 tsp
Crushed and powdered black pepper: take 6-7 numbers of black pepper
Cardamom powder: 1 tsp
Saffron/kesar: few strands - 7 or 8
Pistachios & few more saffron strands: for garnishing



Method:

Soak the almonds, cashew nuts, poppy seeds in water for about an hour or so.

Boil the milk in heavy bottomed pan. After the first boil , add the sugar. Take out 2-3 tbsp. of hot milk in a small bowl and soak the saffron strands.
Let the milk simmer till the it reduces to half by continuously checking and stirring.

In the mean while make a smooth paste out of the soaked almonds, cashew nuts, poppy seeds.

Once the milk starts reducing add the above paste and mix well. Let it simmer for some 10-12 minutes. Finally add the powdered black pepper, powdered fennel seeds and cardamom powder. Pour the saffron soaked along with the milk. Give it a nice mix. After a minute or two put the flame off.

Now you can serve it in two ways , either you transfer the thandai to glasses directly , keep it in refrigerator to chill and then serve OR if you want you can strain the mixture first through a strainer , discard the residue, transfer the thandai to glasses, make it chill and serve. Garnish with pistachios and saffron before serving.