This is a seasonal sweet dish from Bengal. It’s made with oranges. When the oranges are added to the reduced milk... it takes the dish to a different level. As this being my favourite sweet dish, after marriage when ever I visited my Ma during the orange season, she would make this dish along with alur dom and luchi or korisutir Kochuri. Ma Ke haat ka khana can never be forgotten.
This dish is easy to make with only 3 ingredients, it taste heavenly.
Ingredients
1 1/2 litres Milk
3 Oranges
1/2 cup Sugar or more as per required
Method:
Heat the milk in a thick-bottomed pan till it comes to a boil. Reduce the flame, and allow the milk to simmer, stir the milk occasionally until the milk reduces to half the quantity. Add the sugar and continue to simmer for 10 to 15 minutes more. Keep the milk aside.
Meanwhile peel the orange, separate out the orange segments. Remove the skin, seeds and the fibres from the orange segments. Cut them into small pieces.
Once the reduced milk cools down, then add the chopped orange segments and pulp to the milk and mix it. Refrigerate the kheer. Server it cold.
Merry Christmas to all... may peace and happiness fills your heart 🎅🏼
We all have some sweet and naughty stories to tell of our childhood..... This recipe takes me back to my teenage, almost 30 years back. I being a teenager, was learning to open up my wings... exploring new things. I was always found of cooking.. as my school always encouraged us for the extra curricular activities - we had cooking class in our school. I had got this recipe from one of my neighbour Aunty, since this recipe content rum... me and my friend became very excited about this recipe. We use to buy a quarter bottle rum... half went into the cake and the other half into our stomach... with Bryan Adams songs playing at the background....
and my mother screaming at another end.
Later there was a Savvy magazine contest about the dishes you can store for a longer period of time... I had posted this recipe to them and this recipe was selected...
This cake can be prepared for any occasions...
This cake is moist and the taste is amazing. Please eat a day after you bake... this cake can be store for 2 months in the freezer. Wrap it in a foil and then in a sealed bag..
Ingredients
500 grams of Dates deseeded and chopped
200 grams of Walnuts chopped
50 grams of Black Raisins deseeded and chopped
50 grams of Truti Fruti
500 grams Sugar
1/2 tsp Salt
1/2 to A cup of Rum
6 Eggs
4 tbsp Ghee
3 1/2 cups of Whole Wheat flour
3 tsp Soda Bicarbonate
3 cups of Water
Method
Soak the chopped walnuts in rum for a day or more. Boil 3 cups of water, switch off the flame. Add the dates, raisins, truti fruti, sugar, salt, ghee and the soda bicarbonate. Cover and keep it aside to cool. Beat the eggs. Add the eggs and the the flour gradually into the date mixture and beat it. Add the walnut soaked in rum and mix it again. Take 4 baking mould - 2 of 1/2 kg and 2 of 250 grams each. Grease the baking moulds. Pour the batter up to 1/2 the baking mould. Bake the cake at 180 degrees for an hour approximately in an pre heated oven. Check the cake by inserting a tooth pick after 50 minutes, as different oven has different temperature levels. Once done, remove the cake. Cool the cake and remove from the mould. Cool it further on a cooling rack. Enjoy the cake the next day... this cake can be stored in a freezer for 2 months. Wrap the cake in a foil paper and then keep it in a sealed bag.
This is a side dish made with prawns and brinjal. Though the wet paste made with mustard seeds and other ingredients are commonly used in Bengali dishes to make Jhal, Paturi, Bhapa etc, and even brinjal is a common ingredient used along with fish to make curry, here I have tried out the recipe in a bit different way...
This dish can be made with other small fishes.
You can serve this dish with steamed rice.
Ingredients
1 medium size Bharta Baigan / Brinjal
10 to 12 medium size Prawns cleaned and deveined
1 small Onion or 1/4 part of the Onion
4 to 5 Garlic Cloves
4 to 6 Green Chillies as per the spiciness you require
Salt to taste
1/2 tsp Turmeric powder
1 tbsp Fresh or Desiccated Coconut
1 1/2 tbsp Mustard seeds
1 tsp Poppy seeds
1 tbsp Coriander leaves chopped
2 tbsp + 1 tsp Mustard Oil
2 tbsp Curd (Optional)
Method
Take the brinjal, cut the brinjal from the center horizontally leaving the end tail part of the brinjal intact. Scoop out the inner part of the brinjal on both the sides. Keep it aside. Now chop the scooped flesh of the brinjal and keep it aside. Take a grinder, add the onion, green chillies, garlic, mustard seeds, poppy seeds, coconut, turmeric powder and salt. Add little water and 2 tbsp of curd (optional), make a smooth paste. Rub little salt on the inner and outer parts of the brinjal. Take a bowl, add the prawn, chopped brinjal flesh, coriander leaves, 2 tbsp mustard oil and the paste. Mix all the ingredients together. Now stuff the prawn stuffing on one side of scooped brinjal. Cover it with the other side of the brinjal. Tie up the brinjal with a thread. Keep the stuffed brinjal in the refrigerator for an hour, Remove the brinjal from the fridge. Place the brinjal into a baking tray, pour the remaining mustard oil, and apply the oil on the brinjal. To bake, you can either bake it in a preheated OTG at 200 degrees Celsius for 15 to 20 minutes, turning the brinjal after 10 minutes to cook it evenly or to bake it on a gas stove, take a wok, place a pressure cooker stand into the wok, cover the the wok for 5 minutes on medium flame. Open the lid, place the tray on the cooker stand. Cover the lid and bake for 10 minutes on medium low flame, after 10 minutes turn the side then continue to cook for another 20 minutes with the lid covered. Remove the baking tray from the wok. Remove the thread, place the brinjal on a serving plate and open one side of the brinjal. Pour in the liquid of the baked brinjal and prawns. Garnish with coriander leaves and green chillies. Serve the dish with hot steaming rice.
Pickle making is my passion, I love to develop new pickle recipes, specially when it comes to non veg pickles adding up with vegetables...This is a Bengali style meat and tomato pickle. You can use any meat, here I have used pork.
For the Masala
Ingredients
1 tsp Cumin seeds
1 tsp Coriander seeds
1 tbsp Mustard seeds
1/4 tsp Fenugreek seeds
25 Garlic Cloves
2 to 3 small piece of Ginger
10 to 15 Green Chillies depending upon the spiciness you require
Method
Take a grinder, add the dry ingredients and coarsely grind into a powder. Keep it aside.
Now grind the ginger, garlic and green chillies into a coarse paste without adding any water, keep it aside.
Pork and Tomato Acchar
Ingredients
250 grams Pork meat + 125 pork fat cut into small pieces
375 grams Ripe Tomato chopped into small cubes
Dry Masala powder
Wet Masala
1 tsp Turmeric powder
1 tbsp Kashmiri Red Chilli powder
Salt to taste
1 1/2 tsp Sugar
1/2 tsp Panch Phoran
1/2 cup Vinegar
1/4 cup + 1/4 cup Mustard oil
Method
Take a strainer, add the pork pieces along with the pork fat in the strainer, sprinkle and apply salt on the pork, keep it aside for an hour or two for draining out the extra water. Pour 1/4 cup mustard oil in a heavy bottom pan. Let it heat up, add the pork pieces and fry the pork until golden in colour on a low medium flame. Remove and keep it aside. In the same pan, add the panch phoran, sauté for few seconds. Add the wet paste. Add the remaining mustard oil. Sauté and cook the paste on a low flame until the oil separates from the masala. Now add the tomato pieces. Sauté and cook the tomatoes until the tomatoes have become pulpy and the oil has separated from the tomatoes. Add the pork, continue to cook for 10 minutes. Add the dry masala, salt, sugar, turmeric powder and chilli powder. Continue to cook for another 2 to 3 minutes. Switch off the flame and add 1/4 cup of vinegar, stir and then add the remaining vinegar and stir, let the pickle cool down completely. Store the pickle in a dry glass container. This pickle can be preserved for 2 to 3 months in the refrigerator.
Halba Kosti Tribes from Madhaya Pradesh, who are weavers by professions came to Vidharba region of Maharastra Nagpur and settled there. They settled in large numbers and took up job at Empress Mill. They introduced Saoji Cuisine, their cuisine is fiery hot and spicy that needs an acquired taste. It’s the unique spice blend that makes the difference, it’s is slow cooked and linseed oil is used in the authentic recipe. Each house adds their twist to the spices. The recipes are closed guarded secret to each family. In 70s the first Saoji joint was opened in Nagpur, there after now many restaurants have opened selling Saoji Cuisine. They are mainly non vegetarian having mutton, chicken, fish. The cuisine is now known to the world by word of mouth.
For Saoji Masala
Ingredients
2 tbsp Coriander seeds
1 tsp Cumin seeds
1 tsp Shahi Jeera
8 Dry Red Patna Chillies
8 to 10 Black pepper corns
1 inch Cinnamon stick
1 Black Cardamom
4 Green Cardamom
4 Cloves
1/2 Nutmeg
1 Star Anise
1 tsp Dagad Phool / Stone Flower
1/4 piece Nutmeg 2 Bay leaves
1 tsp Poppy Seeds or White Sesame Seeds
1 tsp Rice
2 tbsp Dry Grated Coconut / Dessicated coconut
1/2 tbsp Chana Dal / Split Chickpeas
3 Bay leaves
Method
Take a pan, on a low heat stir and roast Coriander seeds, Split Chickpeas, Rice, Cumin seeds, poppyseeds or sesame seeds, cinnamon, cloves, black and green cardamom, nutmeg, star anise, pepper, bay leaves, stone flower, whole red chillies and dry grated coconut . Roast until you get an aroma out of the spices. Cool the spices down and then grind the spices into a powder.
To make the Saoji Chicken
Ingredients
1 kg County Chicken / Gavti Murgi / Komdi cut into pieces
2 Onions sliced
1 tsp Garlic paste
1 tsp Ginger paste
Few Coriander leaves chopped
2 Bay leaves
1 tsp Turmeric powder
1 tsp Spicy Chilli powder
3 tbsp of the Saoji Masala
Salt to taste
1/2 cup Oil
Method
Take a pan, add a tbsp oil, fry the onion until brown, cool it down and make a paste with little water. Take the saoji masala, add little water and make a paste..
Take a pot, add oil, add bay leaves, add ginger and garlic paste, sauté for few seconds. Add the fried onion paste, sauté for a minute, add few chopped coriander leaves, turmeric powder, chilli powder, Saoji masala paste, chicken and salt. Stir and cook the ingredients on a low flame. Cover the pot and cook for 5 minutes. Open the lid, now add a cup of water. Stir, cover and let it cook for another 15 minutes. Open the lid, add 2 cups of water, close the lid and cook until the chicken has cooked. Garnish with chopped coriander. Serve the chicken with Roti, bhakri or rice.
