Chickpeas/Channa Masala

Chickpeas/Channa Masala:

Chickpeas/channa masala can be easily prepared using the canned chickpeas. Of course it is not very hard to prepare it from scratch but it requires early start. First, you need to soak the chickpeas/channa overnight and then boil them. I prefer using the canned chickpeas as it is the easier method. Here, I present with a recipe of chickpea/channa masala which will be sufficient to serve 4 people. This would taste good with jeera rice, plain rice, poori or even roti.

Ingredients:

• Canned chickpeas/channa: 2 cans
• Medium sized onions: 2
• Medium sized tomatoes: 3
• Amchoor powder: ½ teaspoon
• Jeera: ½ teaspoon
• Bay leaves: 2
• Garam Masala powder: 1 teaspoon
• Jeera/cumin seeds powder: ¼ teaspoon
• Dhania/corriander powder: ½ teaspoon
• Garlic paste: 1 teaspoon
• Chili powder: ½ teaspoon
• Oil: 3 teaspoons
• Water: 12oz
• Salt for taste

Preparation:

• Cut the onions and tomatoes into very tiny pieces. Wash the chickpeas/channa from the can and mash half a can of chickpeas/channa and keep aside.
• Now in a sauce pan, heat the 3 teaspoons of oil. Add the jeera and bay leaves and fry until they turn brown in color.
• Add the onions to the pan and fry till they are cooked. To the onions add the tomatoes and and half the amount of water and close the pan with a lid and le it cook till oil floats.
  At this time, add the garlic paste, jeera powder, coriander powder, garam masala, amchoor powder, salt and chili powder to the pan.
• Let it cook for 2 mins. Add water, mashed chickeas/channa and channa to the sauce pan. Let this cook for 5 more mins.
• Lip smacking dish of chickpea/channa masala is ready to be served. Get pleasure from it with rice, poori or roti.

Warnings:

• Add salt and chili powder according to your taste.

Alterations:

• 2 teaspoons of tomato paste can be used instead of tomatoes and amchoor powder.
• Pureed onions can be added as a substitute of cut onions.

Raw mango chutney/Mamidikaya pachadi

Raw mango chutney/Mamidikaya pachadi:

Chutney or pachadi is made very frequently in the state of Andhra Pradesh in India. There is an old way of using a manual grinder/ rokali in India. Many people there use an old method of grinding the vegetables to make pachadi as it is really delicious if made in a traditional way. You can almost all kinds of vegetables to make pachadi. Chutneys can be eaten as side dish, dip or even can be mixed with rice. Here is the recipe to make raw mango chutney/mamidikaya pachadi.

Ingredients:

• Medium sized raw mango: 1
• Mustard seed: ½ teaspoon
• Urad dal: ½ teaspoon
• Chana dal: ½ teaspoon
• Fenugreek seeds: ¼ teaspoon
• Red chilies: 6
• Hing: pinch
• Turmeric: pinch
• Oil for frying: 1 teaspoon
• Coriander leaves
• Salt for taste

Preparation:

• Wash, peel and cut the raw mango into 1” pieces.
• In a frying pan, heat the teaspoon of oil, when oil gets heated add fenugreek seeds, mustard seeds, urad, dal, chana dal, red chilies and fry until the mustard seeds splatter and the dal turns light brown in color.
• When the mustard seeds start to splatter add the hing and let it cool.
• In a blender add almost all the fried ingredients leaving a little bit to garnish. Also add salt, turmeric and the cut mango pieces to the blender and make it into a paste.
• Garnish with coriander leaves and the remaining fried mixture. Delicious chutney is ready to serve. Enjoy this as a side dish with roti or rice.

Warnings:

• Add salt, green chilies and red chilies according to your taste.

Alterations:

• Add coriander seeds to the frying ingredients if you like.
• Add Coconut powder to make it tastier.

Raw mango lentils/Mamidikaya pappu

Raw mango lentils/ mamidikaya pappu:

Raw mango the word itself makes my mouth water. It is the summer season in India where you can see mangoes all over. Mangoes are used in a variety of ways in cooking like dal, chutney, pickle etc. I can eat anything prepared from mango. I’ll present here with a mango dal recipe which I like to cook very often.

Ingredients:

• Medium sized raw mango: 1
• Tur Dal/ lentils: 1 small cup
• Red chilies: 3
• Green chilies: 2
• Coriander leaves
• Curry leaves: 1 strand
• Mustard seeds: ¼ teaspoon
• Urad dal: ½ teaspoon
• Hing/inguva: pinch
• Turmeric: pinch
• Garlic: 5 cloves
• Water: 2 ½ cups
• Oil: 1 teaspoon
• Salt for taste

Preparation:

• Peel and wash the mango and cut into pieces of 1”. In a frying pan fry the dry lentils/dal until it turns to golden brown in color.
• Add the fried dal to a bowl and add 2 cups of water. In another bowl add the cut mango and green chillies.
• Now, put the two bowls in a pressure cooker and cook for 3 whistles. After the pressure in the cooker goes down take out the cooked dal/lentils and mango pieces and mash them with a spatula together.
• In a deep frying pan heat the oil and add mustard seeds, urad dal, cut red chilles and peeled garlic cloves. When the mustard seeds start to splatter, add hing and then add the mashed dal/lentils and mango pieces.
• Now add the remaining water and salt for taste and cook in medium heat for 2 min. Garnish it with coriander leaves. A mouthwatering mango dal/mamidikaya pappu is ready to serve and enjoy it with plain rice or roti.

Warnings:

• Add salt, green chilies and red chilies according to your taste.
• Make sure to put the lentils and cut mango in separate bowls while cooking do not mix them. The bowls must be able to hold the cooked lentils which will be higher in volume than the raw ones.
• Raw mango used must be sour in taste.

Alterations:

• Dal/lentils can be used without frying if you like.
• Add curry leaves to make it tastier.
• Can be cooked in a bowl directly instead of using pressure cooker but make sure you cook the lentils and mango separately. Not using pressure cooker may increase your cooking time.

Mint/Pudina Rice

Mint/ Pudina Rice:

“Mint” wow! It is the aroma of mint that makes the dish yummy. I love to use mint in many of my dishes, here I’m going to present you with a healthy recipe of Mint Rice. There are a lot of varieties to prepare mint/pudina rice but I like to prepare it in this method as it is tasty and nutritious.

Ingredients:

• Fresh mint leaves – 2 medium sized packs


• Jeera – 1 ½ teaspoon


• Cinnamon – 2” stick


• Cloves – 6


• Green chilies – 6 small sized


• Basmati Rice – 3 cups


• Onions – 1 medium sized


• Carrots – 1


• Potatoes – 2 medium sized


• Green beans – 10


• Peas – a handful


• Salt for taste


• Oil – 3 teaspoons


• Water – 5 cups

Preparation:

• Separate the mint leaves from the stems and wash them. Cut the onions into thin long pieces and the remaining vegetables into 1’ pieces.


• Using a blender/mixer grind 1 teaspoon of jeera, cinnamon and cloves into powder, then add mint/pudina, green chilies, into a smooth paste.


• In a deep sauce pan, heat the oil and add the remaining jeera and let it turn brown in color. Now, add the blended paste and fry for a minute now add all the cut vegetables and peas to the pan. Add the basmati rice to the pan and fry for 5 min.


• Add salt and 5 cups of water to the mixture in the sauce pan. Let the water boil.


• When the water starts to boil close the sauce pan with a lid and cook it in low flame for a few minutes. Check if the rice is cooked frequently.


• Delicious mint/pudina rice is ready to be served. Enjoy it with plain yogurt, raita or even with the eggplant masala.

Warnings:

• Add the salt, green chilies according to your taste.


• Make sure that the sauce pan is thick at the bottom; otherwise the rice will be burnt.


• Do not stir the rice while it is cooking.

Alterations:

• You can spinach leaves to the mint leaves if you don’t have enough mint.


• If you like add 2 teaspoons of coconut powder and also cashew nuts to make it yummier.


• You can use any rice variety instead of basmati but make sure it is not sticky.

Eggplant Masala/Gutti Vankaya kura

Eggplant masala / gutti vankaya kura:

Eggplant is popularly known as vankaya, king of vegetables in Andhra Pradesh India. Eggplant masala is one of my all time favourite curries. It tastes good with rice, chapathi / roti or biryani. There are a lot of varieties to make this dish but according to me the time at which the ingredients are added to the dish makes it different in taste. I hope you like and enjoy making this method.

Ingredients:

• Small sized Eggplants: 1/2lb
• Medium sized Onions: 1
• Medium sized tomatoes: 5
• Cashew nuts: 15
• Garlic: 4 cloves
• Small piece of ginger
• Garam Masala – 1 teaspoon
• Coconut powder – 1 teaspoon
• Chili powder – ½ teaspoon
• Water – 8 oz
• Salt for taste
• Oil for frying

Preparation:

• Slit the Eggplant/Vankaya into two for one side and do the same from the opposite side of the eggplant. Do not cut them into pieces.
• Put Onions, Tomatoes, fried cashew nuts, garlic, ginger, garam masala, coconut powder, chili powder together in a blender and blend them into a smooth paste adding some water as needed.
• In Frying pan heat 3 teaspoons of oil. Add the Slit Eggplants and fry them until they are completely cooked.
• Take out the eggplants from the frying pan and in the remaining oil add a teaspoon of oil. Add the Masala paste into the frying pan and water. Let it cook until you start to see oil floating. Stir the masala paste frequently while cooking.
• Add the fried eggplants, salt and chili powder to the masala paste and cook it for 2 more min. A delicious eggplant masala/gutti vankaya kura is ready to eat. Serve it with plain rice, pulav, biryani, roti or tortilla.

Warning:

• Add the salt, chili powder and garam masala according to your taste.

Alterations:

• Bigger Eggplant which is commonly available can be used if you don’t find the small sized ones. Cut the bigger Eggplant into squares of 1.5’ approximately.
• Peanuts can be used instead of cashew nuts.
• Tomato paste can be used instead of whole tomatoes.

Welcome to my cooking world!

Lip smacking recipes, as the name suggests, is a webpage where you will find a variety of mouthwatering recipes.

Little Intro: I was born in an Indian city named Hyderabad in the state of Andhra Pradesh. I'm a woman with typical Aquarian qualities like friendly, emotional, takes-to-heart and at times short-tempered. By profession, I’m a software Engineer. Living in US of A since 2001, I miss my parents and my home land. Being away from my country and food had made me an ardent lover of cooking. I really enjoy cooking and feeding food lovers, of course I also love to hear the positive comments. According to what I believe there is no one in the world who doesn’t enjoy eating good food. I hope you’ll all try out and enjoy my recipes.