Eggs on a bed of chili garlic potatoes

Working from home has its perks; no traveling, no waiting for bus, no fighting with auto rickshaw drivers and no pushing yourself through the nudging elbows and sweaty armpits in a crowded local. Another good part is cooking whenever and whatever you like, trying out new recipes which you hardly get time for. Anyway, I think that the grass is always greener on the other side. I am perfectly happy with my job and enjoy these one off working-from-home days.

Today was one of those days when I stayed home, woke up late and made a nice brunch. Result was two very happy and well fed human beings. For eggs on a bed of chili garlic potatoes, I got inspired from this recipe on www.foodnetwork.com. The original recipe had zucchini which I replaced with potatoes. I used McCain's chili garlic potato bites for this recipe but you can make it with diced potatoes, garlic and chili flakes.

Prep Time: 10 minutes
Cooking time: 15 minutes
Serves: 2

Ingredients:
Eggs - 2
Onion - 1 medium (chopped)
Potato - 1 large (diced)
Carrot - 1 small (diced)
Bell pepper - 1 small (diced)
Pickled gherkin - 1 (chopped)
Garlic - 2 cloves (crushed)
Chili flakes - 1/2 tsp
Oregano - 1/2 tsp
Black pepper powder - 1/4 tsp
Coriander - 1 tbsp (chopped)
Salt to taste
Olive oil - 1 tbsp

Method:

• Heat oil in a pan and throw in onions for frying.
• Add minced garlic, potatoes and carrots and fry till they are almost cooked.
• Add bell pepper, gherkin, chili flakes, oregano, coriander, black pepper powder and salt and cook for another 2 minutes.
• Bring the whole mixture to the centre of the pan and make two depressions in the mix using a ladle. 
• Now break both the eggs in these depressions, cover and let them cook on slow flame.
• Once the yolk is cooked, remove from the pan and serve with toasted breads.

My Doodle recipe is a part of Easy Doodle Recipe contest at BlogAdda.com in association with TastyKhana.com

Nigella Lawson's Flourless Chocolate Orange Cake

I love Nigella Lawson and practically everything that she cooks. Of her all the recipes that I've tried, this is the one which I've tried mastering. The first time I made it turned out brilliant, second time wasn't so good cause I used desi oranges. This time i went with one of those imported looking oranges, not sure what are they called. Their rind is just bitter enough to give this cake a perfect flavour. I've added just 2 tbsp of Nutella but you can add more or less as per your taste but this ratio will give a perfect bitter-sweet taste which is divine.

Ingredients:
Oranges - 2 medium
Eggs - 6
Cocoa powder - 50 gms
Castor sugar - 200 gms
Baking powder - 11/2 tsp
Dark chocolate - 2 tbsp (chopped) I used the Royce chocolate bar that I just bought :D

Method:

• Place oranges in cold water in a pan and boil them for 2 hours or till they become soft.
• Cut them from the centre and remove the pips if any.
• Throw the oranges in the food processor (with the skin) and pulp everything together.
• Preheat oven tp 180 degree Celcius.
• Add eggs, cocoa powder, sugar, baking powder and the chopped dark chocolate to the orange pulp and run the motor till everything is mixed properly. You'll get a slightly runny batter, don't worry this is how it should look.
• Grease the cake tin and pour the batter in.
• Bake for an hour. The tester will come out clean by this time.
• Let it cool for a while.
• Dust it with sugar, add frosting, decorate it with orange rind or just eat this rich dark goodness plain.

This is when it just came out of the oven. The husband thinks I am promoting Nutella a little too much : / so  the next picture is without it.

Peanut butter and Nutella cookies

This is my 75th post on the blog and demands a very special recipe. So here's something that I sort of experimented and it turned out really nice. I had a bottle of peanut butter lying in my fridge given to me by Reema on mu birthday...Oh! I need to mention here that she made a really awesome cake for my birthday. It was a layered cake with peanut butter, chocolate and butter frosting and I don't remember what all was there but it was brilliant.

So yeah, coming back to the peanut butter, it was The Gourmet Company product and I had no idea what to do with it. Yesterday while browsing through some random recipes online I though why not make cookies with it. Well, I searched for a recipe, altered it a bit and made these lovely cookies this morning. Very proud of myself cause this was my first attempt at baking cookies and they were yum!

Note: I haven't used any sugar here because the peanut butter already had sugar. If you have a plain peanut butter use 300 gms of sugar.

Ingredients:
Peanut butter - 300 gms
Nutella - 4 tbsp
Butter - 50 gms
Eggs - 2
Flour - 200 gms
Baking powder - 11/2 tsp

Method:

• Let peanut butter, butter and nutella come to room temperature.
• Beat butter in a bowl for 2 minutes (add sugar if you are using it and beat some more), add peanut butter and keep beating so the mix properly.
• Add nutella and keep mixing.
• Beat in the eggs.
• Mix flour and baking powder separately and then add to the mix.
• The mix will give you a little thicker consistency than the cake batter.
• Preheat oven at 220 degree Celsius.
• Sprinkle some flour on the cookie tray, put small dollops of the batter on the tray using a spoon or your hand. Don't put more than 7-8 so that there's enough space for them to spread.
• Let them bake for 15 - 20 minutes. Keep checking.
• Let the cookies cool down.
• Top it with some nutella or dunk it in a glass of hot chocolate and enjoy.

NOW WHO'D LIKE A COOKIE!!! 

burrp! & Knorr Challenge Part II - Pan Fried Chicken on a bed of Fried Spinach

Continuing from the previous post, here's the main-course dish that I made with Knorr Easy-To-Cook meals - Pan fried chicken on a bed of crispy fried spinach served with kaffir lime flavoured Chinese manchurian sauce

Prep Time: 1 hr 10 mins

Cooking Time: 20 mins

Serves: 3

Ingredients:

Chicken breasts - 3

Oil - 1 tbsp

For marinade

Garlic - 10 – 12 cloves (finely chopped)

Ginger - A 1 inch long piece (finely chopped)

Lemon juice - 2 tsp

Salt to taste

For sauce

Knorr easy to cook Chinese Manchurian - 1 packet

Water - 3 cups

Kaffir lime leaves - 5

For plating

Spinach - 1 cup (finely chopped)

Oil - 200 ml

Method:

Clean the chicken breasts, marinate them in ginger, garlic, lemon juice, salt and refrigerate it covered for an hour.

Heat 1 tbsp oil in a pan, place the chicken breasts in the pan and let them fry for 10-15 minutes or till the chicken is almost done. Keep turning so it's cooked on both sides.

Mix Knorr easy to cook Chinese Manchurian in water and pour this mix over the chicken.

Crush Kaffir lime leaves in it. Let it cook for another 5-7 minutes.

Chop the spinach. Heat oil in a wok and deep fry chopped spinach till it’s crispy.

Arrange the crispy spinach on a plate, remove chicken breasts from the sauce and place them on the spinach. Pour the sauce over the chicken and serve.

burrp! & Knorr Challenge Part I - Stir Fried Okra

I've not been a ready-to-eat meals fan except for the soups and packed soups for me mean Knorr. But few days ago I tried few of Knorr's easy-to-cook Chinese meal packs as a part of burrp! and Knorr project. The idea was to create something exciting with those ready-made mixes. So on a Sunday I decided to treat the Husband to Chinese lunch and tried few recipes and took step by step pictures. Yes, I've been inspired by The Pioneer Woman's blog lately and tried taking pictures while cooking like she does. Quite a task I must say and hats off to her for doing this.

So here's the first recipe - Stir Fried Okra with Knorr's Chinese Chili mix, very simple, very tasty and a quick fix starter for a party.

Prep Time: 15 mins

Cooking Time: 10 mins

Serves: 2

Ingredients:

Okra - 250 gms

Garlic - 8 cloves (finely chopped)

Green chilies - 2 (finely chopped)

Knorr easy to cook Chinese Chili - 11/2 tbsp

Soy sauce  - 1 tsp

Sugar - ½ tsp

Oil - 1 tsp

Method:

Wash and pat dry the okra.

Cut them into big pieces.

Sprinkle the Knorr easy to cook Chinese Chili powder on the okra pieces and toss so that the powder coats them properly.

Heat oil in a pan and add garlic and green chilies. Fry for a minute.

Add okra pieces and fry them for 10-15 minutes. Don’t stir them too much and don’t cover and cook.

Mix soy sauce and sugar and pour over the okra. Fry for just one more minute, remove from the pan and serve.

Look at the lovely green colour. You won't get it if you cover and cook and that crunchiness too.

Sindhi Chicken Curry

Sometimes you just need to get straight to the point, without building any story or creating a background. This, is that time. Sharing a Sindhi chicken curry recipe that I tried from a recipe book. Turned out pretty good, so here you go.

Prep Time: 15 mins
Cooking Time: 45 mins
Serves: 4

Ingredients:
Chicken - 1 kg (with bones)

For marination:
Yogurt - 1 cup
Turmeric powder - 1 tsp
Red chili powder - 1 tsp
Garam masala - 1/2 tsp
Salt to taste

For gravy:
Onions - 4 medium sized (chopped)
Tomatoes - 4 (roughly chopped)
Garlic - 8 cloves
Ginger - 1 inch long piece
Cumin seeds - 1 tsp
Poppy seeds - 1 tsp
Coriander seeds - 1 tsp
Cloves - 5
Black peppercorns - 6
Green chilies - 4 (split lengthwise from the centre)
Salt to taste
Ghee - 2 tbsp
Chopped coriander for garnish

Method:

• Wash chicken properly and marinate mixing all the ingredients together. Cover and leave for an hour.
• Heat ghee in a heavy bottomed wok.
• Throw in cumin seeds, poppy seeds, coriander seeds, cloves and peppercorns and let them splutter.
• Add chopped onions and fry till they turn golden brown.
• Remove from heat and let it cool down.
• Once the mix cools down blend it into a fine paste along with tomatoes, ginger and garlic.
• Heat the wok again and fry the marinated chicken.
• When chicken is cooked 3/4th add the paste, 1 cup water if the gravy is too thick, salt and green chilies.
• Cover and let it cook for another 15 mins or till the chicken is tender.
• Garnish with coriander and serve with hot rotis.