Mushroom Soup

Well, Its winter time in Rotterdam and all i crave for is soup every evening. Back in India as i mentioned in my posts before that mom used to prepare almost every evening. i had trained my maids with various recipes.

this is the first time i ever made mushroom soup. i have bought pumpkin also, shall try making pumpkin soup tomorrow... So i googled for cream of mushroom soup. read several recipes. the one which seemed more promising to the taste i was looking for was http://simplyrecipes.com/recipes/cream_of_mushroom_soup/.

All the ingredients were at home, so life is easy, i don't have to look out for any ingredients out in such winter... yeah!!!

I changed was the source of the stock used in the recipe. being veg. I substituted the chicken stock as mentioned in the recipe with veg stock. I had put milk instead of cream, so of course the consistency differed, and added 1 tbsp of cream in the end. My soup was little less thick as compared to what the recipe suggests.

And also, had 250 gms of mushrooms as against the recipe states the measurement of ingredients as per 500Gms of mushroom, so i halved the measurement of other ingredients accordingly!

Ingredients:

250 gms regular white mushrooms, cleaned, quartered or sliced

1/2 Tbsp lemon juice

1/2 Tbsp unsalted butter

1 Tbsp minced shallots

1/2 tbsp chopped fresh thyme or 1/2 teaspoon dried thyme

1/2 bay leaf

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/4 teaspoon fresh ground pepper

1 cups Milk

3/4 veg. stock ( i used maggie stock cubes)

1 teaspoon cornstarch dissolved in 1 Tbsp water

1 tbsp cream

Minced parsley for garnish

Method:

1 In a food processor, coarsely chop mushrooms and lemon juice.

2 Melt butter in (4-5 quart) sauce pan and lightly sauté shallots on medium heat. Add mushrooms, thyme and bay leaf, sauté over moderate heat for 10-15 minutes, or until the liquid that is released from the mushrooms disappears.

3 Add salt, pepper, milk and stock and bring to boil. Reduce heat and simmer for 20 minutes.

4 Add cornstarch and simmer for 10 minutes and cream, stirring constantly.

Correct seasoning and add more lemon juice to taste.

Lamingtons

When i saw the picture of the Lamingtons in a booked at rainmaker shack in Lonavala near Mumbai, India. I immediately wanted to make and have them. But for some reason we couldn't. I borrowed the book from Dhanya, (the chef at the Rain maker shack) and photocopied that ... Thanks Dhaniya! She told me that that book belonged to her and she had bought at very younger days. This book has really good recipes. No wonder they still have that book.

when i reached came back to Delhi, i immediately wanted to make them ..and made them couple of times after that when we had to go to somebody's house.. i love to make hand made and take.

Recently on my hubby's birthday, he had to take some sweet to office, so i thought what could be better than Lamingtons. He was bit skeptical about it ... give that he had never tried them and also when he tasted them while i was making he was little confused .. may be with new taste or the cocoa and sugar syrup hadn't soaked-in yet.

Next morning when he pinged me on chat.. first thing he said .. people saying very good!! aah i was again on top of the world! :)

so here is how i make them :

Ingredients

Makes about 20

Cake

11/3 cups Maida (flour)

1 tspn Soda bicarbonate

1 tblspn Custard powdered

1 cup Caster sugar

½ cup Milk

¼ cup Margarine/soft butter

2 Eggs- lightly beaten

½ tspn Vanilla essence

Icing

2 cups Icing sugar

½ cups Cocoa

½ cups Boiling water

For Coating

Desiccated coconut

Method:

1. Combine al the cake ingredients in the large bowl and mix well. Pour the mixture into well greased tin bake it at 180 degree for 25- 30 minutes or until golden brown. Cool it in tin for 5 minutes then turn it out onto a wire rack to cool. Make the cake the day before required as its easier to cut.

2. Cut cake into squares or any shape you wish.

Icing. Sift icing sugar and cocoa together into a bowl, add sufficient boiling water to make a fairly runny icing.
Using a fork or your fingers, dip each cake into the chocolate icing until well coated.

Roll in the coconut then place on a wire rack.

Another way to coat the lamingtons is to place the coconut in the plastic bag, add the cake and toss gently until cake is well coated.

Vada Pav (Indian Burger)

Wow it has been 3 months that i have posted any recipe ..well for 6 weeks i was travelling to India .. where i had great culinary experience as me and my husband were travelling for the first time there after marriage. We were booked for first 2 weeks for either dinners or lunches or sometimes both. Shall write in detail about it in another post. I am writing this recipe immediately after trying it for Kiran, who had asked for it, when she saw its photo on my Fb.

Yesterday, Ruchi, (my only friend here in the city, returned from India. Her family lives at Pune in Maharshtra in western part of India, From where this dish comes from) had come over to meet me after work and had brought the red chili chutney for me, which i had asked her to bring only for Vada Pav. You cannot cannot make the authentic Vada Pav without it. So, we decided to make the Vada pav for dinner.

Vada Pav is one of my favourite street food from Maharashtra. Though, I had first tasted it in Singapore. These were sold at Jade(Indian film cinema), Shaw towers and there used to be limited quantity of them before each show. So, just for vada pav, we sometimes used to go there an hour in advance.

For Vada Pav, you require Pav (bun).. which is rectangular in shape, but we don't get it here so i made using round buns! Then, Green Dhaniya Chutney and of course as I mentioned above the Red Chili chutney. Well, in the market there are different type of red chili chutneys available..dried or semi dried, with roasted and crushed peanut or just chili with garlic and other spices. I used the one which Ruchi got for me was with crushed Peanut one. Recipe for all is as follows:

For Pav: Get ready made from your nearest bakery.

For vada: Makes 7

Ingredients:

Vada filling

3 medium Potatoes (Boiled)
3-4 Garlic cloves
1/2 inch piece of ginger
1 tsp mustard seeds
4-5 curry leaves (chopped)
1/2 tsp turmeric
1/4 tsp asofoetida (heeng)
2-3 green chilies
Salt to taste.

Covering:
2 tbsp Besan
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp turmeric powder
1 tsp oil
Pinch of baking soda

Oil for fry

Method:

1. Make the past of garlic, ginger and green chilies in your mortar or food processor.
2. Peel and mash the potatoes
3. Add the above ginger,chili, garlic paste and salt. Mix it well.
4. In the pan, heat up a little oil and mustard seeds, when they splutter add curry leaves, heeng, turmeric powder. Mix.
5. Add the potato mixture. Combine the mixture with spices really well. Remove from the heat and let it cool.
6. After the above mixture is cooled, divide it in 8 portion and make balls. if the mixture is sticky which means you have over boiled the potatoes. don't worry just add little oil in tour hands so that the mixture doesn't stick to your and.

For the covering:
1. in a bowl, mix besan, turmeric powder, salt.
2. Add enough water to make thick batter not the watery consistency.

Frying:

Vadas are deep fried. So heat enough oil in the frying pan.
when oil is hot. dip the balls in the batter and fry them until they are golden brown on high heat. (you can more than one ball in the pan depending on the size of the pan at one go.)


For Green Chutney

100gms green coriander leaves and stacks (washed properly)
2 green chilies
1 tbsp lemon juice
1 tsp dried mango powder
1/2 tsp roasted cumin powder
1/2 garam masala
1 tbsp curd
Salt to taste

Method:
Churn all the above ingredients in a food processor and its ready.

Ingredients
Red Chili Chutney

Since i used the one from the packed which Ruchi had got me from Pune. Here is the recipe from Tarla Dalal.

Ingredients
1/3 cup garlic (lehsun) cloves, peeled
1/4 cup grated dry coconut (kopra)
2 tbsp chilli powder
1 tsp oil
salt to taste

Method
Heat the oil in a pan and sauté the garlic and coconut for 2 to 3 minutes over a medium flame.
Cool, combine all the ingredients in a blender and grind till it is a smooth paste.
Use as required.

I shall try this soon. :)

Variation:
Use roasted and peeled peanuts, grinding them with red chillies,salt,garlic clove(small),olive oil and chat masala to a fine paste using a blender.

For serving:

1. slice the Pav from middle upto 3/4. don't divide them into 2.
2. Brush the Pavs with butter and toast them on flat pan (tava).
3. spread the green chutney top inner layer and the red one on lower layer.
4. Place the Vada in the Pav and serve with green chili or tamarind sauce. (optional)