Paneer (Cottage Cheese) Shawarma Wrap

Shawarma is a roti wrap or a roll which is wrapped with Paneer or boneless chicken piece or a meat with spreads and sliced onions and tomatoes. Which is easy, healthy and quick if you are having all the ingredients handy. I myself tried it first time but find it really tasty and healthy other than spring rolls which are fried. 

Here i have used home made tomato paste and bell pepper paste as a spread on wrap. If running short of time, you can also buy tomato paste jar readily available in market. As it was not in a stock, so i made it by myself. Below you can see its recipe. If you end up making tomato paste in large qty, than can store in cleaned glass jar in refrigerator for months.

Ingredients:

Tomato Paste:

6-7 large size bright red tomatoes

3 pods of garlic

1 tbsp Olive Oil

1/2 -1 tsp salt or to taste

Green Bell Pepper Paste

2 Green bell pepper Roasted on Gas Flame (1 large and other medium small)

1 1/2 tbsp Sesame seeds

Salt to Taste

1 1/2 tsp olive oil

1 small green chilly

For Marinating Paneer (Cottage Cheese)

100 gms Paneer (Cottage Cheese)

2 tbsp thick creamy Curd or Yogurt

1 3/4 tsp Tomato Paste

2 tsp Bell pepper paste

1 tsp ginger- garlic paste each

1 tsp Red chilly powder (adjust the spice level to your taste)

1 tsp Pickle powder or paste (optional.. I bought ready pickle mix powder packet that is used in making pickles, if you do not have, can skip)

1 1/2 tsp olive oil

Salt to taste

1/2 tsp lemon juice

For Wrap

1 Cup whole wheat flour

1 cup Maida/APF

1 tsp Instant dry yeast

1 tbsp Olive oil

3/4 cup warm water

1/2 tsp sugar

salt to taste

For Garnishing and Serving:

1 Large Onion Sliced

1 large Tomato Sliced

1 cup of freshly chopped green Coriander leaves.

Recipe: 

1. For Tomato Paste 

In a heavy vessel pan, boil tomatoes with tsp of salt. Boil until its outer skin can be peeled easily. Bring the boiled tomatoes out of water, peel all and puree all the peeled tomatoes in a mixer jar with garlic and olive oil until nicely pureed. 

Heat a pan, pour all the blended puree in to it and cook on medium-high flame for 20-30 minutes. Keep a watch and stir in between, Quantity will reduce little by the time. Later turn the flame to medium and cook until you get thick paste like consistency.. (Consistency should be similar to tomato catch up)

    2. For Green Bell Pepper Paste

Roast Green bell pepper greased with olive oil on a gas flame, until soft and shrinks a little.

Once roasted, Remove its seeds and chop roughly, blend in mixer jar with sesame seeds, small green chilly, olive oil and salt to taste. Blend until smooth.

   3. For Marinating Paneer (Cottage Cheese)

Cut Paneer (Cottage Cheese) in to finger size. Marinate it with ready Tomato Paste, Green bell pepper paste, thick creamy curd/yogurt, ginger-garlic paste, lemon juice, pickle powder or pickle paste, red chilly powder and salt to taste. (Save some tomato paste and bell pepper paste for spreading on wrap).

Mix all well. Cover and let it stand for 20 minutes.

In a Non stick pan, heat a tsp or little more oil, and shallow fry panner (cottage cheese) until light brown. If you want to avoid shallow frying, can also grill in Oven or on non stick grill pan on flame. (Save some marination mixture for spreading on wrap).

    4. For Wrap

Dissolve yeast in warm water with sugar, let it stand until mixture is frothy. (about 10-15 minutes)

In a large bowl, Mix Whole wheat flour and Maida/APF with salt and olive oil. Add Frothy yeast mixture to the flour and knead in to soft, smooth and elastic dough. Once Kneaded, Cover it with a tea towel and allow to rise until it doubles in volume (about 45min-1 hour).

Once it is proofed, deflate the dough by punching down. 

Pull out large lemon size ball of the ready yeasted dough and roll each dough ball with a rolling pin in to a round roti shape.

Roast all the rolled rotis in a non-stick pan with slight patches on both the sides.

Wrapping Shawrma...

• Spread a little of saved marinated mixture, tomato paste, bell pepper paste on roasted roti. Add 2-3 Shallow fried or grilled Paneer Fingers, sliced onions, tomatoes, freshly chopped Corriander leaves and Roll it. 
• Serve the Paneer Shawrma wrap or a roll in a plate with few more sliced onion and tomatoes.
• So here you are ready with your delicious and tangy Paneer Shawrama.
• Non Vegetarians can use Grilled and marinated boneless chicken and meat by replacing paneer that too will taste yummm...

Oatmeal & Bulgur Wheat (Daliya) Bread

It was Since long i wanted to try something different ingredients for making bread other than usuals...Came across many recipes which Uses different sorts of grains, honestly speaking, i wanted try those mix grain bread but i was not having all the grains handy so thought, why not to use which is available In pantry already..

So here is my Bulgur wheat (Daliya) and Oatmeal bread. A healthy wealthy bread mixed With goodness of wheat germ..Have a look to the recipe below.It is really "Worth trying".

Ingredients:

Whole Wheat Germ

For Sponge:

1 1/4 tsp Instant dry yeast
1/3 cup bulgur wheat (fine or coarse grind)
1/3 cup oatmeal (any variety, coarsely grind)
1/4 cup wheat germ (finely grind) (optional)
1 cup sifted maida  / all purpose flour
1 tsp sugar
1 cup lukewarm water (not hot)

For Bread:

Above all sponge mixture
1 cup sifted maida (and a little extra for dusting and kneading)
1/4 cup + 2 tbsp Luke warm water
2 tbsp olive oil or any vegetable oil(and a little extra for greasing dough)
1 1/2 tsp salt

Method:

For sponge

• In a small bowl, mix a cup of sifted maida/ all purpose flour with, sugar, fine or coarse grind bulgur wheat, coarse grind oatmeal and finely grind wheat germ, instant dry yeast and a luke warm water.
• Mix all the sponge mixture, cover and let it rest for about 15-20 minutes.
• After 15-20 minutes, here you are ready with your sponge...

For dough:

• In a large bowl, mix a cup of sifted maida/all purpose flour with salt and olive oil/vegetable oil and mix.
• Now add in all sponge mixture to it, start gathering in to a dough. Add a 1/4 cup of water and little more to accumulate all into a sticky dough mix.
• Knead for few minutes, until dough is smooth, soft and elastic. (Can use a little qty of flour for dusting and kneading the dough)
• Once done, grease the dough in a bowl with oil.
• Cover the bowl with a plastic cling film and allow it to rise for 30 -40 minutes or until double in volume.
• Once the dough doubles, deflate it by punching the dough down.
• Knead for a minute and shape the dough to a loaf.
• Place the shaped dough in to a loaf pan.
• Cover the loaf pan with a tea towel and allow the dough to rise further for about 1-1 1/2 hr or until doubles in volume.
• Mean while preheat oven at 180 degree Celsius.
• Bake the bread for 20-25 minutes in preheated oven at 180 degree Celsius (place a bowl of water in lower rack of oven and bread on top, this gives a moist and nice color crust to bread).
• Once baked, bring the bread out of oven and in a minute or so remove the bread loaf from a loaf tin.
• Place a loaf on a wire rack and allow it to cool completely.
• Here you are ready with a nice rustic bulgur and oatmeal bread.
• Slice and enjoy....:)

Puffed Amaranth Granolas (vegan-gluten free-low fat)

Since few days i was planning to bake granolas for breakfast but apart from oats and other grains, i wanted to bake something with Amaranth grains, as it was lying since long in my shelves. And believe me it was a big big biggg hit at my place and at my husband's work place too. Its Nutritional values are so attractive for weight watchers, so have to definitely bake it for my hubby. Its Low fat, low calorie, gluten free and sugar free Amaranth Granolas. All in one with a healthy, quick and easy meal in itself. 

I was already having puffed amaranth, but if you have unpuffed amaranth grain, than check below, popping amaranth.

Ingredients:

2 cups puffed amaranth
1/2 cup honey
1/3 cup raisins
1/4 cup small chopped almonds
1/4 cup small chopped pistachios
1/4 cup small chopped dry figs

1/2 tsp green cardamom powder for flavor (Can also use cardamom  or vanilla essence, i personally prefer using cardamom powder)
2 tbsp pumpkin seeds
1 tsp salt

Recipe:

• Pre-heat oven at 180 degree Celsius.
• In a large bowl, Mix all the above listed ingredients well together.
• Grease lightly, parchment paper in baking tray and spread the Amaranth Mixture equally all over in a tray.
• Bake it for 20-25 minutes in preheated oven at 180 degree Celsius. 
• If you prefer your granola to be more crunchy, bake little more, about 40-45 minutes while keeping continuous check to avoid burning. (Baking 40-45 minutes will form bars)
• Once baked, bring the tray out and allow the granola to cool. (If baking for 20-25 minutes, Granola will be little moist, if baking more than you will get granola bar pieces. As i myself prefer having granolas rather than its bar, so i end up baking for 25 minutes).

Amaranth Granola Parfait:

Granolas
Beaten yogurt/dahi-1cup

Small Chooped in to cube- 1 Mango

Pomegranate Grain- 1 cup

Small Chopped In to cube Sugar Melon-1 cup

Method:

In a glass, firstly layer the bottom with granola, than yogurt/ dahi, than fruits above. Repeat layering all, till the rim of the glass and here you are ready with your healthy Amaranth Granola Parfait for breakfast...

Puffed Amaranth Granola Parfait

Popping Amaranth:

Heat an aluminium pan on a medium flame, and empty 1/4 cup of amaranth grain in it. (1/4 cup of dry Amaranth yields 1 cup puffed amaranth)

Take any cotton cloth and press amaranth in a pan, you will notice after few minutes it will start popping. At that point, avoid pressing further and cover the pan with a lid on and keep tossing the pan. Once all the grains are popped up, turn the flame off. (Procedure for Popping amaranth is much similar popping popcorns)
This is how Puffed Amaranth looks like :

Sunday Dream - Sunny Sunday With Bread Toast

Sunday breakfast is always a challenge, I want my holiday breakfast quick easy and yet delicious as sundays are really lazy most of the time. So today its same, quick and easy Eggs with bread Toast..Out of which one compliment says "Vibrant Breakfast" :)  (Vibrant- feels nice hearing this).

Sunday Dream - Sunny Sunday With Bread Toast

Ingredients:

2 tbsp Butter or Margarine

1 large finely chopped white onion

1 medium over riped finely chopped bright red tomato

2 tbsp red chilly sauce

Pinch of Red kashmiri chilly powder (kishmiri chilly powder is not much spicy and gives wonderful red colour. Use and adjust to your taste)

1 tsp dried organo flakes

1 tsp dried parsley (optional)

1 tsp Mixed spices herb

1 tsp fresh basil (can use dried one too..i used both dried and fresh)

1 tbsp Fresh Coriander leaves

6 large eggs

 Pinch of black pepper about 1/2 tsp

Salt to taste

Note: If tomatoes are bright red and over riped, only than you'll get this nice red color else other option is you can use edible red food color too, totally up to you, luckily i got good bright tomatoes and another was having Kashmiri chilly powder)

Recipe:

• In non stick tawa  pan, melt butter or margarine and saute finely chopped onion until translucent, add finely chopped over riped tomatoes, red chilly sauce and kashmiri chilly powder. Saute them until tomatoes are cooked and all gets into semi paste like in consistency. 
• Now add all dry herbs with fresh coriander and basil, about 2-3 tbsp of water and little of salt to taste (as again salt will be used furthur so be carefull).
• Spread this gravy all across pan (on all sides of pan like a thin layer).
• Now crack the unbeaten eggs one at time directly over the gravy evenly (Similar to half fry), 5 eggs around the edges and 1 at the centre . Do not mix at all, just sprinkle salt and black pepper and allow it to cook on low flame for about 10 -15 minutes, or until you see egg yolks are not runny at all.
• Garnish it with fresh coriander leaves.
• And enjoy it with toasted bread. See the picture below to get idea as how i did.

Serves : 4

Total Time : 20-22 minutes.

Konkani Vegetable Dal / Lentils

Ingredients:

Konkani Vegetable Dal/Lentil

1/2 cup yellow split Moong Dal
1/3 cup Tuver Dal (Arhar in Hindi and Pigeon pea in English)
1/4  cup Masoor Dal
2 tbsp Green Moong Dal
1 cup Chopped palak (Spinach)
1 cup dice in cube shape Lauki (Bottle Gourd)
1/2 tsp Turmeric Powder
Pinch of salt
1/2 cup Small chopped onion
1 tbsp olive oil
3 tbsp Fresh grated coconut
1 tbsp Tamarind Paste
4 whole Red Chilly
1 1/2 tsp dry fenugreek seeds

For Tempering:
1 tbsp Olive oil
1 tbsp ghee (Clarified Butter)
Pinch of Asafoetida Powder (Heeng)
1 tsp cumin seeds
1/2 tsp Mustard seeds
5-6 Fresh Curry Leaves
1/2 tsp Red Chilly Powder

Recipe:

• Pressure cook all four dals (Moong dal, Tuver dal, Masoor dal, Green Moong dal) with salt, turmeric, diced in cube shaped bottle gourd and Spinach together.
• Mean while in a non stick pan dry roast Fenugreek seeds until light pink and than add whole red chilly, further roast for a minute.
• Grind this Dry roast ingredients with  grated coconut and Tamarind paste in a mixer grinder jar and keep it aside.
• In the same pan, Heat 1 tbsp of olive oil and saute sliced onion with little salt until translucent.
• Now add all grinned and boiled ingredients to it with little water to it (about 1/2 cup or as required).
• Simmer on low flame and cook for 3-4 minutes.
• Now its time for tempering
• In a small fry pan heat oil and ghee with cumin and mustard seeds, as soon as it splutters add asafoetida powder, curry leaves and lastly red chilly powder.
• Pour this ready temper on dal and mix it nicely. Cook for another 2 minutes on low flame (add water if required).
• Garnish it with Fresh Coriander leaves and serve it with plain paratha or roti..