Spinach Pulav

A healthy nutritious and yummy dish that takes under 10 minutes to prepare. A blessing in disguise for a working mom, especially if your kids like it and are willing to take it for lunch.

Ingredients:

2 packs chopped spinach (I like either the Birds' Eye brand or the Lucerne/Dominicks brand organic chopped spinach)

1 cup basmathi rice (regular white or brown rice is fine too, but the basmathi gives the pulav a special flavor)

2 spoons of sambar, or rasam powder, or vathakozhambu powder (using each of these gives the pulav a slightly different taste)

salt to taste, a tsp of ghee or oil to saute

1 tsp cumin seeds

1 onion chopped

Deep fried paneer cubes (optional).

Preparation method:

Saute the cumin seeds in ghee or oil.

Add chopped onions and saute for a couple of minutes.

Add the basmathi rice, spinach, salt, sambar/rasam powder, and two cups of water.

Cook either on open flame (with the stockpot covered) or transfer contents to a rice cooker.

Serve with yoghurt, raita or any sabji, if a side dish is considered necessary. My kids eat this without anything on the side.

Optional: Adding deep fried paneer pieces after the rice is cooked gives this a rich taste.

A variation to this is carrot-peas pulav, made with frozen peas and carrot combo packets (replace spinach with carrots & peas in the above recipe).

Lemon Pickle - The easy way !

With the name of the blog being thachi mammu, I realized that there is not a single post for the most important accompaniment that goes with thachi mammu.

It is pickle....usually avakkai (Mango pickle), Vadumangai (Tender mango), Mixed vegetable go higher up in the order of preferences. Lemon pickle...is savored generally when nothing else interesting is available. I made my first attempt at this one and it came out pretty well.

When made in this method, the pickle does not last long. So make it in small quantities and enjoy it fresh !

Ingredients:
Lemons - 2 (big ones)
Salt - 2 tbsp
Turmeric powder - 1 tbsp
Gingely oil - 3 tbsp ( if you are not diet conscious, be generous with this one)
Fenugreek powder - 1.5 tbsp
mustard, asafoetida ( to season)
Chilli powder - 3 tbsp

1. Cut lemon into small pieces. Heat kadai in medium flame, and add the cut lemons with salt and turmeric and mix well
2. Keep the kadai closed with lid for 2 minutes, you can see that the mixture starts to get a little gravy
3. In a separate kadai, heat gingely oil, add mustard, asafoetida powder
4. Add chilli powder and fenugreek powder to the lemons. Before mixing, add the seasoned hot oil and mix it all together and leave it for a couple of minutes.
5. If you think there is not enough juice in the mixture, you may boil a little bit of water in the same kadai in which you heated the seasoned oil and add it to the mixture.
6. Leave it out for 8 hours or so and then refrigerate.

With this method, the pickles turn out spicy and tangy without tasting bitter !.

Enjoy with thachi mammu!.