STYLISH BLOGGER AWARD...!!! THANK YOU.....!!!

What a great way my week started :) ....!!!!
When I logged in my blog today I saw a comment "Come visit my blog and grab your Stylish Blogger Award!"..... SURPRISED and AWESOME are the 2 words that can totally express my feelings :) .. I was in the seventh heaven upon receiving the comment....I surely do love my style but being appreciated for it feels AWESOME.....Thank you Kankana(didibhai)  for the Stylish Blogger Award :) I feel very honored. As I had to run to office I could not claim my award so am doing it now :P

How can anyone claim the award?...Well blogging is all about knowing and sharing with others.....so to accept the awards there are a few criteria to be fulfilled :

• Thank and Link Back to the Blogger Who Awarded You With The Award
• Share 7 Things About Yourself
• Award 15 Recently Discovered Great Blogger
• Contact The Bloggers and Inform Them of The Award

So let me start with sharing 7 things about myself :

1. I love shopping specially electronics and clothes.
2. I love being with the computer....not only just work or blogging. I enjoy surfing and learning new stuffs basically R & D on my system. Like I have designed my blog on my own :) ..
3. I am totally addicted to TV :D . The first thing is do when I wake up is switch on the TV and its on the whole time I am at home.I would be watching some cooking shows or cartoon or movies.
4. I never cook on friday's , generally i get some KFC chicken and watch TV till 3-4 in the morning :D .
5. I absolutely adore travelling...I love to go to different place and not only see the tourist attractions but also meet different people and have the local food.
6. I love dancing...have got degree in Kathak dance. Had the opportunity to perform in several programs :) .
7. I wanted to become an architect :( and I still love to see beautiful house....I can spends minutes staring at a beautiful house....So next time if you catch me staring at your house don't get shocked or annoyed...take it as an appreciation for your house :P  .

Its very recent that I have started viewing other blogs so to name 15 stylish blogger is quite a task for me :) . Yet after recking my brain for hours listed below are the STYLISH BLOGGER I could think of 

1. Celeste from  Sugar & Spice by Celeste
2. Tram Le from Nutrition To Kitchen
3. Susan from Sticky Gooey Creamy Chewy
4. Mary from One Perfect Bite
5. Lois B from Food is my Love Language
6. Sandra from Sandra's Easy Cooking
7. Bergamot from Cooking Escapades
8. Harika from Harika's Kitchen
9. Pam from For the love of Cooking
10. Erica from Goddess of Cooking
11. Sukina from Lick my Spoon
12. Beth from OMG! Yummy
13. Mallika from Quick Indian Cooking
14. Jane from Make Ahead Meals for Busy Moms
15. Lola from Lola's Artistic Endeavors

CRUNCHY FISH FRY

I think its true that Bengali's cannot stay away from fish....HAHAHAHA.... :D the best example is my Baba , he really doesn't enjoy food without a fish dish. I too like to have fish ones a month and I love fish fry the most.  One thing I have felt over the years that having fish at home made weekday dinners easy :) . Just one fish dish with some rice or roti and we are done. Well the following recipe is something which I had made after i came from office at 11:00 and believe me by 11:30 I was enjoying my dinner.

Rohu Fish	2 pieces
Breadcrumbs	4 tablespoon
Dried Parsley	1 tablespoon
Turmeric Powder	Half teaspoon
Red Chilli Powder	1 teaspoons
Black Pepper Powder	1 teaspoons
Ginger Paste	Half teaspoon
Garlic Paste	Half teaspoon
Oil	2 tablespoons
Lemon	1 piece
Salt	As per taste

1. Marinate the fish pieces with the ginger paste , garlic paste, lemon juice , salt , turmeric powder , red chilli powder and black pepper powder for 10 min.
2. Grind bread into crumbs and add salt , parley and black pepper powder.
3. Heat oil(I prefer the mustard oil) in a pan.
4. Coat the fish pieces in the bread crumbs and deep fry them in the pan. And done. 

COLORFUL MASH

26th Jan is the Indian Republic Day.Its the day the constitution of India came into force and India became a truly sovereign state. In this day India became a totally republican unit. Since childhood this one holiday has been a total fun day for me. My dad used to work in the electricity so on republic day morning at 7:00am he would take me to see the flag hosting in his station. We would be back by 9:00am, and mom would always come up with very special breakfast every republic day a new different and yummy breakfast. And then we would watch the republic day celebrations on the tv. A wonderful day that I terrible miss nowadays. Well as for the story behind this recipe,a few days back I saw the Veg Tiranga Rice in th CookingEscapades blog and I totally adored it. So yesterday morning while watching the parade on tv I thought that I want to create something that says "REPUBLIC DAY" so here it is... :)

Potatoes	4 medium sized
Carrots	3 large ones
Spinach	2 bunches
Cream	1 cup
Red Chilli Powder	2 teaspoons
Black Pepper Powder	2 teaspoons
Flour	2 tablespoons
Butter	1 tablespoon
Garlic cloves	3 medium sized
Onion	1 medium sized
Oil	2 tablespoons
Salt	As per taste

CARROT MASH FRY:-

1. Boil water in a cooker with a pinch of salt and add the carrots and cook till the soften.
2. Mash the carrots. Then add the flour,salt,red chilly powder and black pepper and mix all them properly and set aside for 5 min.
3. Heat oil in a pan , spoon balls of the carrot mixture and fry them.
4. Place them on a tissue paper and set aside.

POTATO MASH:-

1. Boil water in a cooker with a pinch of salt and add the potatoes and cook till the soften.
2. Mash the potatoes. Then add the salt,butter and black pepper and mix all them properly and set aside for 5 min.
3. Place the potato mash in a baking dish and bake it for 10 min.

SPINACH MASH:-

1. Cut the spinach into very small sizes so that it almost becomes a mash while cooking.
2. Grate the garlic cloves and set aside.
3. Heat oil in a pan and add the grated garlic let to get light brown then add the spinach,black pepper and salt and fry.
4. When it looks done add 1 teaspoon of cream and cook it again. Remove it in a bowl and set aside.

CREAMY GRAVY:-

1. Chop the onion very finely.
2. Heat oil in a pan and add the onions and salt and fry them till golden brown.
3. Add the rest of the cream and let it shimmer. 

ASSEMBLING:-

1. In a baking dish, coat its bottom with little butter.
2. Place the spinach mash first in a smooth layer.
3. Top the spinach with the mashed potato and pour the creamy gravy on top to of the mashed potato.
4. Finally place the fried carrot balls on top and bake the whole thing for 2 min. And walla...!!!!

                                 

I had it with garlic bread.......... :) 

PALAK SAAG

Saag in typical Bengali sense is the name for fried green leaves with little or no masala. And its a very tasty and traditional dish. I do like the north-indian version of Saag too with all the spices but I adore the way my Mamoni made it and still prefer to have Saag in that style....You know Mom's always the Best :) And as I have told Bengali's cannot stay away from mustard seed. And am not different at all.I love to eat saag with kasundi (its actually a type of mastard paste. Not sure how its made , mom makes it for me.)

Spinach	3 bunches
Brinjal	2 numbers thin ones
Turmeric Powder	1 teaspoons
Green chilly	2-3 pieces
Oil	2 tablespoons
Black mustard seeds	1 teaspoon
Salt	As per taste

1. Cut the spinach ,after washing, as finely as possible. The finner the cutting is somehow the better it tastes
2. Cut the brinjal into small pieces too and coat it with half teaspoon turmeric and salt and set aside for 5 min.
3. Heat oil{I prefer mustard may be the Bong instinct :)} in a kadhai and fry the green chillies and remove.
4. To the same oil add the brinjal and fry them till they are brown from all sides. When down remove it from the kadhai.
5. Heat oil in a kadhai again and add the mustard seed and dry red chilly and cover the kadhi. 
6. Then add the spinach leaves add salt and turmeric powder ; cover the kadhai for it to cook. Keep stirring from time to time so that it doesn't burn.
7. When the water from the leaves starts drying up add the brinjal and keep cooking , don't cover the kadhai now. Keep stirring constantly now till the water is all evaporated.
8. Palak Saag will be ready. Server with steamed rice and kasundi.

PANEER PASANDA

Paneer is a fresh cheese common in South Asian cuisine. It is of Indian origin. In eastern parts of India, it is generally called Chhena.(wikipedia) I just love to eat Paneer. But somehow didnt have it for the past so many months.Last week when I went for my household shopping I saw panner and was so tempted. I left chicken and bought paneer. :). The dish I made was a total experiment so had to christine it. Since I really enjoyed the dish , the word "PASAND" (mean like) poped up in my head and as its made of paneer so "PANEER PASANDA" .

Paneer	200 gms
Cashewnuts	7-8 numbers
Rasins	20 numbers
Cornflour	2 teaspoons
Red Chilli Powder	2 teaspoons
Turmeric Powder	Half teaspoons
Jeera Powder	1 teaspoon
Flour	2 teaspoons
Onion paste	Paste of 1 medium
Ginger paste	1 teaspoon
Garlic paste	1 teaspoon
Tomato	3 medium size
Green chilly	2-3 pieces
Garam Masala	Half teaspoon
Oil	2 tablespoons
Ghee	Half teaspoon
Salt	As per taste

PANNER PIECES:-

1. Cut the paneer into square shapes neither too big nor too small.
2. Roughly cut the raisins into very small pieces , also coarse grind the cashewnuts.
3. Mix together the cashewnut and raisins with ghee and salt and set aside.
4. Take 2 pieces of paneer, place some amount of the cashew mixture on one slice of paneer and place the other slice on top of it and press the slices together softly. Repeat the same with rest of the pieces.
5. Whisk flour,cornflour,salt,one teaspoon red chilli powder with water making a semi-liquid paste.
6. Heat a pan and drizzle a bit of oil not much as we dont need to deep fry the paneers.
7. Coat each pair of paneer with the semi-liquid paste and fry the same on the pan in medium heat.
8. When the paneer pieces turn brown on both the sides , remove on a tissue paper.

GRAVY:-

1. Heat oil in a kadhai and add ginger and the garlic pastes.
2. Add onion and green chilli paste and salt, cook till oil separates out.
3. Boil water separately , and add the tomatoes to the boiling water. When the tomato's skin wrinkles remove it . Mash the tomatoes till it forms a puree.
4. Pour the tomato puree in th kadhai and cook till the oil separates out. Add some red chilly powder,turmeric powder and jeera powder to the same and cook it for 10 min.

ASSEMBLING:-

1. In a baking dish, coat its bottom with the tomato sauce , place half of the paneer pieces on the sauce.
2. Then add half the sauce on top of the pieces.
3. Place the other half of the pieces now and then add the sauce again. 
4. Sprinkle the garam masala on top and bake the dish.            

NOTE : I have added the garam masala at last coz I have made the masala at home after roasting the ingredients. In other case add it in the before itself.
I have baked after assembling coz in that case the paneer will not split.

CHOCOLATE TRIFLE

Nigella Lawson has been a great inspiration for me to start cooking. Seeing her enjoy cooking and relishing the food , I had decided to try my hand in this field and today cooking has become my pasion. I had seen her create the Chocolate Trifle in one of her episodes. And I was determined to try to make the dish. So when I finally decided one night to make it , turns out I could not get a lot of the stuffs. So I made my version of Nigella's Chococlate Trifle.... :) Well i liked the taste of it...Hope you do to.

Chocolate cake	1
Apples	2 numbers
Rasins	2 handful
Cherry	100 gms
Carrots	50 gms
Dairy Milk Chocolate	2 number
Milk	1 and half cups
Cream	1 cups
Egg yolks	2 numbers
Sugar	1 cup
Red Wine	1 cup
Cinnamon	2 sticks
Butter	2 tablespoons

For the chocolate cake either you can buy it for you can refer to my cake recipe.

FRUIT TOPPING:-

1. Cut the apples,raisins and cherries into small pieces.
2. Heat about half cut water in a pot. When it get luke warm add the fruits and let them shimmer.
3. When the fruits becomes little soft, add half cup sugar and the cinnamon stick and let the fruits soften.
4. Remove the fruits and set aside with some of the liquid syrup.
5. To the rest of the syrup add the wine and let it cook for 10 min in low heat. Remove and let it cool.
6. Cut the chocolate into medium pieces and layer them properly in big bowl, then pour the soften fruits and syrup in the cake and keep it covered till the custard is done.

CHOCOLATE CUSTARD:-

1. Mix together cream and milk together and then heat the same in a saucepan.
2. Melt chocolate and butter together in a microwave and let it soften.
3. Whisk the egg yolks, sugar, and cocoa in a large bowl. Pour some quantity of warm milk and cream into the bowl whisking it into the yolks and sugar mixture.
4. Add the melted chocolate to the custard mixture and mix it properly. 
5. Pour the final mixture to the rest of the warm milk and cook the custard over a medium heat until the custard thickens, stirring all the time. Make sure it doesn't boil, as it will split and curdle. 
6. Remove the custard and put it on top of an ice base so it it starts cooling also keep stirring the same.
7. When the custard has cooled down. Pour it on top of the cake and wine syrup and keep it in the refrigerator .      

You can have it as it is or you can try it some soft cream.

BANANA CAKE

I love having cakes and the ones I love most are made by my mom. I have helped her several times in making cakes so thats was has got me into cakes and the taste.....YUMMY...!!!! It so happened that my mom had bought too many ripe bananas in my house and I don't like to eat bananas raw. So I decided to combine my love for cake with banana and so my first banana cake was formed.And the funny part is that after that i started to buy bananas and I try different things with banana.....like banana pancake :)

Ripped Banana	2 numbers
Milk	1/2 cup
Sugar	1 cup
Flour	1 cup
Baking Powder	1 teaspoon
Baking Soda	1/2 teaspoon
Oil	2 tablespoons
Butter	2 tablespoons

1. Whisk together ripped banana and milk till everything is smooth.
2. Add sugar to the mixture and blend it again till smooth.
3. Mix flour,baking powder and baking soda separately.
4. Melt the butter. Add the butter and oil in the banana mixture.
5. Finally add the flour mixture and whisk till smooth.
6. Coat the baking bowl with slight oil and then add the batter in the baking dish.
7. Bake the mixture in the microwave for 15 min.