Chickpeas Shami Kebab/Vegetarian Channa Shaami Kebab

Shami Kebab or Shaami Kebab is quite a popular kebab variety which is mostly prepared with minced or ground meat though vegetarian versions with potato or paneer is quite popular as well.Shami kebab is eaten as snack or an appetizer. They are served along with sheer kurma during Eid celebrations.Do you know shaami kebabs may be served with roti along with ketchup, raita or chutney. Though most of us love shami kebab prepared with meats, not to forget that many vegetarian and vegan version do exists. And my today's post is a fantastic, dangerously addictive, vegan shami kebab with chickpeas as main ingredient. Prepared with variety of spices, this incredible vegan shami kebab makes an excellent evening snack to enjoy with your favourite sauce.

Kalmi Kabab/Chicken Kalmi Kebab

Kalmi Kebab, calls always for chicken drumsticks, though chicken thighs makes excellent, juicy, succelent, tender kebabs. Kebab lovers will definitely fell in love this meaty kebab, this kebab is a must if you want to give a try kebabs at home. Homemade kalmi kebabs calls for mild spices and the marination plays an important role to get juicy kalmi kebabs. Tandoori ovens are usually used for making kebabs, however baking in oven works awesome to dish out this succelent chicken thighs. If you have went through my earlier post, you might have noticed that am posting Kebabs varieties for this week's blogging marathon. After a creative drumstick pulp kebab, i couldnt stop posting this delicious Kalmi kebab.

Shahi Tukda/Shahi Tukra - Royal Bread Pudding

Shahi Tukda or Shahi Tukra is a super rich dessert and its truly tastes divine with exotic flavors. Shahi Tukda is literally means Royal Piece or Royal Morsel. Though this sweet is prepared with bread, its origin is from Mughlai Cuisine. This dish is quite similar to Hyderabadi's popular dessert 'Double Ka Meetha'. I have been looking for an opportunity to give a try to this ultimate dessert for a while and finally i got a chance to make this ultimate dessert at home for a special festival. Holi, this festival of colours is quite a famous festival among Indian especially for Hindus after the festival of lights 'Diwali'. Obviously any festival or special occasion would be incomplete without sweet dishes. Being super exotic this scrumptious dessert will definitely please anyone's sweettooth.

Shir Sewain - Uttar Pradesh Special

Uttar Pradesh known as UP is a state in North India with Lucknow as capital and Kanpur as the commercial capital. This states shares it border with Rajasthan,Haryana,Delhi, Uttarakhand,Bihar and Jharkhand.Uttar Pradesh cuisine is famous for it royal dishes. While Nawabs ruling this regions, the royal slow cooking generally used for rice and meat cooking with sealed containers for retaining flavors and juices calle Dum pukht got introduced in this Cuisine.A typical vegetarian meal of Uttar Pradesh consists of roti,rice,dal,sabji, raita and papad. On festive occations, usually tava,the flat pans for making roti is considered as not auspicious and they eat friedfoods. A typical festive thali goes for Puri,Kachauri,Sabji,pulav,papad,raita and desserts.The cuisine of Uttar Pradesh is just as diverse as its geography. Ranging from simple every day fare to rich, elaborate banquets, the cuisine of Uttar Pradesh has absorbed and adapted a variety of cuisines to create  wonderful dishes..  Each city offers a different but equally inviting cuisine for the gourmet.Awadhi and Mughlai cuisine are the two prominent cuisine of this state.

Delectable delicacies like chaat, samosa and pakora, that top the most popular street food charts in all of India, are native to this state.Awadhi cuisine spread consists of elaborate dishes like kebabs, kormas, biryani, kaliya, nahari-kulchas, zarda, sheermal, roomali rotis, and warqi parathas. The richness of Awadh cuisine lies not only in the variety of cuisine but also in the ingredients used like mutton, paneer, and rich spices including cardamom and saffron.While Mughalai is strongly influenced by Persian cuisine of Iran and also have strong similarities with Kashmiri and Punjabi cuisine.ew famous dishes from this cuisiner are Bedvin this Indian flat bread known to have originated in Uttar Pradesh definitely satify your tastebuds. Paired with potato curry or chana (chole) its makes for a happy combination. Crisp and fluffy, the puris are made with whole wheat flour and urad dal while Keema dum ,kheema kebabs,mutton kofta comes from this cuisine, a prefect feast for non vegetarians. Arhar ki dal, a everyday simple classic food with dal a comforting food served with rice. Every household have their own version of this dal.Shir sewain belongs to this rich cuisine which goes for roasted vermicelli, this shir sewain is nothing but a delicious vermicelli kheer tastes fabulous as dessert after having heavy foods.

Malai Kofta Curry/Malayi Kofta

Personally i think Malai kofta doesnt need any specific introduction, its a very rich curry prepared with paneer-potato combo fried balls dropped into a very rich creamy onion,tomato and cashew paste based gravy. Actually Malai kofta curry may sounds very complicated to make at home but its not that much difficult curry, they may go for a list of spices but trust me if you have everything at home, you can make this delectable dish within few minutes. Coming to today's dish, Malai kofta was our this month's challenge for  South vs North Challenge an event owned by Divya Pramil. I missed the January month challenge and i dont want to miss this month's challenge, so yesterday i prepared this malai kofta dish challenged by Nupur of Uk Rasoi.

The theme of this event is to exchange an Indian recipe between two teams. One team is Southern team (food bloggers  born and brought in South India) and the another one team is Northern team (food bloggers born and brought in North India). Every first of a month, a blogger from each team will challenge a recipe from their origin and the opposite team have to cook the recipe challenged by the other team. If you want to be a part of this challenge, dont forget to join us, just send a mail to the Divya and get ready to face the challenge every month.Thanks Nupur, i got so many appreciation from my family coz of this utterly delicious malai kofta, i served this dish with phulkas since this dish is very much rich in calorie. If you are making Malai kofta for your dinner or lunch, dont forget to make low calorie dishes just to compensate calories in this fingerlicking rich curry.

Butter Pulao, Mughlai Kesar Murg & Bread 65 ~~ A Virtual Birthday Party for Divya Pramil

Celebrating virtually a friend's birthday, seriously am loving it. Eventhough many miles separates us we, a bunch online friends aka bloggers trying our best to celebrate birthday of each and every person of our small group. Today Divya Pramil of You Too Can Cook, a young and bubbly chef aka one of my best sister celebrates her birthday and we cooked few party dishes from her space to celebrate this day.

Happy Birthday Divya Pramil, make god bless you.Look up to the sky, too many stars are shinning up there, i want to see you shinning like a star on the sky of life, have a sparkling birthday Sister.

To a wonderful person i crossed in this virtual world, i cooked three dishes from her space to celebrate virtually her birthday. She shares many beautiful dishes and her breath taking clicks will definitely tempt you also you will learn easily her dishes through her stepwise pictures. Hope Divya will love and enjoy my virtual treat, but seriously everyone at home enjoyed this beautiful dishes and Bread 65 is our recent favourite.Dont forget to check out Sangee,Manjula Bharath,Divya Prakash,Vijayalakshmi,Preeti Tamilarasan,Shama Nagarajan,Priya Ranjit and Pretika the other bloggers joining their hands with me. Go through their blog and enjoy the virtual feast we cooked for Divya's virtual birthday party.

 Butter Pulao from Here
  

1cup Basmati rice (washed & soaked for 30minutes)
1no Onion (big& sliced)
1no Green chilly (slit opened)
2nos Garlic clvoes (chopped)
1/2tsp Pepper powder
10nos Cashew nuts
5nos Raisins
Salt
3tsp Butter
2cups Water

Heat a pan,add a teaspoon of butter, add the cashew and fry until they turns golden brown.

Add the raisins to the same butter and fry until they turns brown. remove and keep aside.

In a pressure cooker, heat two teasppon of butter,once the butter starts melting, add the slit opened green chilly,chopped garlic, saute for few seconds.

Add the sliced onions,saute well until they turns transculent.

Now add the salt, pepper powder,cook for few more minutes.

Add the soaked basmati rice,saute for a minute, add 2cups of water, stir.

Now add the fried cashews,raisins, give a stir and close the cooker with a lid, dont put the weight and cook the rice in low flame.

After 5 minutes, check the water and rice, if the rice is cooked and no more water, out off the stove.

If the rice is not cooked again for few minutes.

Toss gently the rice, dont stir much and serve with raita.

Bread 65 from Here:
3nos Bread slices
1/4cup Gram flour
1tbsp Rice flour
2tsp Cornflour
1pinch Baking soda
1/2tsp Ginger garlic paste
Few curry leaves (chopped)
1tsp Red chilly powder
1/4tsp Fennel seeds (crushed)
Salt
Oil for frying
Yellow food colour - A pinch

Cut the bread slices as small cubes.

Take a medium size bowl with gram flour,corn flour,rice flour,baking soda,ginger garlic paste,chopped curry leaves, red chilly powder,crushed fennel seeds, salt and yellow food colour, make a thick batter by adding enough water.

Batter should not be watery.

Heat the oil for deepfrying, dip gently the bread cube in the prepared batter and drop immediately the hot oil.

Fry until they turns brown, dont over crowd  and fry in small batches.

Remove from oil and drain the excess of oil with a paper towel.

Enjoy!

Mughlai Kesar Murg/Saffron Chicken from Here
1/2kg Chicken
2cups Thick curd or Yogurt
1/2cup Warm milk
3tbso Fresh cream
1tsp Saffron
1/2tsp Ginger powder
1tsp Red chilly powder
2tsp Coriander powder
1/2tsp Fennel powder
1/4tsp Turmeric powder
a pinch Asafoetida powder
1tsp Cumin seeds
Salt
Oil
Chopped coriander leaves (optional)

Wash the chicken pieces thoroughly, add the curd,ginger powder,chilly powder,coriander powder,fennel powder,turmeric powder,salt and mix well until the chicken pieces gets well coated.

Keep aside for half an hour.

Meanwhile soak the saffron strands in warm milk and keep aside.

Heat a kadai with oik, once it gets hot, gently remove the spiced curd coating from the chicken and drop it in hot oil.

The curd may get dispersed in oil,but dont worry,fry the chicken until they get half cooked.

Remove the chicken pieces from oil.

Heat an another pan with oil, let crack the cumin seeds, add the asafoetida.

Now add the curd mixture used for the chicken marination,stir well and cook for few minutes until the oil gets separates.

Add the fried chicken, stir well.

Add a cup of water to the cooking chicken and cook everything in medium flame until the gravy gets thickens.

Finally add the saffron milk,cook for few minutes.

Add finally the fresh cream,mix well and remove from flame.

Garnish with chopped coriander leaves.

Enjoy with butter pulao.

Sending to Srivalli's Side dish Mela.