Badam Halwa: A delicious sweet / dessert

• Soak 1 cup of almonds in a bowl of boiling water.
• Remove and discard skin.
• Grind to make a fine paste.
• Boil 2 1/2 cups sugar with 1 cup of water to get syrup.
• Add the paste of almond to the boiling syrup and stir well.
• Dissolve 1 pinch of saffron in a little water and add to the syrup.
• Add 1 cup of ghee and stir.
• Wait for the contents to become like paste and add one more cup of ghee gradually.
• Maintain medium flame. Remove from flame when we get a batter like result.
• This tasty Badam Halwa, can be served hot or cold.

Coconut Burfi: A tasty dessert (Tengai Burfi)

• Take 1 tbsp of ghee in a saucepan.
• Heat it under low flame.
• Add 2 cups each of grated coconut and sugar.
• Stir constantly to get the contents thick.
• Grease a plate with ghee.
• Transfer the preparation to the plate and level it.
• Wait for cooling a little.
• Cut into required shapes like square, rectangle, diamond, etc.
• Decorate each piece with almond or cashew nut.

Kolukattai / Kozhukkattai, a special sweet for Ganesh Chaturti (Vinayakar Chaturthi / Pillaiyar Chaturthi)

• Roast lightly 2 cups of rice flour in a skillet.
• Allow it to cool by spreading on a tray.
• Add 1 cup of jaggery which is shredded, ¼ cup of finely sliced coconut and 1 tsp of salt.
• Mix together with required quantity of water so as to be well-kneaded and firm.
• Make lemon sized balls.
• By gripping each ball within palm, knuckle shaped kolukkattais can be made easily.
• Arrange the kolukattais in idli cooker so that they don't contact each other.
• Steam cook until light brown in color.
• This is similar to modhakam or modhak.
• Serve hot or cold.

Green gram Payasam (Paasipparuppu Payasam / Split Moong dal Payasam) : A dessert

• Take 1 cup of water in a pressure cooker.
• Add ½ cup of slightly fried split green gram.
• Boil under low flame.
• While boiling, add ½ cup each of grated jaggery and grated coconut.
• Fry qty 6 each cashew nuts and raisins in 2 table spoons of ghee.
• Add this also to the boiling content along with some cardamom powder and 1 cup of milk.
• Boil further for 5 minutes.
  
  
  Glossary
  
  English --------------------- Tamil -------------- Hindi
  Green gram (split) - Paasipparuppu / Payattham paruppu - Mung dal
  Jaggery ------------------ Vellam -------- Gud
  Coconut ----------------- Tengai --------- Nariyal
  Cashew nut -------------- Mundhiri paruppu ------ Kaju
• Raisin ------------------ Ular Drakshai ----- Kismis
  Cardamom ------------------- Elakkai --------- Elaichi
  Milk -------------------- Pal / Paal --------- Dhoodh
  Ghee -------------------- Nei ------------ Desi Ghee

Pal Kozhukkattai / Paal Kolukkattai / Sweet Milk- Rice flour Ball Dessert

• Mix 1 cup of rice flour and required warm water so as to make thick dough.
• From this, make small balls of uniform size.
• Boil 1 cup of milk with 1 cup of water, ½ cup of shredded jaggery (Traditional unrefined sugar called vellam in Tamil), 1/4 cup of grated coconut and a little cardamom powder.
• Add the balls and cook for about 8 minutes under low flame.
• Serve hot or cold.

Venpongal (pongal)

• Wash 2 cups of raw rice (pacharisi) and ½ cup of husked green gram (pasipparuppu / moong wash).
• Add 6 cups of water, some fresh grated ginger (inji / adharak), salt and asafetida / asafoetida (perungayam / hing).
• Pressure cook for a duration of three whistles.
• Meanwhile fry some cashew nuts, one teaspoon of black pepper (milagu / Kala mirch / kali mirchi), one teaspoon of cumin seeds (Jeera, Jeeragam) and some curry leaves (kariveppilai / karipatha) in four tablespoon of ghee in a deep vessel using low heat.
• Mix well with cooked rice.
• Serve hot either with sambar or chutney or with both.

Idli (Idly)

• Wash 4 cups of parboiled rice (pulungal arisi).
• Wash 1 cup of urad dal (husked black gram / ulundham paruppu) + a tsp of fenugreek (methi / vendhayam). (Wash only a little to retain available yeast, which is useful for fermentation).
• Soak them separately in water for about 2 hours.
• Grind rice and dal separately to a smooth fine paste. Add water little by little while grinding to achieve desired result. Cold grinding is preferable.
• Mix together with 2 teaspoon of salt with your hand and make a thick batter and just cover the container.
• Leave it for not less than 8 hours to ferment. The duration of fermentation is more during winter or in cold countries. The volume of batter increases and becomes almost double at the required fermentation stage. So select the container accordingly.
• Boil water in idli cooker.
• Apply oil over plates of idli stand.
• Stir the batter a little (If you stir more air bubbles will come out resulting in less spongy idlies), pour in the idli plate with the help of a spoon and place it inside the cooker.
• You can use normal cooker without the weight.
• Steam for about 10 minutes.
• Take out the stand, remove idlies from plates by using a sharp wet spoon.
• Serve hot with sambar, chutney, mutton /chicken gravy, or milagai podi with gingelly oil.

Mango Rice, Coconut Rice, Potato chips, Salad, Sambar Vadai, Payasam (Kheer), Sweet Porridge, Rava (Suji) Laddu, Halwa, Nellikkai(Amla) Chutney,etc.

Mango Rice (Mangai Sadam)
Cook 1 cup of Rice. Cut a small piece of ginger and 2 green chilies (chillies) into very small pieces. Peel and grate a raw mango. Fry 1/4 Cup of Peanuts(ground nuts) for about one minute, by using 2 tsp Oil,1 tsp Mustard seeds and fresh Curry leaves. Add ginger, green chilies and grated mangoes. Stir, till the mango gets cooked. Remove from flame. Mix with rice and Salt to taste. Serve hot or cold.

Coconut Rice (Tengai Sadam)
Fry 1 Cup of grated coconut, by using 2 tsp coconut oil, 1/4 tsp each of mustard seeds, black gram(ulundam paruppu,urad dal), Bengal gram(kadalai paruppu,channa dal), some peanuts (ground nuts), cashew nuts, fresh Curry leaves and 2 green chilies. Continue frying on a medium heat till the appearance of golden color. Mix this well with 2 cups of cooked rice and salt to taste.

Potato chips
Slice potatoes thin and round. Add some salt in a bowl of water, soak the slices for 5 minutes and dry. Deep fry them in oil. Mix with red chilly powder.

Mixed fruit salad
Cut required quantity of fruits like grapes, banana, papaya, orange, apple, pineapple, and dates. Boil some jaggery in a little milk and filter. Mix every thing slowly with pre boiled cold milk and keep in refrigerator. Serve cold.

Idli Podi
Roast and grind 100 gm each of Black gram (ulundam paruppu,urad dal), Bengal gram (kadalai paruppu,channa dal ), 50 gm each of red chilly, white sesame and a few curry leaves, separately. Mix all with a little asafoetida (perungayam,hing) and required amount of salt. Store in air tight container.


Sambar Vadai
Soak 1 cup of urad dal (husked black gram, ulundham paruppu) for ½ an hour. Grind to a smooth paste and mix well with a tbsp of rice flour (arisi mavu) , 1/2 chopped onion, 1 chopped green chilli, 2 coarsely broken blackpepper, a handful of mixture of chopped coriander leaves and curry leaves and salt to taste. Shape into vadais of preferable size and deep fry.Put them in hot sambar. They float,absorb sambar, and become smooth and tasty Sambar vadais.

Quick Pal Payasam (Kheer).
Take 1 litre of milk, ½ Kg of sugar, a handful of washed rice of your preference & a pinch of cardamom in a pressure cooker. Cook for one whistle and then for about 5 minutes.

Sweet Porridge
Boil 100 gms of broken wheat with 100 ml of milk, a tablespoonful of coconut turnings and a little water, till the broken wheat becomes soft. Add 50 gms of jaggery and a pinch of cardamom powder. Boil further for 5 minutes. Serve for 5.

Rava Laddu
Roast 1 cup of rava slowly until it gives an aroma. Allow it to cool. Grind it soft. Grind 1 cup of sugar into powder. Mix them with ½ tsp of cardamom powder. Fry qty 6 cashew nuts and qty 10 raisins (kismis) in ¼ cup of ghee and mix well with the powdered mixture of rava, sugar and cardamom. Make laddus (round balls). Add hot ghee if required to make laddus conveniently.



Carrot Halwa
Boil 500 gm of grated carrots in 750 ml of milk. Stir intermittently at the beginning and continuously when it starts thickening. Reduce flame; add 200gm of sugar, a tsp of ghee and a pinch of cardamom powder. Stir until the ghee comes out. Serve hot with decoration of your choice.



Nellikkai (Amla) Chutney
Take 100 gms of nellikkai. Remove seeds. Grind with a green chili, a little ginger, garlic, salt and jaggery (optional).Season with mustard seed, jeeragam (jeera or cumin seed) and oil.

Ginger Tea
Boil 500 ml of water. Add some slices of fresh ginger root. Reduce flame. Cook for 10 minutes and strain. Add honey and/or lemon juice of your choice. Drink hot. (Good remedy for sore throat, cold, etc.)

Introduction

Good health and fitness mainly depends on nutrition. The intake of food largely determines our health. Let us see an overview of preparation of a variety of simple, hygienic, tasty and nutritive food.