recipe Archives - Holachef Blog

Posts

Chicken Schnitzel Recipe By Chef Mohit Chotrani

December 15, 2015/0 Comments/in Food Worth Craving For /by Holachef

Chicken schnitzel is a juicy and tender variation, cooked with a crunchy exterior. In all my years of cooking professionally, this is one dish that I have never tried either at work or at home. Infact, I had observed a senior chef prepare it using veal, early in my career. Still fresh, this memory and the simplicity of the dish makes me share the recipe here.

Number of portions – 2
Cooking time – 15 min
Preparation time – 10 min

Ingredients

Chicken breast – 2 whole
Mustard sauce – 40 gm
Eggs – 3
Salt – 15 gms
Black pepper – 10 gm
Refined flour – 100 gm
Panko crumbs – 100 gm
Oil to shallow fry
Lemon wedges for garnish

Method

1. Slice the chicken breast into two, also known as butterfly
2. Marinate the pieces with mustard sauce, salt and pepper
3. Heat oil in a frying pan
4. Coat the marinated chicken breast with flour while dusting off the excess flour
5. Next, dip it in beaten eggs and then into the panko crumbs
6. Once the oil is heated, add the coated chicken and cook on each side till golden brown
7. Serve with lemon wedges and dijon mustard

P.S: In case you cannot find panko crumbs you can use white bread instead. However, this could take away from the crispiness of the dish.

Diwali Special: Gujiya Recipe by Chef Ravi Saha

November 10, 2015/0 Comments/in Food Worth Craving For /by Holachef

Having spent his childhood in Lucknow, Chef Ravi Saha remembers the Diwali festivities starting from Dussehra itself. He fondly reminisces how the festival was all about family, diya patterns and special recipes. Among all the sweets and preparations, khoya gujiya were a favourite and served along with the grand festive meal as a traditional sweet dish by his mom. It has been his best dessert ever since and Ravi Saha takes a walk down the memory lane by sharing its simple recipe.

Iss Diwali make the gujiya we say!

Portions: 20 khoya gujiya

Ingredients:

600 gm maida (refined wheat flour)
500 gm desi ghee
25 gm cardamom powder
200 gm sugar
200 gm khoya (milk solids)
2 medium coconuts (grated)

The crust:

Take around 600 gm of flour and 5 gm cardamom powder in a mixing bowl.
Rub the ingredients in the bowl with your hands till you get a crumbly but consistent texture.
Keep adding water, a little bit at a time, and kneading till you get a soft dough. Cover this dough with a damp cloth and keep it aside.

The filling:

Heat about 50 gms of ghee in the pan. Add the grated coconut to the pan followed by the cardamom powder and stir.
Now add the khoya and the sugar and keep stirring and sauteing the ingredients for 5 minutes at a low flame.
The distinct aroma of the khoya after about 5 minutes is the indicator of the filling being ready.
You will also notice some excess oil oozing out on the pan.
Keep this aside and let it cool.

Making the Gujiya:

Divide the dough into 20 equal parts rolled into small balls and then further into rounds with a 4” diameter each.
Divide the filling into 20 equal parts and roll them in the palm of your hands.
Place the filling in the rounds and fold it into a semicircle.
Press and fold the edges to seal the filling.
Heat about 400gms of ghee and deep fry the gujiyas till they attain a golden brown colour.
Make sure that you deep fry the gujiya in batches of four and drain them on paper towels.
The gujiya are now ready to be served.

Isn’t that an easy-peasy recipe? Make some right away and relish the good ol’ festive memories with friends and family! Here’s wishing you a very happy diwali

Preparing For Diwali with a Home-made Medicine

November 5, 2015/0 Comments/in Granny’s Foodie Tales /by Neighborhood Granny

How do you plan to celebrate Diwali this year? Go shopping for clothes, sweets, gifts, serial lights, stick-on-rangolis or settle for a homemade Diwali?

Back in those days there was no buying of boxes of sweets and gift hampers to exchange with friends and relatives. Everything was made from scratch – the sweets, the savory snacks; the cleaning and decorating of the house; sometimes even the clothes were stitched at home by the womenfolk. And oh, the rangolis! They used to be huge and colourful and neighbours competed to outdo each other in the size and colours of the patterns. Diwali was a celebration of love, sharing joys and lots of oil diyas in every house. And crackers too. Ugh!

Days before the festival, the whole street would be suffused with the aromas of chaklis, murukkus, laddoos, karanjis, chiwda, burfis and more goodies. The quantities of these were enormous. We needed to share them with our neighbours and then have enough left over, as guests dropped in during the holidays for tea and snacks. On Diwali, we kids would be busy shuttling between houses, carrying trays laden with sweets to and fro. In between, we would be stuffing ourselves to the gills with goodies! But then, we would have been fortified with the special Diwali ‘medicine’ to prevent any stomach ailment. More about it later.

This and the crackers were the spoilsports for me during the festival.

On Diwali day, we would be woken by the string of firecrackers that father burst to announce the victory of Lord Krishna over Narakasura. With that, Diwali was officially on! Mother would have lit the lamp and arranged all the sweetmeats and namkeens in the puja room. Among all the goodies, there would be a small dabba with a halwa-like thing in it – The Medicine!

After wearing our new clothes and touching the feet of elders, we would look at and drool over the spread but would we get to eat them? No sir! We had to first have a spoonful of the ‘medicine’. Needless to say, I didn’t like it one bit on early in the morning on Diwali!

I also told you about the other spoilsport, didn’t I? I still don’t like firecrackers especially, the 1000-wala or 10,000-wala or million-wala strings that go on and on, splitting eardrums, terrifying dogs and other pets, causing respiratory problems and burn injuries, and creating mountains of garbage the day after. No, I positively hate firecrackers.

As I grew older, I began liking the ‘medicine’, which is very effective in preventing and even curing stomach problems. It is actually very tasty too, you know. So I am going to share the medicine recipe, which is very simple. Why don’t you try it at home during this Diwali?

Ingredients:

Coriander seeds – 1 tbsp

Jeera – 1 tbsp

Peppercorns – 1 tsp

Ajwain – 1 tsp

Dry ginger powder – 1 tsp

Long pepper (pippali) 1 tsp (don’t worry if you can’t find it)

Badi elaichi – 1

Cardamom powder – ¼ tsp

Jaggery – 8-9 tbsp (or double the quantity of the powder mix)

Ghee – 1 tbsp

Method:

Dry roast the ingredients lightly till they emit their aroma. Don’t roast till they turn colour. Use the ginger powder as it is. Grind to a fine powder. In a small kadhai, add just enough water to cover the jaggery. Once the jaggery comes to a rolling boil, add the powder and keep stirring till it comes together. Add the ghee and stir till the mixture reaches halwa consistency. Don’t cook too much as it would harden to a lump. Remove from fire, cool and store. And don’t forget to eat a spoonful the first thing on Diwali day!

Wish you all a very happy, safe and cracker-free Diwali! Remember it is a festival of lights and joy, not noise and pollution!

The author is your regular neighborhood granny. Loves cooking, feeding her friends and family, telling tales and reading children’s books among others — on her Kindle. She is comfortable with people her age, older than her and of course all youngsters right down to infants. And oh, she is in tune with the times too. She has seen the telegram transform into Twitter and telephone into WhatsApp. You could call her Gadget Granny Seeta, if you like. She loves saying that the tip of her tongue is in the fingers on her keyboard!

Choosing To Be A Vegan – It’s Personal!

September 30, 2015/1 Comment/in Kavita’s Korner /by Kavita Devgan

After my last post on meat ban, a reader wrote in saying that she’s a vegan and that she is not missing any nutrients because of that. She runs a vegan bakery and on exploring her blog I found some really ingenious ways to make vegan food enjoyable (banana rajgira pancakes anyone?). I tried out some of the wonderful recipes she has listed there and had a full fledged vegan cookout at home that evening. So thanks, dear reader.

Coincidentally in the same week Australian celeb chef Renae Smith of 2014 MasterChef fame was also in my city (Delhi) for a cook out (she specializes in vegan and vegetarian cooking) at Dusit Devarana. We got chatting and she shared that she had turned vegan only about a year back and was now spreading information and goodness about this way of life – as it has benefited her immensely. But she also added that while it worked for her, being a vegan needs a lot of thought and effort investment, and of course easy access to good quality produce too. So her advice was: before taking the leap make sure it fits in with your circumstance and situation.

Ditto my thoughts! I too believe that while veganism is a good way to eat and live, it is important to understand its ethos right. It does not ‘just’ mean excluding certain foods, in fact it is more about ensuring that you eat enough of the right stuff to make sure that all dietary requirements are met adequately. As sometimes let’s be honest, it can be a stretch (a vegan excludes a lot of produce – meat, seafood, eggs, dairy).

Protein thankfully is no longer a huge problem as judicious combinations can help one score all the essential amino acids, but some nutrients like vitamin B 12 (keeps the body’s nerve and blood cells healthy), creatine (helps increase muscle mass and endurance), carnosine (this amino acid helps prevent a range of diseases like diabetes, cataracts, Alzheimer’s disease and Parkinsons), docosahexaenoic acid (DHA), iron (non-heme type that we get from veg sources is not that easily absorbed in the body) and vitamin K2 (helps transport calcium into our bones) can prove quite elusive, so one must make sure one gets them or their alternatives in somehow. There are ways of course, for example carnosine can be formed in the body from the amino acids histidine and beta-alanine, so it is important to eat foods rich in these. Apples, corn, mushrooms, bananas are rich in histidine, so is rye. For beta-alanine one can incorporate soy flour in daily diet. Similarly to ensure enough vitamin A one must include A rich foods in much larger quantities to score enough. So basically information is the key.

Secondly, one shouldn’t just wake up some morning and decide to turn magically vegan. It takes work, effort and understanding. And please don’t fall in the trap of excluding animal produce and replacing it pronto with junk or way too much soya. Keep the balance of foods right at all times.

Finally, I am sharing a wonderful vegan recipe that I learnt from Renae, which I am sure everyone including the non vegans too will enjoy immensely. I did!

Vegan Apple & Strawberry Cider Crumble

Heat oven to 180c.

Peel 4-5 apples and chop into chunks (around 3-4cm). Pour 100 gm castor sugar over the apples and cover them with 1/2 bottle of cider. Bring to a simmer over a medium heat for about 10 minutes, stirring occasionally. Apples should just soften but still have a slight crunch.

Meanwhile, make the crumble: place 50 gm oats, 50 gm shredded coconut, 100 gm brown sugar, 100 gm flour and 1 tsp cinnamon in a bowl and rub 100 gm butter through with your fingertips until the mixture resembles bread crumbs and holds together when pressed.

Drain the apples (drink the left over cider) and put them in an oven-proof dish. Sprinkle over 1 cup frozen berries (any). Cover the apples and berries with the crumble topping. Put the crumble in the oven for 20-30 minutes, or until golden brown and bubbling.

Kavita Devgan is a Nutritionist, Weight Management Consultant and Health Writer based in Delhi. She will be contributing to the column Kavita’s Korner every Wednesday for this blog.

Follow her on Twitter here: @kavitadevgan

The Shawarma Secret

September 3, 2015/0 Comments/in Food Worth Craving For /by Holachef

This Middle Eastern preparation is traditionally slow cooked on a vertical spit where meat is arranged in a cone and shaved off as as the outer sides steadily get grilled. Served with pita, this delectable dish can come to your kitchen with a slight twist but the same taste! Chef Joel D Souza reveals the secret to a home made and low fat chicken shawarma.

What you need:

100 Gram Chicken Breast Boneless

½ Teaspoon Salt

2 Green Cardamom

2 Cloves

1 inch Cinnamon

1 Black Cardamom

3 Pods Garlic Finely Minced

2 Tablespoon Vegetable Oil

2 Cucumbers Skinned, Deseeded, Cut into Long Strips

2 Table Spoon Sugar

¼ Teaspoon Salt

4 Tablespoon White Vinegar

1 Teaspoon Grated Ginger

250 Gram Curd

1 Teaspoon Garlic Powder

Half a lime juice

100 Grams White Cabbage, Cut Juliene

50 Grams Red Cabbage, Cut Juliene

1 Green Pepper, Cut Juliene

1 Tomato, Sliced

2 Pita Bread or 2 Whole Wheat Rotis

What To Do:

Clean the chicken and cut into small cubes.

Toast spices, cool and crush them in a spice blender. Coat the chicken with oil, salt and crushed spices. Cover with cling film and leave in refrigerator to marinate for minimum 1 hour.

Hang Curd in a muslin cloth for about 2 hours in your refrigerator or overnight till you get a nice thick and creamy texture. Beat the hung curd with a whisker and add in garlic powder and lime juice, first half of the lime juice and add more if you want it zingy. Keep cool.

In a small sauce pan, add the pickling agents, vinegar, sugar, salt and ginger and once it comes to boil stir the mixture till all the sugar has melt.

Cool this liquid and add to the cucumbers. The liquid taste should have a strong acidic smell, sweet to taste and salty in the mouth. Mix well and store in refrigerator for atleast 30 minutes. Remove cucumbers and discard water. You have now made a quick cucumber pickle for your shawarmas.

Grill the chicken in a pre-heated oven at 200 C for 15 minutes. Once done, cool and keep aside.

Cut your coleslaw, green chillies, add lime, salt to taste.

Assemble the shawarma. Add chicken, coleslaw, pickles & sauces. Roll and enjoy!

Baked Shrimps (Recipe)

August 11, 2015/0 Comments/in Food Worth Craving For /by Holachef

With a preparation time of not more than 20 min, this dish is a treat for sea food lovers and a healthy option too. Chef Amit Gadre shares the secret to a delicious blend of flavours with this baked shrimps recipe.

Baked Shrimps

What you need:

Large prawns (about 30), peeled

(1 cup) Unsalted butter

1 1/2 Teaspoons salt, or to taste

1 Tablespoon minced garlic, or to taste

1/2 cup Coriander leaves, washed well, & chopped fine

2 tablespoons Freshly grated lemon zest (from about 2 large lemons)

2 tablespoons Fresh lemon juice, or to taste

What to do:

Preheat oven to 450°F.

In a baking dish large enough to hold prawns in one layer melt butter with salt over moderately low heat. Stir in garlic and half of parsley. Add prawns and bake for 5 minutes.

Turn the prawns and sprinkle with remaining parsley, zest, and lemon juice. Bake the shrimps until cooked for another 5 to 10 minutes.

Serve the shrimps with rice and lemon wedges.

Chicken Tikka (Recipe)

June 3, 2015/0 Comments/in Food Worth Craving For /by Holachef

By Chef Mohit Chotrani

I still remember my first day of kitchen training as a chef. The very first dish that I learned that day was Chicken Tikka. Since then, this has been a very special dish for me. Over the years, I have improvised this recipe with my experiments and have delighted many with its taste. Simple to make and hard to resist by all chicken lovers, here’s my recipe for the heavenly Chicken Tikka:

What you need:

200 Gms – Boneless chicken cut into tikka size pieces.

50 Gms – Hung curd

15 Ml – Mustard oil.

10 Gms – Coriander powder

10 Gms – Jeera powder

10 Gms – Garam masala

20 Gms – Red chilli powder

20 Gms – Ginger – garlic paste

Red food color – Optional (If you need the dark red color)

What to do:

Pre heat the oven at 180 degrees and grease the baking tray. Keep it ready.
In a bowl, take the chicken pieces, add in the mustard oil, hung curd, coriander powder, jeera powder, garam masala, red chilli powder, ginger-garlic paste, red food color and mix well.
Once everything is properly mixed and the chicken pieces are coated; spread them on the pre-heated baking tray and bake it for about 18-20 mins or until done.
Remove, serve hot with a mint and yogurt dip along with some naan bread.

Healthy Soup: Tomato, Basil and Bean Soup

April 1, 2015/0 Comments/in Food Worth Craving For, Know Your Chefs /by Holachef

This recipe originally appeared on HealthMeUp.com. You can read it here.

Tomatoes are rich in important antioxidants such as Vitamins C and A. They can also decrease LDL cholesterol and triglyceride levels in the blood. Basil is loaded with phytonutrients and essential oils, which protect the body from free radicals, while beans stay in your digestive system longer and add to the feeling of fullness, aiding weight management. Club them together and you have a recipe for good health and weight loss.