Brown Rice -- Mint Rice

Why are you on Orkut or FaceBook ?

Why would you want to see pictures of the girl-you-hated-in-Kindergarten holidaying in Corfu while you are shoveling snow in some god damn suburb of New York ?

How will it help to know that girl from section C third grade who used to come over for homework help has just been hired by the company who rejected your resume thrice ?

Why would you want to see your one time crush smiling at you from his profile pic, svelte wife, fat kids and a steel gray BMW in tow ?

Why would you in midst of a hectic day forgo lunch and pause to fish out a picture of yours from last summer when your tummy was still in and post it on Facebook ?

Why would you write comments like "Cho chweet baby" and "Best Couple ever" on your networked friend's pics when you really don't care a nickel about the baby or couple ?

Why would you want to see a person's life in delta(t) time and ruin yours in +t time ?

Why do you want to connect to people whom you you took no effort to remember even two years back when you were not Orkutting ?

Why do you hate Brown Rice ?

The answer, my friend, is blowin' in the wind,
The answer is blowin' in the wind

Early summer my neighbors had heaped me with bushels of mint leaves. I am not sure if Mint leaves come in bushel but any way I want to use that word so "bushel of mint leaves" it is. I am not a huge fan of Mint and anyway there was too much of it. When those leaves were almost wilting and crying for help I put them in the blender with few green chillies, made a paste and froze the paste. Result was my freezer was full of Ziploc bags holding pretty green frozen cubes of mint.

Most of those cubes I used to make a Pudina Rice with Brown Rice. Brown Rice is kind of a staple at our home for Saturday Lunch, if we are having a Saturday Lunch at all. Also if there is a Saturday Lunch it is usually a one pot meal, quick, easy convenient. The Mint Rice or Pudina Rice suits that purpose to the hilt. Flavorful it imbibes the Brown Basmati with a fragrance and taste that makes a Brown Rice hater just forget that he discriminates rice by color & creed.

Note: I am not on Orkut or Facebook, don't go finding me there. The questions are triggered by this very honest post and comments from real life friends


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Pudina Rice/Mint Rice

Prep

Soak 2 cups of Brown Basmati for half an hour. You can also use White Basmati but then the water required to cook will vary.

Make a paste of half of a large red onion(or 1 small red onion), 4-5 cloves of garlic, 1" of peeled ginger and 4 tbsp of Mint Leves (Pudina) paste. Add 2-3 green chillies to make the paste, I didn't because Saturday Lunches are for everyone in the family even the non-chili eaters. Note: My neighbors had given me lots & lots of mint/ pudina over summer, which I had transformed into a paste which I then froze, so that is why I say paste here. I am not sure but I think a bunch or two of mint would suffice. Update on 12/21: I did this again last week and this time I added corriander leaves along with the mint to make the paste. beautiful end result.

Start Cooking

Heat Oil

Fry 1/4 cup of cashews to lightly brown, remove and keep aside

Temper the oil with 4 clove, 2 green cardamom and 1" thin stick of cinnamon

Add the onion + garlic + ginger + mint paste and fry till you see the oil seeping out of the sides of the masala

Add 1 tsp of coriander powder, half a potato chopped in quarters, and any veggies you like. I added 1/3 cup of peas & carrots. Cauliflower cut in small florets would have worked very well too. Fry for 3-4 minutes with a little sprinkle of water

Drain the rice, smear with little ghee and add to above. Add 1/4 tsp of Biryani Masala and fry the rice for a couple of minutes

Add water to measure. For 2 cups of Brown Basmati I added about 5 cups of water. Read your rice package for directions.

Add salt and let the rice cook. Once the rice is cooked add the fried cashews and a pinch of sugar if you like sweet.

There your one pot meal is ready in no time

Serve with a papad, some yogurt or raita on the side and a salad of cucumber & radish

Similar Recipes:

Brown Rice -- Methi Rice

Brown Rice -- Tomato Rice

Jeera Biscuit -- Whole Wheat Eggless Cumin Cookies

After the thekua episode I was on a high. This was easy I thought. I didn't have to fish out menacing contraptions to whisk, mix etc. as in regular baking. I didn't have to follow measures diligently, I could still throw things around. I didn't even have to roll out perfect rounds like chapati !!! Why not make something more I thought.

Jeera Biscuits, savory cookies spiced with cumin, has always been a favorite. So that was it largely based on this recipe. Mine had no eggs and were made of whole wheat. They were delicious, lovely accompaniment to the evening tea. The recipe lets you experiment a lot, next time I am going to add some other spices and see the result

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Whole Wheat Eggless Jeera Biscuits

In a bowl mix with the tip of your your fingers 1 cup whole wheat flour(atta), 1/4 cup oil, 1/2 tbsp Ghee/melted Butter, a pinch of baking powder, 1 tsp & little more of salt, 1 tsp of cumin seeds, 1/4--1/2 tsp of sugar and some ground pepper powder. The result should be like a crumble. Note: Adjust salt to your taste. Now I think ajwain/carrom seeds would have tasted great in this.You can add other spices too.

Mix 2 tsp of yogurt in 1/4 cup of water and add it gradually to the above, mixing with your hands to make a dough. Knead gently with your hands to make a stiff dough that does not stick. If you need more/less water adjust accordingly

Wrap the dough in a wet kitchen towel and let it sit for 15-20 minutes

Roll it out thick with a rolling pin and cut out shapes with a cookie cutter or just cut out rounds with a bottle lid. Prick them with a fork.

Place on a greased baking tray

Pre-heat oven to 375 F

Bake for about 30 minutes till they are light brown in color. In my toaster oven, these took about 30 minutes after which I flipped and baked for 10 more mins to make them cripser. Note: These are my toaster oven settings, time may vary and should ideally be done in 25-30 mins in regular oven. Check to see if they are nicely browned and that should be it.

Drawback: They weren't as crisp the next day but they still tasted great.



Now Reading:

Here is some more update on the Food Memoirs I have been reading for the last few months.

Comfort me with Apples -- Ruth Reichl. This is a sequel to Tender on the Bone. Wish I had a life like her, almost, would have had so much to write about. Sometimes when I read her I am not sure if it is pure fiction, everything in her life is so vastly different from a life I am used to. Still reading...

Miriam's Kitchen -- Elizabeth Ehlrich. After this drop me in a Jewish kitchen and I will dance away in there smoothly. I know all about kosher, paerve, "kosher style" and how difficult it is to maintain a Kosher kitchen. The author's journey from "ambivalent Jew to a woman who observes tradition and teaches her children about their ethnic heritage" is definitely interesting. I know very little about the Jewish life and this book opened up a window to a culture and traditions that were very interesting. Almost done.

Kitchen Confidential -- Anthony Bourdain. Though I am smitten by this guy, the book hasn't touched a chord yet. But then I am not even half way through this book.

Baked Phoren Thekua on Halloween

Immigrant mothers in a different country amidst a different culture have it hard, they are a confused lot. They are most confused around festival time. They do not know which to celebrate, which to shun, which one to just participate and which one to immerse one selves in.

There is the stuff that she has grown up with, the ones that gave her immense joy, she wants to be bonded with her children through them. She wants to share with her daughter the same thread of excitement that she once did with her own Mother over scouring and then lighting brass lamps for diwali.

But then she doesn't want to completely let go off the new festivals in the new country either. She has grown to like Halloween, the way it ushers in fall, the bright orange color of the pumpkin bringing warmth on an otherwise cold porch. She likes that it stretches her Indian festival month by a few more days, that there is something to look forward to even after the Diwali lamps have died out and Bhai Phota sweets are forgotten. And yet her thrifty logical mind does not acquiesce to spend so much money on flimsy "made in china" costumes that lose their utility beyond one single day.

After 3 years of worthless but pretty Halloween costumes, she wants to give them a miss this year. "What about being an Indian princess ?" she asks her daughter. The daughter who had fallen in this trap 3 years back is still gullible. The little girl is excited at the prospect of wearing the Anarkali churidar her aunt has sent from India for her upcoming birthday. "I will get you a crown and some jewellery and you will look like a real princess", the Mom tells her. The daughter is happy, it doesn't matter, she doesn't like spooky yet and "Halloween Express" eludes her.

Later the mother asks, "Which festival do you like best", secretly hoping for the answer to be Durga Pujo. "Halloween" she hears, "because it means lots of candies" continues the little voice. The choice has been made or maybe not.

What the future holds, we shall see. Till then there was a princess, a frog turned into last-minute flower and two un-carved pumpkins on the porch.

My Ma was not confused. Though she brought us up in a different culture, same country, she only followed what she was comfortable with. She didn't go hyper and try to do everything. We participated in the new, on the fringe and that was it.

So though we were invited for Chhath Puja, we never did it at home. We were at banks of the river Ganges observing the devotees and enjoying the rituals without feeling the stress ourselves. All the Thekuas that we loved, we had in our neighbor's home. We maintained a silent respect for all our neighbors who followed stringent rules in sanctity to make Thekuas for the Puja and never tried to re-create them at home.

I don't know why I wanted to have Thekua after all these years and went going back and forth this post & this. Too much ghee, can't do it, I reasoned. Then I saw Sharmila's Cookies and something went *Ping* in my brain. Why the thekuas were almost similar like her cookies with little differences. So I made them, no ghee, dry fruits and raisins within, spiced up by few fennel seeds and then baked, no frying. We loved them, earthy, lightly sweet, they reminded you of the soil, of your beginnings. Fried they would have been better.

I am not sure if those one time neighbors would have approved. Maybe they would say "Ee to phoren ka thekua hai"(This is a foreign thekua). You can call them whole wheat cookies if you wish.


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Thekua or Whole Wheat Cookies

Makes about 10-12 thekuas
Measurements are eyeballed

In a bowl mix with your fingers 1 cup of whole wheat flour, 1-2 tbsp of Oil/Ghee, a pinch of baking powder, 5-6 tbsp of agave nectar/honey, some fennel seeds, 1/4 tsp of ground cardamom powder. Note: If you want replace honey/agave nectar with sugar or jaggery. Also adjust the measures according to your sweet level.

Add some chopped raisins/cranberry/dried apricot.

Gradually pour approx. 1/2 cup of milk and work the flour with your hands to make a dough like the chapati dough. Adjust the milk accordingly. The dough should be stiff and not stick to your fingers.

Pat the dough with your hands in a flat thick-ish circle. Cut out circles with a cookie cutter or with a bottle lid. You need to imprint them using a mold, I had none so they remained plain.

Put them on a greased baking tray. Brush them with some oil/ghee.

Bake at 375F for 25-30 mins till they are nicely browned. These were my toaster oven settings, so the time may vary. Alternately deep fry them in aromatic ghee.

Cool on the rack and store in an air tight container.

If they are not enough sweet, sprinkle some sugar on them.