Ajwain paratha | Easy paratha recipes

Ajwain paratha, is made with whole wheat flour and ajwain | omam in Tamil |carom seeds. It is a very simple North Indian paratha, can be made for breakfast or lunch or even dinner too. A perfect one to pack for Lunch box too. Last week, while i was busy with Diwali preparations, saw this ajwain paratha in Veggie wok's Instagram story. It was super tempting and i decided to make this soon. Finally today before making this ajwain paratha, cleared my silly doubts with anamika and made the parathas. Me being a huge fan of parathas, loved it and the ajwain flavor complimented the paratha well. Check out my

• Aloo paratha
• Pumpkin paratha

Ajwain paratha

  Preparation Time : 10 mins | Cooking Time : 20 Mins |Makes: 5

     Whole wheat flour| atta  1 cup
     Salt as needed
     Oil  few drops
     Ajwain  1 and 1/2 tsp
     Red chili powder  1 and 1/2 tsp
     Ghee or Butter   as needed (to make parathas)
Method:

• In a wide bowl add the wheat flour and little salt. 
• Add water little by little and make a soft dough.
• Divide this into equal big lemon sized balls.
• In a bowl mix the red chili powder with 2 pinches of salt and mix well.
• Take one dough ball and dust it with dry flour.
• Spread this into a roti.
• Add few drops of ghee on this and spread it.
• Sprinkle red chili powder and spread it on the rolled roti.
• Sprinkle some ajwain on this and press it gently with your fingers.
• Fold this into a semi cirlce and then bring both the edges together.
• If you want to make it as a square paratha follow my masala square paratha recipe.
• Dust this with atta and roll it into a triangle roti. 
• Heat a pan and cook the rotis on both sides and drizzle with ghee or a dollop of butter.
• Cook till you see nice golden brown spots on both sides.
• Repeat this for the rest of the dough.
• Serve with plain yogurt or some pickle.
• You can have this ajwain paratha with tea /coffee too.

     
     

Method with step wise preparations:

• In a wide bowl add the wheat flour and little salt. 
• Add water little by little and make a soft dough.

• Divide this into equal big lemon sized balls.

• In a bowl mix the red chili powder with 2 pinches of salt and mix well.
• Take one dough ball and dust it with dry flour.
• Spread this into a roti.
• Add few drops of ghee on this and spread it.

• Sprinkle red chili powder and spread it on the rolled roti.
• Sprinkle some ajwain on this and press it gently with your fingers.

• Fold this into a semi cirlce and then bring both the edges together.
• If you want to make it as a square paratha follow my masala square paratha recipe.

• Dust this with atta and roll it into a triangle roti. 

• Heat a pan and cook the rotis on both sides and drizzle with ghee or a dollop of butter.
• Cook till you see nice golden brown spots on both sides.

• Repeat this for the rest of the dough.
• Serve with plain yogurt or some pickle.
• You can have this ajwain paratha with tea /coffee too.

Notes:

1. You can make this in any preferable shape of your choice.
2. To make it very simple, knead ajwain and red chili powder to the dough and make the parathas.
3. The parathas tasted very nice with plain yogurt. 

      

Gajar kalakand, Carrot kalakand recipe | Easy Diwali sweets

Gajar kalakand | carrot kalakand, is a quick and easy sweet made with paneer, condensed milk, milk powder and carrot. I have posted kalakand recipe from the scratch. Also i have posted chocolate Kalakand recipe using store bought paneer. This Gajar kalakand i planned to post during Janmashtami itself, but couldn't post. Finally this easy kalakand recipe i made yesterday for deepavali. If you are running out of time, in the last minute and want to try out any sweet, do try this Gajar kalakand recipe. Check out my carrot burfi recipe too.Check Full collection of diwali collection from jeyashri's kitchen.

Masala murukku recipe, Easy murukku recipes

Masala murukku | Poondu murukku, the idea i got after the Popular Grand sweets in chennai. I saw the packet of Grand sweets Garlic masala thattai and saw the ingredients in that. First i thought i will make this as mini thattais, just like the Krishna sweets one. Since i have posted thattai and milagu thattai recipe, thought i will post this as murukku. It turned out very crispy and flavourful. In fact, the murukku turned out more flavorful the next day. Try this easy masala murukku recipe for this diwali.

Badam Puri recipe | Diwali sweet recipes

Badam Puri | Badam poori recipe is a authentic Karnataka style sweet, made using maida, sugar and almonds as main ingredients. I have tasted this badam puri last year, when my friend sent to me.Last year itself i was thinking to try this out but it was last minute and couldn't post. Finally last week i met her, and asked her for the recipe. She  called me up yesterday after talking to her mom and gave me the detailed recipe. The sweet turned out so well and we all loved it.Thank you so much Nanda, for the detailed recipe. It was so crisp and juicy inside. The grated dry coconut and the flavour of saffron and cardamom complimented the badam puri.

Gavvalu recipe , Diwali recipes| Sweet version

Gavvalu| kulkuls| Sweet shells| Seedakaai| Kalkals, is a Andhra style sweet, made with maida and sugar as main ingredients. Generally sweet version of Gavvalu is more popular but they make Karam gavvalus too. Traditionally they use a wooden Gavvalu maker but if not available you can use fork or new comb too. I got this recipe and the gavvalu maker from my friend Anuradha, who also shared with me some sweet gavvalu she made. I wanted to post this recipe for last year diwali itself, but finally posting for Diwali 2017. I have tried both sweet gavvalu and Karam gavvalu too.
The same one Goans also make for Christmas and call this as Kulkuls. Check out my full collection of Diwali recipes.
Karam Gavvalu recipe will be coming soon.

Gavvalu recipe(Sweet version)

  Preparation Time : 10 mins | Cooking Time : 25 Mins |Serves: 2

    Maida | all purpose flour 1/2 cup
    Sooji | rava  1 tblsp
    Hot oil 2 tsp
    Melted ghee  1 tsp
    Sugar *  1/3 cup
    Salt  a pinch
    Baking soda a pinch
    Water  to knead the dough
    Oil   for deep frying
* I used raw sugar, you can use jaggery or white sugar too. 
Method:

• In a wide bowl, add the flour, sooji, salt, baking soda, hot oil and ghee.
• Mix it well.
• Add water little by little to make it into a dough.
• Let this be like a chapathi dough and not too hard.
• If you have time, keep it aside for 10 minutes, else go ahead with making the gavvalu.
• Make the dough into small balls, like how we make for vella seedai.
• Roll this over the gavvalu maker and make the shells.
• Alternatively, you can use a big fork or a big new comb.
• Grease the comb before you start making.
• Make this for the rest of the dough.
• Heat oil and once it is hot, keep the flame low.
• Gently drop the shells into the oil.
• Fry this in low flame till it becomes golden brown and crisp. 
• Take out from oil and drain excess oil in a kitchen towel.
• Let's make the sugar syrup.
• Add sugar in a saucepan and add 2 tblsp of water.
• Let the sugar dissolve completely and boil in a low flame till you get 2 string consistency.
• When you take a drop of sugar syrup in your fingers, and hold between your index and thumb finger, it should form 2 strings.
• Switch off the flame.
• Add the fried gavvalus into the sugar syrup and mix it up nicely.
• Take it out from the syrup and allow this to cool completely by spreading it into a plate.
• Once done, separate them and store this in an airtight container. 
• Sweet gavvalus are ready. 

Picture of gavvalu maker

                                 Video of How to make Gavvalu

     
     

Method with step wise pictures:

• In a wide bowl, add the flour, sooji, salt, baking soda, hot oil and ghee.
• Mix it well.
• Add water little by little to make it into a dough.
• Let this be like a chapathi dough and not too hard.

• If you have time, keep it aside for 10 minutes, else go ahead with making the gavvalu.
• Make the dough into small balls, like how we make for vella seedai.
• Roll this over the gavvalu maker and make the shells.

• Alternatively, you can use a big fork or a big new comb.

• Grease the comb before you start making.

• Make this for the rest of the dough.
• Heat oil and once it is hot, keep the flame low.
• Gently drop the shells into the oil.

• Fry this in low flame till it becomes golden brown and crisp. 
• Take out from oil and drain excess oil in a kitchen towel.

• Let's make the sugar syrup.
• Add sugar in a saucepan and add 2 tblsp of water.

• Let the sugar dissolve completely and boil in a low flame till you get 2 string consistency.
• When you take a drop of sugar syrup in your fingers, and hold between your index and thumb finger, it should form 2 strings.
• Switch off the flame.
• Add the fried gavvalus into the sugar syrup and mix it up nicely.

• Take it out from the syrup and allow this to cool completely by spreading it into a plate.
• Once done, separate them and store this in an airtight container. 

• Sweet gavvalus are ready. 

Notes:

1. If using jaggery, boil the syrup until you get a soft ball consistency. 
2. When you put few drops of jaggery syrup into the water and gather it, it should form a soft ball.
3. If you want, you can add a pinch of cardamom powder to the syrup to enhance the flavour.
4. Always fry them in a low flame. Else it will not come out crisp.
5. You can try this with wheat flour too, but make a thick dough and cook for a long time in low flame.
6. This sweet gavvalus stay crisp for more than 15 days.

        

Wheat Halwa recipe | Tirunelveli Godhumai halwa

Wheat flour halwa from scratch - I have posted Godhumai halwa made using Wheat flour. This one is the halwa using wheat berries. Tirunelveli, is the town in Tamilnadu, famous for halwa. So we call this halwa as Tirunelveli halwa. During my childhood days, though i am not a big fan of sweets, i love to eat halwa from a particular shop in Madurai. My dad used to buy Mundiri halwa from Happy man Iyengar,Madurai, the halwa loaded with cashew nuts. He buys mundiri halwa for us and normal halwa for my grandmother(as she finds it difficult to bite lots of cashews). After coming to Singapore,tasted this tirunelveli halwa in my friend Anusha's place. This was some 8 years back. This time it thought of trying this traditional wheat halwa at home and called her up and asked for the recipe. She consulted with her mom once, who is an expert in making the godhumai halwa. Later she gave me the detailed recipe to me. Generally they add food colour to the halwa to get the golden colour or caramelise the sugar to get this naturally. I used raw sugar which gives the natural golden colour to the godhumai halwa.
   Many readers ask this question, does raw sugar give one string consistency, yes it do give. I have tried it once and used it for this halwa recipe.
Check out my full collection of diwali recipes.

Coconut Ribbon pakoda, Diwali snack recipes

Coconut ribbon pakoda with video

Coconut ribbon pakoda| seeval, i just saw this name in Krishna sweets during our trip to India in June. I didn't check out the packet to see the ingredients but noted down the name itself. I have already posted 2 version of ribbon pakoda in Jeyashri's kitchen. I tried this coconut ribbon pakoda at home by adding coconut milk, to make the dough. But some how i am not satisfied. Finally after 2-3 attempts, got the taste, which i had in my mind😃. I made this for my Cookery demo in Pasir ris CC, Singapore. Try this yummy, crispy coconut ribbon Pakoda. Check out my full collection of Deepavali Snack recipes | Diwali snack recipes.

Milk powder Burfi recipe, Kesar burfi, Easy Diwali Sweets

 Milk powder Burfi|Kesar Milk powder burfi recipe with video. This recipe is made with milk powder, sugar and saffron as main ingredients. I have already posted Chocolate burfi, using milk powder. I just followed the same recipe by replacing chocolate powder with kesar|saffron. It turned out so well, to be more precise as similar to the Mithaiwala, milk sweets. Check out my milk powder Peda and Badam peda recipe. Check out my complete collection of Diwali recipes.

Cashew Pepper murukku | Diwali recipes

Cashew pepper murukku recipe with video

Cashew pepper murukku | mundiri murukku, i first tasted in my friend's in-laws place. Few years back when i visited my friend's mil's house,(from whom i learnt Kalyana rasam)in Chennai, she made cashew murukku and thengai burfi for me. She was excitingly shared with me that she learnt this mundiri murukku from a TV show and tried it at home. It tasted awesome and i happily ate the murukku. She also shared with me the recipe of the murukku. I have tried this too and sent for Aval kitchen magazine Deepavali edition few years back. I tried this again with the addition of pepper powder. It tasted so well,the pepper and cashew nuts complimented each other very well. The murukku was super crispy. Try out this cashew pepper murukku for this Diwali. Check out my full collection of Diwali recipes. 

Garlic Karasev recipe | Diwali recipes

Garlic karasev | Lehsun sev is a gram flour based deep fried savory recipe. I have already posted karasev recipe with video. During our childhood days, appa used to buy karasev from a shop in our hometown, Madurai. They used to wrap it in a newspaper and tie with a jute thread. The moment we open the packet, the flavour of garlic and other ingredients, tempt us to finish the whole packet in one go. I wanted to try out garlic karasev for last year diwali itself, but somehow couldn't make it. Try out this easy tea time snack. Check out my full collection of diwali recipes. Scroll down till the end of the post to see the tips section.