Ghee (Clarified Butter)

Ingredients

Butter (homemade or store - bought unsalted)

How to make homemade butter?

1. In a glass bottle / plastic container, take little amount of curd (yogurt).
2. Boil milk & let it cool to the room temperature.
3. Collect the thick layer of cream (aadai in Tamil) that is formed on the surface.
4. Add this to the curd & refrigerate.
5. Keep collecting the thick layer of cream for about a week or 10 days & keep on the adding to the bottle.
6. After this, take out the bottle from the refrigerator and set it to form curd.
7. Now, shake the bottle up & down, about 100 - 150 times.
8. Add little water and shake a few more times.
9. Now butter separetes out & floats on the top.
10. Transfer this to another vessel and separate out the butter from the buttermilk.
11. Store the butter in a container and refrigerate.
12. Repeat the same process one more time to collect more butter.
13. Now its time to clarify this butter into ghee.

Method

1. Heat a large saucepan under medium heat.
2. Add butter which slowly melts & starts to boil and lathers.
3. Reduce the heat to a low - medium, so that the foam won't spill out of the saucepan.
4. This thick foam, in due course of time, subsides into a thin foam.
5. At this time, the liquid underneath the foam will be unclear and boiling vigorously.
6. After some time, the foam becomes very thin and will start to change into pale yellow color.
7. By this time the liquid underneath will be very clear so the base of the saucepan can be seen.
8. Turn the stove off and let the ghee cool to a luke warm temperature.
9. Transfer to glass bottles (only the clear ghee & throw away the remnants) & close tightly.
10. This ghee will stay fresh for months.



15 sticks of unsalted butter melted & clarified
to get 1 1/2 large bottles of ghee

 Note

1. Never use stove on high heat. This will burn the ghee to brown color.
2. Always use dry spoons for ghee. This will make the ghee stay fresh.
3. Always use air tight bottles.

Valentine's Day Cooking

Chocolate - Strawberry Jam - Short breads

Strawberry Smoothie

Spicy Egg Omelette



Homemade white Bread

Chocolate Hearts

Shortbread Cookies

Pancakes

Pineapple Shake

 

Cheese Pizza

Ginger Tea

Serves 2 people...

Ingredients

Milk (Whole milk / Vitamin D milk) - 1 1/2 cups
Water - 1/2 cup
Tea dust - 2 - 3 sp
Ginger (skin peeled) - 2 inch piece
Sugar - To taste

Method

1. Clean the ginger piece and grind it into a paste in a mixie / blender, adding 1/4 cup of water.
2. In a pan, add the 1 1/2 cups of milk.
3. When the milk comes to a boil, reduce the heat to a low - medium.
4. Add tea dust and let this boil for 2 min. Make sure the milk turns slightly brown before adding ginger. Else the milk will curdle.
5. Now add the ginger paste along with the remaining 1/4 cup of water.Let this boil for 2 - 3 min. in a medium heat.
6. Now add sugar and boil for another min.
7. Filter out the tea into cups.
8. Pour the tea back and forth (twice or thrice) between two cups with arc - like motions of the hand.
9. Serve hot.

Note

1. Never add ginger to milk. This will curdle the milk for sure. Always add ginger once the milk turns little brown because of the added tea dust.
2. Its better to use whole milk than low fat & skim milk because reduced fat milk will be too watery which will not suitable for a good tea.
3. Having a cup of ginger tea everyday avoids the problems of indigestion & gastric troubles.

Sweet Corn vegetable soup

This recipe serves 2 - 3 people

Ingredients

Water - 3 cups
Noodles (optional) - 10 strings
Carrot (finely chopped / grated) - 1 /2 handful
Beans (finely chopped) - 1 /2 handful
Cauliflower (finely chopped) - 1 /2 handful
Sweet corn - 1 handful
Sweet corn (grind in blender w/ little water) - 1 handful
Sugar - 1 sp
Salt - To taste
Pepper powder - To taste
Corn Starch - 2 sp (mixed with little water)
Spring (Green) onions (chopped) - To garnish

Method

1. In a pan, bring water to a boil.
2. Add sweet corn along with all the chopped vegetables & noodles (optional). Let this cook for 2 - 3 min.
3. Now, add the grind sweet corn & mix thoroughly.
4. Add in the sugar, salt and pepper powder & give a good stir.Let this cook for a minute or so.
5. Stirring continuously, add in the corn starch mixture and cook for another minute.
6. Turn off the stove and garnish with spring onions.
7. Serve hot before lunch / dinner.

Note

1. Soup can be made creamy or little watery either by adding more or less corn starch.
2. This is totally healthy & too filling.

Masala Paal (Almond Milk)

Me & my family don't like to eat almonds as such.....Somehow, one day I bought a big pack of almonds from Costco...hoping that I will eat them.But it never happened. The pack was sitting unopened in my refrigerator for 2 whole months....

One day, while cleaning my refrigerator,I remembered this pack of almonds......which I bought & gave a good rest w/o using them.....I didn't want all my almonds to find their way to the trash....Instead I tried something with it which my family love to drink.....and my guests too....

I prepare this almond masala powder in large quantities.....store them in bottles....refrigerate them. Everyday, either after breakfast or dinner....this hot almond milk.......sip...sip...sip...hmmmm...YUMMY!!!

Ingredients

Almonds (Badam) - 2 handful (No need to remove the skin)
Pepper powder - 1 - 2 sp
Turmeric - 1/4 sp
Cardamom - 1 (use seeds alone & not the skin)
Saffron - For garnishing (optional)
Pistachios - 1 handful (optional)
Milk (Hot boiled) - As required
Sugar - To taste

Method

1. Add all ingredients (except milk, sugar & saffron) to a mixer / blender.
2. Grind slowly (better to use pulse mode in mixer) taking care not to break the mixer blades.Do not add water.
3. Grind till a point so that, 3/4th portion of fine masala powder & 1/4th portion of coarse masala powder is got.
4. Store in a container & refrigerate.
5. When required, add 1 - 2 sp of masala powder to a cup, sugar to taste and hot boiled milk.
6. Pour back & forth between two cups in huge arc - like motions of the hand.
7. Garnish with a few strands of saffron (optional) and little masala powder.
8. Serve hot.

Almond milk for kids

1. Take very little masala powder and grind in a mixer, adding little water to a very fine paste.
2. Add to milk (boiled & cooled) with required sugar & feed.

Note

1. Almond milk is a very healthy energetic drink.
2. When these almonds are taken by pregnant ladies, it enhances the brain development of the growing foetus.
3. Turmeric is added in little quantity so as to give the nice yellow texture to the milk and also for its medicinal properties.
4. This milk is good for cold & cough since it has both pepper and turmeric.