• Lotus root slices, 2 cups or one frozen pack
• Tomato, 1 large, diced
• Onion, 1 medium, diced
• Scallions,  1/2 cup sliced
• Edamame beans, 1/2 cup
• Green chillies, large, sliced, 4
• Garlic, 4 cloves, crushed

• Preparation: 

• Peel, rinse and slice the lotus root into 1/3 inch slices (I bought frozen, pre-sliced lotus root).
• To prevent discoloration, keep slices in bowl of water with 1 tbsp of vinegar. 
• Heat up 2 tbsp. cooking oil in Wok, Add garlic and onion, Add salt to taste.
• Once the onion slices turn golden brown, add the rest of the ingredients, add 1/2 cup of water. 
• Cook for 30 minutes on low medium flame and keep it covered while cooking. 
• Add 2 tbsp lemon juice. 

• It goes well with roti or steamed rice.

   

Even though Ven Pongal looks like an easy recipe. You need to know few tips, to make it perfect. Thanks to my friend Amrutha Varada for sharing those tips with me.

Ingredients:

• Brown rice 2 cups
• Moong dal 1 1/4 cup
• Jeera(cumin) 1tsp
• curry leaves(10)
• Whole black pepper(10)
• Oil 1 tsp
• little asfoetida
• Green chillies,small(7-10)
• Ginger, about 1 inch piece- grated or cut into fine pieces(you can exclude this if you are going to have Pongal with ginger rasam)
• Ghee(clarified butte) 2 tsp

1. Cook the mixture of dal and rice in 7 cups of hot water, add salt to your liking. I prefer to cook this in pressure cooker; you can even cook on stovetop, but you need to cook until rice is mushy.(tip#1)
2. Add olive oil and ghee to skillet and season with jeera, curry leaf, whole black pepper, asafetida, add little bit of jeera powder(cumin), fine cut green chilies(3).
3. Mix seasoning in cooked dal and rice.
4. Then add about 2 cps of hot water to pongal at the end and mix well. (tip #2)
5. You can add fried cashew nuts at the end if you like.

It tastes very delicious with ginger rasam (tip #3)

Condiments for Ven Pongal:

Ginger Rasam
Coconut Chutney

Ingredients:

• Ginger, garlic – fresh paste 1 tsp. each
• Soy sauce, organic 4 tbsp. dilute this with 4 tbsp. of water
• Any vegetables of your choice, 4-5 cups; I used Banana flower (How to prepare banana flower), Bean sprouts, bamboo shoots (I used boiled and vacuum packed), Baby bok choy. (carrots, broccoli, water chestnuts, cauliflower are other vegetables go well with stir fry)
• Red pepper flakes or chilly powder, ¼ tsp.
• Onion, 1 medium size, cut into chunks
• Scallions, handful, cut into small pieces
• Sesame oil, 1 tbsp.(add hot oil if you want more kick)
• Cilantro or chives, freshly chopped
• Peanuts 2 tbsp. (with red skin on)
• Sesame seeds, 1 tbsp.

Preparation:

• Lightly fry peanuts and sesame seeds in ½ tsp. of oil and keep them aside for garnish.

• Cut all vegetables into approximately same size for even cooking.

• Heat one 1 tbsp. of sesame oil in a large skillet over medium heat fry onions and scallions, once golden brown add chilly flakes and sear other vegetables for ten minutes until all vegetables are cooked. Add veggies like carrots, peas, beans first. Add ginger, and garlic afterwards. Add diluted soy sauce at the end and fry for 2-3 minutes. Amount of soy salt in this recipe varies depending on the type of sauce you are adding and it also depends on how salty you would like the dish to be.
• Garnish with peanuts, sesame seeds, and cilantro at the end.

• Serve over steamed rice or pasta.

•  

  FYI:

• If making with banana flower, for a lovely presentation serve in outer purple layers of banana flower. If you are pressed for time, skip banana flower in the recipe, as it takes some extra time to peel and cut banana flower.
• If you like the veggies to be crispy just stir-fry them for 5 minutes, uncovered.
• Japanese soy sauce or light soy sauce is less salty than Chinese soy sauce. If you like it saltier use Chinese soy sauce, which is darker in color.
• Adding soy protein to this dish is also a good idea to make it protein rich. If you add soy protein, marinate it in water, squeeze water out and fry it in oil first with soy sauce and keep it aside. Clean the skillet and fry other vegetables as mentioned above. 

Date Nut Roll

BY DRSAILA · JUNE 24, 2015

Date Nut Roll is a dessert of celebration. I make this for festivals and for other ceremonial occasions. Very easy to make, healthy, & delicious. Some people call this no sugar sweet, but I wouldn’t give that description, because sugar in dates comes mainly from fructose, which is a type of sugar, any sugar must be consumed in limits. This is natural sugar, has no chemicals that are usually found in refined white sugar. You can make circles, squares or any shapes you like.

Ingredients:

• 1 pound dried dates(Khajoor), handful of raisins(if you like low sugar sweet, replace some dates with dried figs), deseed and chop into small pieces.
• Mixed nuts(amount varies depending on how many nuts you like(I usually keep half pound) – walnuts, almonds, cashews or pista; chop them into small pieces.
• 2 spoons of ghee(melted butter)
• dash of cardamon powder(elachi)
• Little bit nutmeg powder

Procedure:

• Add 1 tbsp of ghee to the pan and fry the nuts until they turn light brown and keep them aside.
• Add 1 tbsp of ghee and add pitted dates, raisins, keep stirring over medium heat until they become mushy, can add 1 tbsp of water if needed.
• Add nuts to the fruit and mix. Shut off the heat, while the mixture is warm, take a spoonful of mixture into you hand, make logs(apply ghee to hands if it sticks), and roll in desiccated coconut and cool completely in freezer for few hours.
• Slice with sharp knife once the roll is firm.