Harvest. Unexpected Projects Using 47 Extraordinary Garden Plants by Stefani Bittner & Alethea Harampolis is a fun, beautiful, inspiring, and informative gardening cookbook I recently bought.
I pre-ordered this book and I never pre-order a book. I like to read the reviews and have the book be out for a while to see what people think of it before I get it. But the name of this book got me hooked – Harvest! What a lovely name for a gardening book. Harvest speaks volumes just by the meaning of the word – the feel good images it conjures of fields and farms, of flowers and nature.
I ordered the book not knowing if I would like it, but that’s the beauty of Amazon. I figured if the book didn’t live up to my expectations I could easily return it. I finally got a copy of Harvest in the mail about a month ago, and with an open mind started perusing this book. Let me give you just a few of the many reasons why this is a wonderful book to add to your gardening and cookbook collection. Continue reading Harvest. Unexpected Projects Using Extraordinary Garden Plants by Stefani Bittner & Alethea Harampolis→
This recipe is for a strawberry mint lemonade simple syrup which is a concentrated syrup that can be stored in the refrigerator until you are ready to make a lemonade drink.
Okra also called ladies fingers is an interesting vegetable. Growing up my Mom made okra quiet a lot, but I wasn’t always a big fan of this vegetable mainly because I didn’t like the texture of okra. It’s slimy when cut and that’s what turns many people off. But my Mom very often made an okra stir-fry in a well-seasoned old wok that got rid of the sliminess, and to get us kids to eat this very unusual vegetable she would tell us okra is good for the brain, that it makes us smarter, so we ate it slimy or not.
Okra provides about 22% of RDA per 100g of okra (which is about 3/4 cup of okra). RDA is short for Recommended Dietary Allowances that the Food and Nutrition Board of the National Academy of Sciences puts out every few years. There is an RDA value attached to each food item. Think about it, 3/4 cup of okra has 22% of a person’s daily-recommended allowance of nutrients – that is pretty high! The many health benefits of okraContinue reading Roasted Pan Sautéed Okra→
Pakoras are deep fried Indian fritters made with chickpea flour and chopped veggies. I haven’t made pakoras in ages, mainly because I stopped deep frying foods at home years ago in an effort to eat healthier. But somehow a couple weekends ago I was craving homemade pakoras. I’ve had pakoras at Indian restaurants many times, but there is something about having homemade pakoras that is – well, let’s just say like anything homemade, it has a taste onto it’s own. Continue reading Cabbage and Onion Pakoras→
For a different take on the orient inspired ramen noodles try this Indian spiced noodles packed with vegetables and Indian spices. This recipe takes your regular fresh ramen or yaki-soba noodles that are available in the refrigerator section of the grocery store and spices it up with Indian seasonings.
There is nothing like the aroma of cooking vegetables, fish, chicken or meats in homemade ghee. Ghee, also known as clarified butter gives any food that you add ghee to an invigorating aroma that has a wonderful feel good effect on our senses. Ghee can be used to cook eggs, vegetables, meat, fish, or even just to add in a warm dish as a flavor enhancer. Sometimes I even toast bread on the pan with some ghee and it tastes amazing.
Health Benefits of Ghee:
Ghee has been used for thousands of years in India for it’s healthy virtues. Some of the many natural ways ghee can be used range from curing sores, to aid in preventing allergies, and to help decrease inflammation, just to name a few. Continue reading The Feel Good Essence of Homemade Ghee→
Want to make a quick salad in as few as five minutes? No dressings involved. Just cut and plate, drizzle with vinegar and olive oil, sprinkle salt and pepper, and the salad is done. Try this avocado salad with cherry tomatoes.
I posted a recipe a while back for lemonade syrup that used over 80 lemons that my friend Elaine gave me. Well, a few weeks later she dropped off another 100 lemons through our mutual friend Rose. Here’s the thing, I already made over 10 bottles of lemonade syrup from my previous batch, and a few more bottles from the new batch, but no matter how much we love lemonade, it was time for me to get creative with these lemons. I thought let me experiment with making a couple of flavored lemonade syrups. Continue reading Blackberry Port Lemonade→
I was swimming in lemons a few weeks ago – over 275 lemons. I posted a recipe for lemonade syrup that used up almost all of them. Guess what? I got another 100 more lemons just last week! Of course I made more lemonade syrup, but I still have a bunch of lemons sitting in my basket.
So I thought let me make a lemon recipe that I grew up with – lemon rice. Mind you, this recipe doesn’t use a lot of lemon – just three in fact, but it’s a great way to make a lemon flavored main dish. Continue reading Lemon Rice→
Hitesh’s big birthday was back in end of February, and he didn’t want any celebration of any kind for this milestone birthday. Which meant that I had to celebrate it 😀 We had a surprise party for him and as a few of you may know, pulling off a surprise party is tough. But somehow we managed it with the help of our dear friends Swati and Tarak who hosted the birthday celebration at their home.
To make this party a very personal and heartfelt celebration for Hitesh, I asked all our friends (the ladies in the bunch) to bring their favorite dish that they knew he liked. Continue reading Saag Sabjee. Greens Curry→
