Savory Couscous cake

This is the first recipe that caught my eye in the "Best Ever" cookbook series. I never tried leeks before, that was also another reason for making this recipe. Leeks belong to the onion and garlic family. They are notoriously dirty - full of dirt between the leaves, do clean them properly before cooking. Remove the tough green leaves and use the bottom white part of the leeks.

Ingredients:
1/4 cup leeks chopped
1/4 cup baby tomatoes sliced
1/4 cup cheese ( any variety you like)
1/4 cup uncooked couscous


Bring 1/2 cup water to a boil. Add 1tsp olive oil, garlic powder, salt and the uncooked couscous. Turn off the heat and cover the pan and set aside for the couscous to cook. In a small non-stick pan, saute leeks and tomatoes with 1 tsp olive oil for 2-3 minutes. Add the cooked couscous with the cheese to the pan. Press down the couscous, and on low heat, allow the cheese to melt and bind the couscous together (shown in picture below). Cheese would make the couscous stay together as a cake. After about 5 - 7 minutes, the bottom of the cake would be crispier . Place the serving plate on the pan and turn over the cake (as in an upside down cake). Garnish with cilantro, tomatoes and serve.

Date Cinnamon Porridge

I saw the AFAM Dates event recently and was pondering over what to make. I first wanted to make Date pistacho kulfi - but since I am in still in my picky mode - no heavy cream for me. After that I forgot about the event until yesterday - I was having my breakfast (apple cinnamon oatmeal) - flash flash - why not use Dates instead of apple and have something like a date cinnamon combination for the breakfast. So here I present Date-Cinnamon Porridge that I prepared today for breakfast. Its totally heavenly - I had it with few slices of strawberries and banana.

Dates have distinctly exotic flavor. They are called as "Kharjuram" in telugu.Wiki has a wonderful report on dates. I was amazed to see the varieties of cultivars in dates. I used medjool dates which are succlent, soft and sweet variety. Also, dates are healthy option to satisfy your sweet/candy cravings. Look at the data - Dates (100 gms) come upto about 280 calories while the same amount of M&M's are about 510 calories. Top of it - dates are totally fat free while M&M's - 27.8 grams of fat in that 100 gms!

Ingredients-
1. 7-8 Dates - chopped ( The amount can be adjusted as per your sweet taste levels)
2. milk - 1 cup
3. Quinoa (prewashed) - 1/2 cup
4. 1 tsp cinnamon powder.
5. 1 tbsp honey
Pistachios for garnish

Add cinnamon powder to milk and bring to a boil. If you donot have powder, boil the milk with cinnamon sticks and remove them later. Add dates and 1 tbsp honey. The amount of honey and dates can be adjusted for the level of sweetness desired. After the milk starts to boil, add quinoa. Cover the pot and simmer the mixture in low heat until the milk is absorbed by Quinoa which takes about 12-15 minutes. The porridge is done and what a sweetly-tastly breakfast - This dish can totally pass into the dessert category with vanilla icecream on the side!Ooh - another idea - how about making a date prasadam with rava? I will try that on some festival day.

Enjoy the warm porridge garnished with pistachios and strawberries.


Food & Music - My combination

Saw the movie Ratatouille? Whenever Remy the rat tastes something very nice and delicious - his mind goes all flashing and musical. The same thing happens to me sometimes. Whenever I eat something very nice - a song pops up in my mind - most of the time its associated with the food or may be was I listening to that song too much?.

Anyway, Eating the date porridge with a strawberry - the prelude of the song "Hum ko Sirf" popped in my mind. This one is surely associated to the dish. The music starts with a slow sound and then the pop - you hear the violin and then drums and then the whistle. Same with the porridge. The taste grows on you like the violin prelude with the sweet taste of strawberry coming as the first piano music introduction. The quinoa porridge hits you like the violin and then starts the drums and whistles of the exotic date flavor.

Listen to the song here

Poached eggs

The recipe is adapted from the "poached eggs" by Sara moulton. Poaching is the process of gently simmering food in liquid, generally water, stock or wine (wikipedia). Poaching also produces food with low calories aka NO oil - isn't what all those of us who want to maintain/loose weight. Poaching eggs just takes 5 minutes.

Procedure:
In a shallow pan heat water drizzled with vinegar and salt. After the water starts to bubble - create a whirlpool in the center using a wooden spoon and drop the egg yolk and white together in the center of the whirlpool. The rotation of water will prevent the egg from dispersing. The yolk covered with the egg white will curdle into the center. Allow the egg to cook for 2-3 minutes and serve over tomatoes. Sprinkle few chives, chopped olives, salt and pepper. Enjoy with a warm toast.