Polvorones - Spanish Almond Cookies

All my last month's pending challenges will be posted this month. Last month's International Food Challenge started by Saraswathi and Shobana, was hosted by Sharanya. Every month a region's cuisine is explored and for the month of February it was Andalusia, the southern part of Spain. She gave us four recipes and we were to choose any one from them. At first I wanted to try out a savoury dish but at the last moment I changed my mind and made these cookies. Polvorones are famous throughout Spain during Christmas. On the day of preparation, I had some guests and I was happy that I could serve these with coffee. The preparation was quite easy and the cookies turned out crispy and flaky and so delicious. Making the almond flour was the only lengthy task needed for these cookies, but if you can get it in stores then it is fine. While grinding the blanched almonds, pulse it in a mixer along with 2-3 tbs of flour to get a nice non clumpy flour. 

Recipe Source: Sea Salt With Food

Makes 16 Cookies

Ingredients:

Flour/ Maida-110 gm

Icing Sugar-40 gm

Almond Flour- 50 gm

Unsalted Butter-100 gm

Procedure:

1. Preheat oven to 150C.

2. In a bowl cream together butter and icing sugar.

3. Add the almond flour and flour to the butter mixture and mix to form a soft dough.

4. Roll it on a lightly floured counter and cut out cookies with your favourite cutter.

5. Arrange on a greased baking tray.

6. Bake the cookies for 20 minutes or until slightly brown.

7. Allow them to cool on wire rack.

8. Dust with icing sugar and serve.

Take butter and sugar.

Mix flour and almond flour.

Cream butter sugar using a wooden spatula.

Add the flour mixture.

Knead dough and roll into a thick disc.

Cut the cookies using a cutter.

Arrange on a greased baking tray and bake.

Dust with icing sugar and serve.

Beetroot Pachadi

I love beetroot and I can have it raw as salad or as a delicious poriyal. My daughter likes poriyal and the pink poori I make with beet juice. But hubby dear hates beetroot and whenever I prepare a dish with it, he never touches it. Sometimes, I have to make another extra side dish just for him. So when I made this pachadi from nandoo's kitchen, I thought he would not touch it. But to my utter surprise, he liked it very much. I made dal palak  and for the side I made this delicious beetroot pachadi. When mixed with curd it turned to a lovely pink and I just loved it. It was quite spicy with ginger and green chillies and DH has asked me to make it again. So thanks to Lisha for this yum recipe. This for the second day of Blogging Marathon #34, week 4 in which I am preparing from Nandoo's Kitchen. This is also one of Kerala Sadya recipes and I am extremely happy to have tried this. If you are making it hours before serving, then do not add curd to the pachadi. Add it at the time of serving else it will become sour.

Read more »

Remembering Dad With his favorite Sweet - Rasgolla with a South Indian Twist

It has been more than 10 days, I posted in my blog. These 10 days were the toughest days in this new year. After mom left us to heavenly abode 6 months back, my dad has also followed her. I just couldn't believe it. Now I am left without my parents and it is killing me. Until they were alive a small girl was alive within me and now I feel like I am missing that girl. Suddenly I feel very lonely and old. The only reason I am staying sane is my little girl Sruti. I didn't even feel like sitting before my PC, but I wanted something to divert me from the sorrow which has struck me the second time in six months. And this post is to remember my Dad with his favourite sweet. 

This is the snap of mom and dad before 20 years. I know the editing is very bad but I couldn't do a better job. 

Read more »

Mushroom and Spinach Lasagna

Lasagna is a Pasta dish made in layers with meat sauce and cheese. I made a vegetarian version using mushroom and spinach. One of my readers wanted me to post Lasagna recipe. I have seen so many recipes but never attempted it at home. SO when I saw the Lasagna sheets in the stores I grabbed it. Those sheets were oven ready sheets so you need not precook the sheets. Just layer it with sauce and cheese and bake for 30 minutes and Lasagna is ready. This recipe is adapted from Titli's vegetarian lasagna. It turned out wonderful. The white cheese sauce was absolutely delicious and it just melted in the mouth. I am really happy that I tried this. Next time I am planning to do a spicy version as hubby likes only spicy food. I assembled the lasagna and refrigerated it. The next day I baked it. There is one more lasagna in the freezer. You can either freeze uncooked lasagna or cooked lasagna. Both works great. So have one in freezer and on a day when you are in no mood to work in kitchen, just remove it, thaw and bake. Your food is ready in 30 minutes without even doing any work...

Read more »

Eggless Santa Claus Challah

For the Home Baker's challenge, I made two recipes from the recipes suggested by Priya. One being the Snowmen Butter Cookies, the other one I chose was Challah. Challah is a Jewish braide bread relished on Sabbath. It consists of eggs and that gives a fluffy bread. I have made Eggless Challah in braided form before and I was searching for other options to shape the bread. Recently I came across the Santa Claus bread in one of the groups. I am sorry I forgot the blogger but I searched for a detailed post and came across one in Taste of Home. The shaping was so much fun and the end result was awesome. My daughter loved it. The bread itself turned out super soft and the texture was very nice. You can use this recipe and braid the dough for an authentic finish. 

Read more »

Wish to Just Eat South Indian Food?

And you thought Indian food was just about the dal makhanis, shahi paneers and tandoori chickens? If yes, you couldn’t be farther away from what the fact is – that Indian food is equally about the dosas and idlis, the upmas and uttapams. After all, South Indian cuisine is an integral part of the culinary heritage of our country. And if I may add, eaten and enjoyed widely, all over India.

Read more »

Eggless Sfogliatelle Ricci- An Italian Pastry - Tribute To Lis - Queen Of Daring Bakers

Today while I visited the Daring Baker's group page, I was shocked to learn about the demise of DB's co founder Lisa who blogged at La Mia Cucina. Dearly called as Lis, she used to introduce us to the host every month. I am one of the silent admirer of Lis. I think Daring Bakers group is the first group to do monthly challenges. Nowadays there are so many groups among bloggers but Daring Bakers remain on top. I am proud to be part of Daring Kitchen for the past three years and this month's challenge post is a tribute to Lis for bringing so many wonderful cooks from all over the world together. I am extremely sad that every month I am doing a tribute post. First it was for my mom, then for my beloved chef Tarla Dalal and now for Lis. I hope this stops this year. I really don't want to lose anybody next year...

Read more »