Mom's Favorite Question

Hi All

I am back. I know that the very famous concern every mom has when trying to start solids with the baby is: Is my lil' one ready? Am I doing the right thing? Is this the right age? etc., etc.,

Well !!! Answer to that is : Your baby.

Yes She will give you clear signs when she's ready to move beyond liquid-only nourishment.

• Head control.
• Sitting with support
• Showing interest when you eat your food are a few signs.

If still in doubt here is a simple quiz that can help you decide.

Starting Solid Foods Quiz

1. Is your baby four months or older?

2. Has your baby doubled his/her birth weight?
3. Does your baby consume 32 or more ounces of breast milk or formula each day?
4. Does your baby turn his/her head away when he/she is full?
5. Does your baby frequently put things in his/her mouth?
6. Does your baby watch with interest as you eat, perhaps even opening his/her mouth and leaning forward as if to ask for a bite?
7. And most importantly, Does your baby sit with little support?

If the answers to most of these questions is Yes then Yes your baby is ready for solid food

Being a Mom

Hi There!!


Life moves fast and we got to run to catch up. Well I have not been a sport's person at all. And Thanks to my laziness which added to it. I couldn't keep up with the running time and life.

But, now being well into my married life (4 years now) and after having been promoted to the title of MOM (mom of a 6 month old). I have decided to gear up and get back to blogging again. But this time with a changed role, as a MOM ;)



Well, I know that its very challenging for all the vegetarian moms like me out there to start solid foods for your babies. So, I thought that I will share my experiences and recipes with you all, to help you with very little that I can.

So, Here is the first Basic Chart that you will need to know:


Introducing to Solid food


Stage 1: 0-4 Months -> Only Milk(Either Breast Milk or Formula)
Stage 2: 4- 6 Months -> Good Time to Introduce Solid Food
Stage 3: 6 - 10/12 Months -> Introduce Iron rich Foods
Stage 4: 10 months to 1 year -> Introducing Finger Foods and Regular Food


I will also add a few product reviews and suggestions that helped my baby to get used to the solid food.

So, see you until my next blog.

Cheers
Shailu

Mazedaar Malai Kofta

Last weekend was such a busy weekend that I was all tied up. Kris's friends had come home. We had lots of fun. Been to all nearby attractions with them and had a lots of fun.

One of my favorite dishes that I cooked for them was Malai Kofta. Here's the recipe. Try it and let me know if you like it

Ingredients

Half Cup cashew/pista or almonds
4 to 5 chopped chilli
1/4 bunch coriander chopped
2 tbsp coriander pdr

Half Cup cream (Heavy Whipping Cream would be the best bet)
1 tbsp cumin pdr
1 spoon garam masala(MDH Garam Masala)
1 tbsp ginger garlic paste
One Cup Boiled potato
One Cup Mix vegetable
2 tbsp oil
2 onions
2 Tomatoes
One Cup Paneer grated
1 tsp Red Chilli powder
1 tsp sahi jeera
3 to 4 tsp Ghee
Salt to Taste
A Pinch of Turmeric

Directions
For koftas:

1. Mash the potatoes, mixed vegetables, paneer and mix together.
Add the spices to this mash and mix well. The resulting dough should be firm.
You could add Corn Flour to the mix to make the dough firm. Season with salt.
Add ghee to frying pan and fry the nuts. Semi grind the nuts and add this to the
mash. Make this dough into balls. Roll into perfect rounds. Coat it with some
cornflour or all purpose flour.

2. Heat the oil on a medium flame. Deep fry these dough balls till they turn into
pale golden color.

3. Drain on paper towels and keep aside.


For the Gravy

4. First heat the 2 tbsp of oil in a deep pan and fry the onions
till light brown. Add Ginger Garlic paste and Coriander and red chilli powder to
the onions. Grind this to paste

5. Puree the tomatoes after boiling them in water.

6. Heat oil add black cumin·

7. Put this paste back into the pan and fry till the oil begins to separate from the
masala.

8. Add 1 cup of milk( you could add water but limit the water because the gravy has \
to be thick) to this masala to form a sauce/gravy. Mix well. Season with salt.


9. Bring the gravy to a boil and then reduce the fire to a simmer.

10.Add cream, and add finely grated paneer that will give good creamy texture.

11. Gently add the koftas to this gravy and stop cooking .

12. Turn off the fire and sprinkle the garam masala and chopped coriander all over
the top of the dish.

13. Serve hot with Roti or Pulav. Will be wonderful to taste.

Bagaira Baigan

My neighbor, Radha, We have met recently but I got to know her and she is really cool and we got to be good friends. She got married recently and wanted to throw her husband a very special birthday party. She asked me to share the some of my cooking recipes with her. So I thought I would put it up here.

Bagara baingan (Stuffed Egg Plants)

Ingredients:
1. Small Brinjals - 1 lbs,
2. Tamarind
3. onion (chopped fine)- 1,
5. Jeera & Methi seeds - 1 tsp,
6. Dhania - 2 tsp,
7. Til- 2 tsp,
8. Peanuts - 12,
9. Dry khopra - 2" piece (finely grinded),
10. Chilli powder - 2 tsp,
11. Haldi - ½ tsp,
12. Oil - 4-5 tbsp,
13. Few curry leaves,
14. Red chillies (broken) - 2,
15. Salt to taste.
16. Bay leaves 2

Method:

1.Roast the following in a few drops of oil and grind to a paste: til, peanuts, dry coconut, dhania, jeera, methi and chopped onion.
2.Grind the roasted ingrediants with chilli powder and haldi. Mix the pastes and add salt to taste. Set aside.
3.Slit brinjals in four keeping the stem intact, put them in salted water.
4.Deep fry the brinjals in oil till they are cooked and cool them.


5.Stuff the brinjals with masala paste. Heat oil and add mustard seeds, broken red chillies, bay leaves and curry leaves.Fry the baigan in the oil
6.Add the tamarind pulp to the Baigan and add water if needed.
7.Cook covered on slow heat till tender.
8.Can be served with bagara rice, jeera rice or biryani.

Ugadi Sambaralu

Ugadi is marked as the commencement of the New Year. And it was celebrated with a lot of zeal in our house hold. We start our day early, we do our pooja and then gathered for the Panchangasravanam(astrological predictions).

The celebrations included preparation of ''Ugadi Pachchadi'', a delicacy made of new jaggery, tamarind, raw mango pieces and Neem flowers
to drive home the philosophy that life is a mix of of sweet, sour, pleasant and bitter incidents.


This year, I have tried my best to keep up with all that my mom used to cook for this festival. Here are a few recipes shared.

So, read on and leave your comments would really appreciate that.

Recipe one:

UGADI PACHADI

Ingredients:

1 cup of raw fresh mango (cleaned and dried and finely chopped along with skin into small pieces)
1 tbsp of neem tree flowers
1 cup of grated jaggery
3 -4 tbsp tamarind paste
red chilli pwd (according to your choice)
salt to taste

Preparation:

Mix all the ingredients mentioned above and your ugadi pachadi is ready


Recipe 2

RAVA LADDU

Ingredients

1 cup fine sooji/rava
1 cup sugar
1 tsp raisins
1 tbsp cashew nuts
1/2 tsp cardamom powder
1 cup milk
1/2 cup Ghee



Preparation

Grind the sugar into a fine mixture with cardamom. This helps to get the cardamom to be properly ground and the aroma to be properly blend into the sugar powder.

Heat ghee and roast cashews and raisins. Remove the raisins and cashews and keep them aside. Add sooji in the same ghee and fry for about 5 mins on medium heat mixing continuously till a nice aroma comes out of it. Add the sugar powder to sooji and mix for 5 mins.

Take out from heat and let the mixture cool down for some time.

Now make laddoos by adding milk to the mixture(Do not add the milk all at one time). If you feel that the mixture is hard just keep adding milk, Make 8 to 10 laddoos and let them cool down.


Recipe Three

Avada (Perugu Vada)

Ingredients

1 cup Urad Dal
3 cups Yogurt
1/2 tsp Mustard seeds
1/2 tsp Cumin seeds (Jeera)
2 Red Chillies
8 to 10 Curry leaves

Soak urad dal for 6 hours in water. Grind to a smooth thick paste with very little water. Take oil in a deep bottomed pan on medium heat for deep frying. Add salt to the urad dal batter and mix well. Make into lemon size balls.
On wet hand place urad dal batter ball and shape it like a donut. Place it into the hot oil and deep fry it until both sides turn golden brown.
This process will make vadas(garelu).




Blend yogurt using a hand blender for couple of minutes. Add salt to taste. In a small pan add 2 tsp oil on medium heat. To the hot oil add mustard.Once mustard sputters add 1 tsp urad dal, cumin, red chillies and curry leaves. When it turns golden brown add it to yogurt and mix well. Set it aside.

Dip all the vadas into the yogurt and refrigerate them.

upma and kobbari podi

Hi All
My first contribution to my blog is upma and kobbari podi, which has been a classic combination that I loved. My mom is a great cook and she always fancied creating her own delicacies. This combination is one of her discoveries. This one of my favorite lunch box entity and it is till date.

The kobbari podi however can be eaten with different combination like idly's, dosa's and with rice.



Here is the recipe for kobbari podi:

Ingredients:

1. Minapappu 1/2 cup.
2. Sanagapappu 1/2 cup.
3. Endu Mirchi 5-6.
4. Jeera 1 tsp.
5. Endu kobbari 1/2 cup.
6. Oil 1/2 tsp.

Method:

Fry the minapappu, sanagapappu along with endu mirchi, till they are properly roasted.
Keep them aside and let it cool down
Now in 1/2 tsp oil fry the kobbari, till it turns golden brown in color.
Keep it aside and let it cool down.

Grind the minapappu and sanagapappu, with mirchi and then add the kobbari and jeera to it.

This kobbari podi can be stored in an airtight container.

Introduction

Hi All

Its been an year that am married now, and started experimenting with cooking. I was always scared to cook, was totally dependent for food on mom, or the famous Indian restaurants. But when I started cooking I really found it interesting. So here I am sharing my recipes with you all out there who have almost the same problem that I had initially with cooking food. I want to start my blog with the specials for Sankranti( Biggest Andhra Festival). So keep waiting for my post....


Cheers
shailu