Thick Tomato Soup

I love this recipe of my Mother's it's such a lift me up especially in the winters and the rains! It's super easy to make and tastes delicious. Now I know the rains have gone but the winter is nearby and anyways this is quite an all weather soup for me so I’m sharing with you. I’ve given you the non-fat version with olive oil so that you can enjoy this soup more often.

Ingredients:

2 tomatoes, skinned and pureed

(To know how to peel a tomato please refer to my Tomato Salsa recipe or click HERE)

2 cups vegetable stock (you could use the ready cube one)

1/2 cup milk (or cream if you want it fatty)

2 tbsp Olive Oil

1 heaped tbsp Atta (whole wheat flour)

1 - 2 cloves garlic chopped

1/2 tsp Chilli powder

Salt to taste

Freshly ground pepper

Method:

· Take a vessel (non stick preferably) and heat the olive oil

· Add the garlic, chilli powder and sauté. You have to be careful here that the olive oil doesn’t smoke at this point and need to work quickly on this

· Add the whole wheat flour and stir

· Once it’s done, this will release a delicious roasted aroma and turn slightly brown.

· At this point, add the vegetable stock and tomato puree.

· If this forms lumps, then just whizz all this up with a hand blender

· Once this is smooth, add the milk and bring to a boil (cover partially, never fully)

Totally ready to go and rocking!

Best Salad ever!

I know my brother Rajiv will totally disagree, but I LOVE sweet salads filled with fruits and this salad totally fits the bill. It's so gorgeous to look at as well as to eat.

PS: I loooooooove strawberries so I put these in my salad in massive quantities but any really lovely looking and tasting fruit will do. My personal suggestion would be a fruit that’s slightly sweeter You can put any one or max two of the following: Cherries, Peaches, Bananas, Raspberries, Mulberries (though these make everything really purple and messy so you can put them only at the very last minute on top of the salad) and/or Watermelon

Ingredients:

1 Iceberg lettuce - 1 torn by hand into bite sized bits

a dozen strawberries cut into quarters (or any seasonal fruit of your choice as given above)

1 apple cut into cubes (I like the red colour and the roughage but you can peel them if you prefer the apple without the skin)

1 potato boiled and cut into cubes

Walnuts crushed

50 gm Emmenthal cheese cut into cubes

Dressing: whizz all this up in a hand blender or a small spice grinder

1 tbsp Lemon Juice

4 tbsp Honey

2 tbsp mint leaves

1 tbsp olive oil

A pinch of Salt and freshly ground pepper to taste

Method:

· Make sure that all your vegetables and fruits are around the same size

· Put the iceberg lettuce at the bottom of your plate/bowl

· Put the apples, potatoes and cheese here and mix all this up well

· Put the strawberries on top, douse with the luscious dressing

· Top with the chopped walnuts and enjoy!

PS: this picture is not my own, it is for representational purposes only. It is taken from

coffeeandvanilla.com

Best Spicy Chutney EVER!

I love this recipe given by my mom and it yields delicious results

take a grinder (one that makes stuff paste) and put the following in it

4 kashmiri chillies (if you want it less spicy take the seeds out)

4 tbsp vinegar (white, non flavoured type)

6 cloves garlic

1 tbsp Salt (or to taste)

keep this soaked for at least an hour or two, whizz it all up and voila! you're done!

I use this in Frankies, wraps, as a spicy sauce for Khausuey and sometimes I even use it almost as a sauce to spice up my everyday meal, like on my Dal Chawal (gotta try that combo)

Thanks Mom!

Peanut Cookies

Soo easy! These peanut cookies are delicious to eat and take less than 20 minutes to make

Ingredients:

100gm flour

100gm butter

100 gm icing sugar

50 gm roasted peanuts roughly chopped

Method:

· Preheat Oven to 180 degrees Centigrade

· Mix the flour and sugar together

· In a bowl, rub the flour and butter together to make it resemble bread crumbs (preferably put this bowl on a cold surface or put the bowl in an ice bath to prevent the butter from melting)

· Gently bring the dough together, do not knead it at all

· Take Cling film at the bottom of a work surface, put the dough on top of the cling film and put cling film on top of the dough and roll it out

·Cut into whatever shape you prefer. It's totally normal that the dough is really soft so be careful when working with it

· Place onto baking tray (you can put directly onto tray, no need to grease)

· Add the chopped peanuts here on top of each cookie. You can gently press them in

· Bake for 15 minutes or until cookies are slightly golden brown

· Wait for them to cool as they will turn hard and cookie-like only once cooled

Gorge on these cookies (I never wait till they are cooled, just stuff my face with them fresh out of the oven)

They can last a week in an airtight container

YAY!

Restaurant Review: Cafe Mangii

Café Mangii has been recently renovated (I mean it’s been a few months already) and it looks and tastes spanking new and fresh.

Food: I was pleasantly surprised at the quality of ingredients, the freshness of the food and the fact that the meats were all cooked well and not overcooked. We ordered the Gnocchi in spinach which was really yummy, the Prawns in Butter Garlic Sauce are skippable and the Cajun Chicken which was juicy, tender were great (though I didn’t understand where it featured on an all Italian menu). However, the piece de resistance in the starters was this warm mushroom salad… It was so tasty and literally melted in your mouth, they had this lively slightly piqant chilli and garlic flakes that really contrasted well with the salad leaves at the bottom. Seriously mouth watering. The Grilled Pomfret in mustard sauce was cooked to perfection with a wonderful balance of mustardy and herby. The succulent pieces just disintegrae in your mouth and infuse a beautifully balanced and delicate flavour in your taste buds. The Minute steak and Grilled Chicken met expectations. The Pizza was lovely, crispy and was made in a wood fire oven.

Beverages: They don’t serve Indian Beer, but the atmosphere is such that you like to sit with a nice mocktail, wine or something on the fancier side. They also have some good Scotches on the menu. The servers have a good knowledge of the drinks and the mocktails are yummy. I would however, personally suggest a wine with the meal as the atmosphere is such.

Service: The service was really good and a refreshing change to see people who had their food and beverage etiquette in order. Our server made some really good suggestions (like the mushrooms) and was really particular about serving in the correct manner. The stellar service really notched up this place for me in my eyes.

Atmosphere: I loved the lighting, it was perfect. It was not too bright and not too dim. Really lovely little bulb lights (which my friend Tasneem pointed out to us like the ever observant designer she is :) ) and the whole colour scheme was pleasing with browns and beiges, simple and comfortable chairs and nice ivory white table linen.

Final Verdict: I likie! will come back

Address:

Junction Of Khar Pali & 14th Road, Off Linking Road, Khar (W), Mumbai

022 26498100