Beignet with peach sauce

Its the weekend and time to make some yummy breakfast. From the past couple of weeks I have been feeling pretty bored with "the usual" breakfasts I make. So yesterday I was searching for something yummy and YAHOO gave me the best idea ever...beignets . It is a French pastry and yahoo had a link to where you can use store bought frozen biscuits and make it into beignets...and yum yum yum my family just gobbled them up. And I made peach sauce to serve them with.

So here is it...Louisiana Beignets with Carolina Peach Sauce 

Beignets with Peach sauce (Fried pastry with Sauce made with peach jam)

 

Ingredients:

1. 1 box frozen biscuits left in the fridge overnight for thawing
2. Oil for deep frying

For Peach sauce:

1. 1 tablespoon your favorite nuts chopped (I used almonds) (You can use walnuts or pecans)
2. 1 teaspoon butter
3. 2-3 tablespoons heaped peach jam (I got locally made peach jam...after all I live in the Peach country)
4. 1/8 cup water

In a sauce pan heat the butter and fry the nuts for 3-5 minutes or until they are crunchy. Add the jam and water and stir and bring to a boil . Your sauce is ready.

Separate the biscuits into individual biscuits and cut it into quarters. Heat the oil to 350 degrees or until a tiny piece of dough added to oil floats to the top. Add 4-6 pieces of biscuit at a time and fry till golden brown, about 2 minutes. Drain and serve with peach sauce

Kheema Paratha

So, after I made the kheema fry and made it into samosas, I has some left-over kheema fry. So I decided to make Kheema parathas, which I have been thinking of making fr a long time.
             Some time ago there used to be an Arabic teacher in our local mosque used to live all by himself. He once gave me about 2 lbs of ground chicken and asked me to make a whole batch of these stuffed paraths for him. So that he can heat and eat later. Man...it took me 4 hrs and I did make so many for him and in the process. had no time to make dinner for my own family. We ate out.
                Anyway, long story short I have been thinking of making these parathas since then and now came the chance. And YES, they were super delicious. Me and my kids just gobbled them up.

Kheema Paratha (Meat stuffed Indian bread)

Kheema Paratha

Ingredients:

1. 1 cup Kheema fry
2. 1/2 cup boiled, peeled and mashed potato
3. 1 teaspoon salt divided
4. Oil for frying parathas+1 teaspoons 
5. 11/2 cup wheat flour
6. water for making dough

Mix the ground meat fry, with 1/2 teaspoon salt and mashed potato and may be some finely chopped cilantro and 1/2 teaspoon finely chopped ginger if desired. And set aside.

Mix the wheat flour with salt and enough water to make into dough. Rub a little oil in your palm and roll the ball of dough so that oil is applied all over it. Set aside for 20 minutes. 

Divide the dough into 6 parts and the filling into 6 parts. Roll each part into 4 inch disk, add filling and make it into a ball again. set aside until you finish the rest.

Heat a griddle and roll one of the stuffed balls into 6 inch disks. Fry on each side until it turns golden brown with dark spots here and there. Enjoy as is or with ginger pickle 

Lamb Samosa

In India, samosa and pakoda are the go to snacks for college students and employees. They are affordable, yummy and available whenever and wherever you feel hungry. But after coming to the US there was not one good place to get samosas. And then one of the sweet stores' had a change of management and a change in their samosa recipe. So we became a regular of that store. But...then came the move.
                         I have tried my hand at making so many things but samosas eluded me for soooooo long. But finally today I found a recipe and boy oh boy the samosas came out perfectly golden brown and super delicious. Especially the crust, which turned out to be such a disaster for me always. I did not change anything from the recipe of the crust of that website. But the filling is my own. It is a ground meat /lamb filling.So here is the samosa recipe

Lamb Samosa (Indian empanada's stuffed with ground lamb)

Lamb/meat Samosa

Ingredients
For Crust:

• 2 cups maida or all purpose flour
• 1 tbsp ghee or oil (The original recipe calls for 4 tbsp)
• 1/4 cup or more of water (add 1 tablespoon at a time)
• 1 tsp carom seeds (ajwain)
• salt as required ( i added ¾ tsp salt)
• oil for deep frying

For Lamb/meat filling:

11/2 cup Kheema Fry

1 medium large potato boiled, peeled and mashed

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 green chilly chopped fine (optional)

The samosa crust

Take the flour, carom seeds, salt in a bowl. mix well and add ghee or oil.
Mix the flour with your hands, the whole mixture should clump-up when joined.
Add 1 tablespoon of water at a time and begin to knead adding water as required.
knead to a firm dough. cover the dough with a moistened napkin and keep aside for 30-40 mins.

Mix all the ingredients of the filling together and set aside.

Divide the dough into 5 parts and make it into 6-7 inch circles , on a clean countertop with a rolling pin. Cut it into two half circles. Add a heaped tablespoon of the filling . Apply water to all the edges of the samosa crust with a wet finger and fold one half to make a triangle. Fold the other half over it and pinch the edges together.

Heat the oil in a pan to medium high heat and fry the samosas for 5-7 minutes a piece or until golden brown, turning every minute. Serve with masala chai and ketchup

 

Personal potato salad

I was craving something creamy and tangy and I was boiling eggs for http://azeemaskitchen.blogspot.com/2011/07/ande-ka-khatta-and-anda-jhinga-khatta.html?m=1 . And I was boiling potatoes for potato fry. Since u had the basic ingredients ready I was ready to make potato salad. So here goes

Tangy potato egg salad

Ingredient

1. 1 medium small potato boiled till fork tender

2. 1 medium egg hard boiled, peeled and chopped

3. 1 teaspoon chopped tarragon 

4. 2 teaspoon heaped plain yogurt 

5. 1 teaspoon heaped mayo

6.1 tablespoon vinegar

7. 1 teaspoon boar's head delicatessen style mustard with white wine

8. Salt and pepper to taste
9. 1 tablespoon each of finely chopped red onions and red or orange or yellow bell pepper and celery

Mix together vinegar salt and pepper and mustard. Mayo and yogurt and onions and bell pepper and celery. Add chopped potatoes and egg and mix well chill for an hour before serving. Yum yum creamy creamyenjoy

New England clam chowder

This used to be one of my favorite soups...mmm so creamy and filling and of course loaded with calories. And for the longest time I didn't make it.

But yesterday when I went shopping I made sure to get two Cans of minced clam and yum yum yum I made a yummy clam chowder with fewer calories than the restaurant ones

New England clam chowder

Clam Chowder

Ingredient

1. 1 tablespoon each of olive oil, butter
2. 3/4 cup diced white onion
3. 1 large clove of garlic minced
4. 3 medium russet potatoes boiled, and cubed  1 cm
5. 3 cups 2 % mlk
6. 1 tablespoon flour
7. 1 cup water
8. 2 cans of 10 zoz minced clams
9. 1/2 cup sweet white corn (optional)
10. 1/2 teaspoon each of salt and pepper or to taste

In a pan heat the oil and butter and add the onions and fry till they become translucent. Add garlic and fry for 30 seconds. Add potatoes and add 1 cup water and cover and cook for 10 minutes. Add the rest of the ingredients. Mix the flour in 1/4 cup milk and add it also to the pot. bring to a boil and simmer for 20 minutes and serve hot

Also try Corn Chowder