I'm strong to the finich, coz I eats my spinach!!!

I was watching a couple of popeye cartoons when I decided that I needed to make some spinach dish this time. The obvious choice was Palak Paneer( Spinach and Cottage Cheese Curry).I got an excellent and easy to make recipe from Sourabh Sinha's Website:
http://members.tripod.com/~SourabhSinha/food.html#PALAKPANEER
I followed the same process but I modified the amount of each ingredient because :(i) I was looking to cook 6-7 servings (ii) The main content of the gravy is the spinach which has a bland taste and if you dont add enought spices, the taste of spinach overpowers the taste of the spices.

Cut Paneer(cottage cheese - get it at your local India store) into cubes and fry them in oil. You can use Tofu as a replacement.But If you are using Tofu make sure you increase the spiciness in the gravy as it can get a bit too bland. For Paneer- use the entire block which is the standard size sold at India stores here. Tofu- I would recommend medium hard ones and use around 1.5-2 packets.

Boil spinach, Garlic, Ginger,Tomatos. I used 4-5 flakes of Garlic, 1 inch of ginger( chopped fine), 2 reasonably big tomatoes( chopped fine), 5-6 green chillies(chopped fine and slight along the middle sold at HEB - lies below the jalapeno aisle) and 2 small rectangular packets of frozen spinach sold at HEB.I waited till the frozen spinach thawed, looked at the water content and then added water accordingly( around 1/2- 1 cup).I boiled it for around 10 minutes.I then allowed the mixture to cool and blended it.

I then chopped two reasonably big onions into fine pieces and fried them in oil until they turned transclucent and slightly brown( for about 5- 7 minutes).Then reduced the heat to low and added the following spices:

2.5 teaspoon chilli powder
1 tsp cumin powder
3 tsp coriander powder
1/2 tsp turmeric
(recommend adding 1/2 tsp garam masala and 1/2 tsp of powdered pepper if your using tofu)
Fried the mixture on low heat for about a minute.Then increased the heat fried it for about 15-20 seconds.Be very careful here, the spices should not get burnt.If your feeling unfortable remove the vessel from the stove, add the spices mix well and put it back.
Now add the blended mixture, Fried Paneer and One cup of water , salt to taste( around 1 one tablespoon ) and bring the mixture to boil.
Goes well with rice, and very well with bread/tortilla/parathas.

goan vegetable curry

Boil potatos,peas and carrots. Fry onion,chillies,ginger,garlic,garam masala, coriander powder,pepper.Grind it into a paste.
Fry the paste in a pan and then add the cooked vegetables..add salt. add 2 cups of water and let the mixture boil..reduce the heat add 1.5 cups of coconut milk and let it simmer for 3 minutes..garnish with cilantro leaves...

A nice and healthy dinner/breakfast item

It is really weird how tastes change as you grow up. I used to hate bitter gourd,rasam, cabbage when i was a kid. Out of the three I used to have a particularly high hatred for cabbage as we used to have it atleast 3 times a week for dinner and lunch.In fact in high school I was nickname khose paiya( cabbage boy) for a year for the amount of cabbage I used to bring for lunch.My mom used to take me with her to go grocery shopping and I used to start whining as soon as picked up a cabbage/bitter gourd and sometimes I used to try to push her away from the cabbage aisle to voice my displeasure:)). After coming to US,all of them are among my favorite dishes.Now here is the recipe I like and kinda developed.

Cut approximately half to 3/4 of a cabbage.Make sure you mince them into fine pieces. Chop one big onion into fine pieces.The finer they are minced the better they taste when fried.Cut 4 green chillies.Mix them all together.Add one teaspoon turmeric powder and one teaspoon chilli powder and mix well. Let it set for 10 minutes. Boil green peas in the mean time and set them aside. After 10 minutes, add 3 eggs to the cabbage/onion and mix well. Let it set for 5 minutes.

Heat approx. 1.5-2 tablespoon of oil. Add mustard seeds, cumin seeds and Chana Dhaal.The Chana dhaal is optional.I add them because I like the taste of fried chana dhaal. Once the mustard starts spluttering, add the cabbage mix. Keep stirring continuosly. After 5 minutes add other spices you want. I add a little bit of garam masala and little bit of coriander powder. These you can vary depending on the taste. Add the peas. Add salt to taste. Keep stirring for another 10 minutes.

Cabbage/onions/eggs - all 3 of 'em are pretty bland items and hence you can vary the spices to cater to your taste. If you want it hot, add more green chillies/chilli powder. Be careful while stirring as it can get burnt pretty easily.

This is called cabbage poriyal/thoran.I normally like to eat it with rice and rasam/dhaal/sambar.It is a very good side dish if u make coconut rice/Lemon rice. And it also makes for a great breakfast item, just stuff it inside a rolled tortilla and you have your indian taco.When I used to cook for myself this was one of my favorite items as I spend around 45 minutes on it and it used to act as my dinner/breakfast/lunch.

peas curry , bitter gourd pachadi and rice

Took around an hour to cook.Looks decent.Bitter gourd pachadi is my mom's recipe and got the recipe for the peas curry( kerala style) from a blog.

Felt like doing some thing retarded

Been thinking about research for the last 2 days..getting a bit bored..felt it was time for some retarded photoshopping...here it goes

seminar flyer!!

My favorite seminar flyer...
No unnecessary details about the profs bio..univs he taught/centers he headed..
No unnecessary details about the research he is gonna present on...
The topic of the talk and pic of pizza...the most efficient utilization of space
on a flyer ever...succint and to the point....it caught my eye when i was buying coffee...