Due to our diet and erratic cooking habits we always try to find the fastest way to cook food – be it chicken, fish or prawns. It’s been quite a few time, Sumi cooked prawns with the shell on. To be frank, I have never been a huge fan of prawn, leave alone cooking it with the shell on. But Sumi was adamant this time and the result was fabulous. Not only did she cook it faster, the prawns were soft, moist and tasty. I am sure you all would love it too.

Ingredients

• 500 gm prawns
• 2 tsp red chilli powder
• 1 tsp turmeric powder
• 4 green chillies chopped
• 1″ ginger sliced
• 8-10 small onions
• 4-5 garlic cloves chopped
• 2 tsp lemon juice
• salt to taste
• 2 tsp mustard oil
• 1 tbsp vegetable oil

Method

Marinade the prawn with all the ingredients (except oil) and set it aside in refrigerator for 2 hrs.

Heat mustard oil till it smokes out, add vegetable oil, put the prawn and fry in medium heat for 5 minutes. Cover and cook till another 10 minutes.

Garnish it with chopped coriander. Eat by removing the shell.

If you like this post please post your comment by going to the original post here Quick Delicious Prawns

© Copyright Enjoyable Recipes - Simple everyday recipes with bits of this and that and a touch of Bengali-ness

Sumi and I love Roast Chicken. However we always wanted to try and cook it ourselves. Alas all the recipes everywhere showed how to prepare it with the help on an oven. And since we live in a rented flat which doesn’t have the provision of an oven fitting, we are always at a loss. Everywhere we read, they said that Roast Chicken cannot be done in a microwave. So we finally decided to give it a shot anyways. Ultimately if it doesnt work we can always cook something out of it.

So with bit of this and that, we finally got it made. When Sumi ate it, she said it was the best chicken she ever made. Well I didn’t correct her. It was really awesome. So now we plan to bring home whole chicken whenever we get a chance. After all, practice makes a man perfect.

Note – The picture is of the chicken when it came just out of the microwave so pardon the untidy look of it :p

Ingredients

• 1 whole chicken
• 5-6 cloves of garlic crushed
• 2 medium onions cut into 4 pieces
• 2 twigs of thyme
• 10 green chillies
• 2 tbs soya sauce
• 4-5, 1″ginger slit
• Salt to taste
• Yoghurt (200gm)
• Turmeric 1 tbs
• Vinegar 1tsp
• 2 lts of water
• 2 lemons cut into 4 peices

Method

Marinate the chicken with all ingredients and keep it dipped in water for 24 hrs so that all vegetables and the chicken gets mixed properly.

Take few of the marinated onion pieces, garlic, thyme and chillies and place them inside the chicken. Now in a microwave safe pan, drizzle some olive oil and salt, put the chicken and drizzle some olive oil again and put the wings folded below.

Pre-heat the microwave oven to 220 degrees celcius. Now put the microwave in Combination (Micro + Convection) mode with the microwave set at the average power and the convection temperature set around 220 degree celsius. Cook the chicken for 30 minutes.

Keep the chicken in the oven for 10 minutes before taking it out and serve it.

If you like this post please post your comment by going to the original post here Roast Chicken

© Copyright Enjoyable Recipes - Simple everyday recipes with bits of this and that and a touch of Bengali-ness

This is going to be the final post of the year. We have not been regular with our posting this year too but things have picked up since November and I am happy for that reason. We are visiting our parents right now and we’ve been here since 24th and we will go back to Bangalore on 1st. Sumi is still following her diet (minus the first day when she just couldn’t resist Mom’s cooking). In contrast, I have simply decided to forget that I am on a low carb diet for these days. That means yummy sweets and wonderful dishes from one. I have requested mom to stay simple. I want to have simple home cooked meals. The result is a fabulous collection of 7 recipes so far in 4 days – not bad at all. And we have 4 full days left. All these recipes will come up on the site and trust me you will love them.

Back to the post, Sumi wants me to close the “being fishy” series now. I have 1 more of the fish recipe from that day in my archives and it was another of those yummy ones that Sumi made. This time it was from the frozen fish fillets that we got from the Super market. I love this brand. It is called Ocean Fresh Fish Fillets. It tastes yummy even with a simple preparation. It has no fishy smell and its very clean. Hope you enjoy this recipe.

I would like to take this opportunity to wish everyone a Happy New Year. I look forward to 2012 and everything that the year has in store for me.

Ingredients

• 3 frozen fish fillets thawed (approx 250gm in total)
• 2 Tbsp coriander paste
• 1 Tbsp cumin paste
• 1 tsp red chilli paste
• 1 tsp garlic paste
• 1 tsp ginger paste
• ½ tsp turmeric powder
• 1 medium onion thinly sliced
• 1/2 stalk of leek thinly sliced
• 1 tomato thinly sliced (8 slices)
• 1 Tbsp lemon juice
• Vegetable oil as required
• Salt as per taste

Method

Marinade the fish fillets with salt, turmeric and lemon juice and set it aside for 15 min.

In a non-stick pan, add vegetable oil sufficient to shallow fry the fillets. Now add the fillets and fry for 3-4 minutes in medium heat. Turn them after 2 min. Fish cooks in very less time. Take care not to fry too much as it will become flaky. Set aside the fried fish fillets.

In the same pan, add coriander paste, cumin paste, red chilli paste, garlic paste and ginger paste.  Sauté for a min. Now add the sliced onion, leeks, tomato and sauté again for 2-3 minutes. Once the paste is fried just enough, you will get a good aroma of ginger garlic and oil separates from the paste.

Now add the fillets back in the pan and add 80-100 ml of water and increase the flame. Coat the fish fillets with the gravy.

You can make it more interesting by adding 100ml coconut milk instead of water.

Serve hot with rice.

If you like this post please post your comment by going to the original post here Yummy Fish Fillet

© Copyright Enjoyable Recipes - Simple everyday recipes with bits of this and that and a touch of Bengali-ness

Monday is vegetarian day at our home. All because of that woman in my home :p She was following this for a long time so even though I argue, I usually give in. So today we were out of options. There was no paneer, which we usually have on Mondays, and almost no vegetables barring few spinach bunches and little bits of this and that. I don’t know what got into Sumi but she decided that it’s high time she tried something new with spinach.

We had this awesome spinach soup at a restaurant before and ever since wanted to try it ourselves. The main problem Sumi faces is washing the spinach leaves properly. We do not get a good quality in our locality store here and it usually has loads of sand and dirt. So this is what she spent the maximum time on. Honestly I would never have the patience to wash each and every bunch (and leaves) and then cut them nicely. But that’s Sumi for you. Anyways after this strenuous preparation, she cooked the stew surprisingly faster. And the end result was very yummy. Oh the joys of wifey cooking for you, I tell you.

Ingredients

• 1 bunch of fresh spinach stems removed
• 1 medium capsicum sliced
• 2 medium tomatoes sliced
• 1 big onion sliced
• 2 green chillies chopped
• 2 cinnamon sticks
• 1 small green cardamom
• 1 Tbsp chopped garlic
• 1/2 tsp ground black pepper
• 1 Tbsp chopped fresh parsley
• 50 ml fresh cream
• 80 g butter
• Canola oil as required
• Water/Vegetable stock  100ml
• Salt as per taste

Method

In a wok add some vegetable oil; now add chopped garlic, green chillies, onion, capsicum, cinnamon and cardamom. Stir for 4-5 minutes till onions are translucent.

Add spinach, black pepper, tomatoes and cook for 5 min. Now add the stock and cook again for 15 min till gravy reduces. Add salt as per taste.

Mix well with butter, cream and parsley.

Serve hot.

If you like this post please post your comment by going to the original post here Palak Stew with Fresh Cream

© Copyright Enjoyable Recipes - Simple everyday recipes with bits of this and that and a touch of Bengali-ness

Mom taught me baking cakes. I loved how she made elaborate preparations days before the actual day of baking. The regular ovens which are available at the US and which my friends tell me about are not that common in India. My mom never ever had one and I don’t think Sumi and I will have it soon. Hence it is difficult to follow the traditional recipes. Mom used to do lots of trial and errors before she found the right combination to bake. I have baked around 12 cakes so far by myself. But only 2 after marriage. Sumi is not comfortable with cakes so it is up to me to initiate them. Since we are so much into the diet, I decided to try my hand at a cheese cake today evening.

Now there were few restrictions (or limitations if you want) that I had to deal with. First, I had never ever prepared a cheese cake before. Second, we have a microwave oven so I could only use its Convection Mode so all specifics with respect to a baking tin etc. which happens in regular ovens will not work here. Third, I would not be able to use many ingredients like crumbled cookies etc. as per Sumi, due to the diet. She only allowed very less variety of ingredients. So with all these restrictions in place, I set about baking my cake.

As you can see, the cake is slightly granular. It should have been more smooth but we didnt have a blender to get the completely smooth whisk. I kept on whisking for so long that my hands started paining LOL

Ingredients

• 250gm Ricotta Cheese
• 125gm Mascarpone  Cheese
• 2 eggs
• 10 sachet of Sugar Free (or as per your taste. Remember mine was low carb so I tried with as less sugar I could)
• 10 drops of Essence of Vanilla
• 20gm Butter
• 3-4 Chocolate pieces

Method

Take the Ricotta and Mascarpone cheeses and mix it well together whisking them slowly.

Add the eggs one by one while whisking slowly. Mix well.

Now add the butter and mix it well.

Start whisking a bit faster and keep adding the sugar and the essence of vanilla to it.

Finally add the chocolate pieces by grinding them.

Mix the batter carefully to get a smooth consistency.

Preheat the microwave oven (convection mode) to 220 degree Celsius. Now in a microwave safe utensil (I used a microwave safe glass tray), add the batter, level it carefully and bake it in the oven for 30-40 mins.

Let the cake stand in the oven for around 10 mins inside the oven. Now take it out and let it cool and then chill for minimum 1 hour.

You can garnish the cake with icing sugar or plain sugar-free.

If you like this post please post your comment by going to the original post here Low Carb Cheese Cake

© Copyright Enjoyable Recipes - Simple everyday recipes with bits of this and that and a touch of Bengali-ness

My favourite non-vegetarian item has always been fish. Mom tells me that the first thing I had at my “Annaprashan“, or the Hindu rite of passage, was fish even though they tried to push in rice LOL. In our culture, rice should be the 1st food which an infant takes during the ceremony but I just loved the smell and taste of fish. Throughout my childhood, I loved fish so much that I used to get upset if there was no fish during lunch any day. All this changed when I went to college. Then I realized, I only loved fish prepared by mom or at least prepared according to the Bengali way. My fish drought had begun ever since I started my engineering. But thanks to my better half, ever since our marriage we again started having fish and in our diet, it is an essential part as fish has one of the lowest (in fact nil in many cases) carbohydrate contest.

Continuing with being fishy, this was the second dish that Sumi cooked on her “being nutty” day. This is a classic Bengali dish which I have adored all my life. Only recently, ever since we started on the diet, did I stop having this. The reason being that the dish goes best with rice. For me any non-vegetarian curry without rice just doesn’t gel, especially fish. But that day we just went crazy. We were missing fish curry and we decided to have it without rice. The result was awesome and I felt like my life had come back when I tasted the fish curry.

Ingredients

• 8 slices of Rohu/Rui Fish (Indian Fresh water Carp) approx 800 gm
• 1 ½ Tbsp ginger paste
• 1 tsp garlic paste
• 3 Tbsp cumin paste
• 1 Tbsp coriander paste
• 1 Tbsp turmeric powder
• 1 Tbsp red chilli powder (as per taste)
• 1  medium onion thinly chopped
• 4-5 green chillies slit length wise
• Mustard Oil (a good amount)
• Salt as required
• 1 tsp chopped fresh parsley

Method

First marinade the fish with turmeric powder and salt. Set it aside for 15-20 min.

In a deep wok, add mustard oil, heat till oil smokes (not a good option usually, however since our main curry element is the mustard oil, we need to heat it properly else it imparts a strong smell).  Now add the fish pieces, fry on each side till light brown. Set it aside.

Discard the oil. Clean the pan or take another and add fresh mustard oil again (approx 100 ml) and heat it till it smokes. Reduce flame; add chopped onion, slit green chillies, add all the paste, fry till oil separates like about 4-5 minutes. Now add 100 ml of water, a bit of salt (required for gravy) and let the water boil and then add the fish pieces back and coat properly with the gravy.

Garnish with chopped fresh parsley leaves.

The oil added in the dish may seem a lot but this is the beauty of this dish. The gravy is very rich and tastes awesome with rice.

If you like this post please post your comment by going to the original post here Macher Tel Jhol

© Copyright Enjoyable Recipes - Simple everyday recipes with bits of this and that and a touch of Bengali-ness

You know we realized that we have only one chicken recipe in our blog so far. This is surprising considering that we have chicken every other day. So I drilled down our archives and found so many delicious chicken recipe pics. But unfortunately neither Sumi nor me remember the recipes. So when Sumi cooked this simple recipe tonight, I just had to post it. This is the most common form of chicken we have had ever since the low carb diet started.

Those busy days when both of us return quite late from work, Sumi is too tired to cook properly and I, as usual, am too lazy to cook. During such evenings this quick recipe comes to our recipe. Guess what, even I cook this recipe deliciously hehehe. That should give you an idea.

Ingredients

• 2 Chicken Breasts
• 1 Tbsp Ginger Garlic Paste
• 1 Tbsp Chilli Powder
• 1 tsp Ground Black Pepper
• 1 Tbsp Lemon Juice
• Salt as per taste
• Oil to shallow fry

Method

Marinate the chicken with all the ingredients. Set it aside for ½ hour.

Shallow fry these for 15 mins turning each side, till chicken is tender and golden brown.

You can have this as a main dish or serve with a gravy/chutney and make it a snack.

If you like this post please post your comment by going to the original post here Plain Chicken Fry

© Copyright Enjoyable Recipes - Simple everyday recipes with bits of this and that and a touch of Bengali-ness

This blog is getting “fishy”. By that I mean, like true Bengalis, the majority of the next few recipes will be fish based. Now mustard is a very tasty and essential ingredient in Bengali cuisine. And in our case, its a perfect match even during our diet. However the way it is prepared differs among various regions of Bengal – this is particularly visible in the cooking of our moms. Sumi, however, has learnt both the ways and she even has a version of her own. Today’s recipe is Sumi’s style of making the fish.

Sumi cooked this 3 months back. It was raining and we were hungry. Just a day back we bought quite a lot of fish from Spar and being a weekend she planned to cook for the entire week That woman’s crazy. The problem is she’s my woman hehehehe, so I sat through the whole ordeal. But in the end it was a yummy one. She cooked around 6 dishes, 3 fish ones, 1 chicken and 2 veggies. I am sure we took a pic of the whole spread. But I can’t find it right now. Anyways this is one of the fish ones. Its downright yummy.

Note – Sumi used Tilapia fish here. You can use any other fish you like instead like Rohu, Catla or Hilsa.

Ingredients

• 2 Tilapia fish cut into half
• 3 Tbsp white mustard paste
•  1 tsp chilli powder
• ½ tsp turmeric powder
• ½ tsp ginger paste
• 1 small onion finely chopped
• 4-5 green chillies slit length wise
• Mustard Oil
• Salt as per taste
• 1 tsp lemon juice
• 1 tsp chopped fresh parsley

Method

Marinade the fish pieces with lemon juice, salt and turmeric powder. Set it aside for 20 min.

In a wok, add mustard oil. Heat till oil smokes, then reduce flame and add the fish pieces and fry them properly. It takes around 7-10 min to fry properly. Set the fried pieces aside.

Now add all the chopped onion, ginger paste,slit  green chillies, chilli powder and fry for 2-3 minutes. Add the mustard paste and saute for ½ min in low flame and add the fish pieces. Sprinkle some water to coat the mustard properly with fish. Do not add more water.

Serve with 1 tsp raw mustard oil on top and chopped fresh parsley.

If you like this post please post your comment by going to the original post here Tilapia Sorshe Dry

© Copyright Enjoyable Recipes - Simple everyday recipes with bits of this and that and a touch of Bengali-ness

It’s been ages since we had ice cream. You obviously know why? Our Diet!! Sometimes we feel frustrated with the diet. Even a single day matters. Sumi had reached her target weight quite a few months back. Believe it or not but she lost a whopping 37kg since she started on the diet. But she is struggling now to maintain it. I, on the other hand, have lost around 12kg since the start which is horrible. I never followed the diet closely. But one thing that frustrates us is that even if we have carbohydrates one single day, it reflects on the weight negatively. And since we are already frustrated, we respond by having more yummy carb filled food LOL. But yes, we can safely attest that a low-carb diet works. In our case, it’s the only diet that has worked without making us mad with hunger.

So what does this have to do with ice cream. Well, in one such frustration filled day, we bought a tub of ice cream (Vanilla flavored of course since that’s my favorite). My parents were also here and my mom adores ice cream. In fact this is her only drawback in her otherwise healthy and disciplined diet. Now Sumi loves watching mom have ice cream which she eats slowly and enjoys every helping like a kid. So what Sumi did was make a fruit salad arrangement with the ice cream scoop as the centrepiece. It was a lovely dinner

Now this isn’t an ice cream recipe. It is just a salad arrangement cum decoration with ice cream.

Ingredients

• 1 scoop of ice cream
• 4 apples
• 4-6 dates
• 1 big or 2 small bananas
• 8-10 cashew nuts
• 10-15 raisins
• 4-6 walnuts

Method for Arrangement

Cut few apples in circular shape and arrange them in the side of a plate.

The remaining apples cut into small pieces. Take a bunch of this and arrange it as a pyramid in the centre of the plate.

Cut few small pieces of banana and place it on top of the apple pyramid in the centre.

Now place the remaining apples pieces in the empty spaces of the plates.

Cut the remaining bananas and place it at the end of the plate on top of the circular apple pieces.

De-seed and cut the dates and walnuts into small pieces and sprinkle in around the plate.

Place the scoop of ice cream in the centre on top of the pyramid.

Now sprinkle the cashews and the raisins on the plate.

Finish it off by placing a cashew, walnut and raisin on top of the scoop.

Enjoy the yummy treat!!!

If you like this post please post your comment by going to the original post here Apples and Ice Cream Yummy

© Copyright Enjoyable Recipes - Simple everyday recipes with bits of this and that and a touch of Bengali-ness

Indian cuisine is varied. There is not only a variety of food but even the ingredients used in different parts of the country are so different, sometimes ending up being downright conflicting. Take fish and curd for example. Bengalis swear by it. I posted a recipe before, Doi Maach, that combined these 2 ingredients. But these same ingredients together in one dish is taboo in South India. It’s the same with various other ingredients too. So funny really.

Back to our recipe, I was updating the blog today with a new theme and ended up using a theme from Studiopress. That was when I noticed, how slacky we have been with the blog. It was then that I decided that regular updates will be a part of this blog now. So when Sumi made this delicious recipe for the evening I just had to post it. This was the first time we actually got fresh fillet directly from the market. We usually have fresh water fish. But fishes like Rohu and Catla we get here in Bangalore are not fresh and tasty like in Kolkata. Hence we have moved towards sea water fishes like Emperor and Salmon which mostly have a neutral taste and smell. I hope you enjoy the recipe.

Ingredients

To Marinade Fish

• 2 big fillets (approx 400 gm each) of Emperor Fish or salmon fish
• 1 1/2 tsp salt
• 12 peppercorns crushed
• Juice of half lemon

• 150gm thick Yoghurt
• 100 ml fresh cream
• 1/3 tsp salt
• 1/2 tsp garam masala
• 1/2 tsp grounded black pepper
• 1/2 tsp red chilli powder
• 1/2 small onion thinly sliced
• 2 cloves of garlic minced

• A non-stick pan
• 100gm butter
• 2 tbs vegetable oil
• Parsley for topping (1 tbsp)

Method

If you like this post please post your comment by going to the original post here Fish Fry with Yoghurt Sauce

© Copyright Enjoyable Recipes - Simple everyday recipes with bits of this and that and a touch of Bengali-ness