potato Archives - MyEdibleCravings

It has been quite some time since my last post. How you guys doing? Sorry folks, I don’t get time to post regularly like before. It is summer break here in the US and school year starting back home. Different parts of the world and different routines 🙂 Coming back to the recipe for today, I have posted a snack food for a change. It is really healthy and you would be surprised, especially children if they come to know about the ingredients. It is called as the Hara Bhara Kabab.

Kabab in general refers to a variety of snack foods cooked mostly in skewers and made of meat. It originated in the Mediterranean and is widely popular all over the world. India too has its own share of kabab varieties. Since more than half the population is vegetarian and us being the innovators :), we have vegetarian kabab varieties. Hara Bhara Kabab is one such variety made using spinach and peas. I came across this recipe a while ago and have made it quite a few times since then. It is one of my favorite snacks and my HB loves it too.

The main ingredients of Hara Bhara Kababs are, as mentioned earlier, spinach and peas. These are very easy to make and uses minimal ingredients. Hara Bhara Kababs can either be pan fried or baked in the oven. I am yet to try the latter and so the cooking method followed in this recipe is pan frying. Having hot Hara Bhara Kababs with ketchup in the evenings is one way to experience culinary nirvana :). Try it out and enjoy!

Hara Bhara Kabab

Recipe type: Snack

Cuisine: Indian

Prep time: 5 mins

Cook time: 2 mins

Total time: 7 mins

Serves: 6

Ingredients

Spinach – 2 cups
Potato, medium – 1
Green Peas, boiled – 2 tbsp
Green chilli – 2 nos
Ginger – small piece
Chat masala – 1 tsp
Amchur powder – ¾ tsp
Gram flour – 1 ¼ tbsp.
Salt as required
Oil – to smear around kababs

Instructions

Pressure cook the potato for 2 whistles.
Blanch the spinach in boiling water for a minute or two without covering and strain and wash them immediately with cold water – to retain the color. Completely drain the water and keep it aside.
Grind the spinach along with green chilli, ginger and boiled green peas (I used frozen) and grind them to coarse paste without adding any water.
Meanwhile drain and peel the potato.
Add the peeled potatoes to the spinach puree and mash it together.
Add amchur powder, chat masala, salt and gram flour. Mix well and make tikki shapes.
Cook it in the flat pan drizzling very little oil. Cook for a few minutes. Flip and cook until golden brown on both sides. Enjoy the yummy hara bhara kabab with ketchup! 

Notes

1.Do not add too much gram flour. It might change the flavor.
2.Don’t overcook the potatoes.
3.Kabab has to be like cotton soft when cut. That’s the right texture.

Vegetable Biriyani is the vegetarian counterpart of the more popular Biriyani, which generally refers to the variety with meat. Back home, during family functions like marriages, baby showers etc we don’t normally serve meat in the menu. But to mark the grandeur of the function we serve vegetable Biriyani as one the dishes.

Vegetable Biriyani is popular in my home state, Tamilnadu. Honestly, I have not seen it in any other part of India. I would say it is a healthy dish since you add vegetables (English vegetables like carrot, beans, potatoes, peas etc) in abundance. You can also add fried bread pieces and that tastes good too.

The recipe for Vegetable Biriyani that I have given below does not have coconut milk as one of the ingredients and it tastes just as good as the one with coconut milk added. I have slightly modified Mom’s recipe and have presented it here. Try this tasty and rich Vegetable Biriyani in your home and let me know your experience:)

Vegetable Biriyani

Recipe type: Main

Cuisine: Indian

Prep time: 15 mins

Cook time: 30 mins

Total time: 45 mins

Serves: 4

Ingredients

Ghee + olive oil - 2 tspn + 2 tbsp
Homemade biriyani powder + big bay leaf - 1 tsp + ½
Onions, small – 2 nos
Freshly ground ginger garlic paste - 1 ¼ tbsp (I used organic garlic from trader’s joe)
Big ripe tomatoes - 1 ¼ nos
Cauliflower, medium sized potato (cut and soaked in turmeric water) - ½ + ½
Green chilli, long, slits - 9 nos
Chopped mint and coriander leaves - ½ cup
Salt - 1 ¾ spoon
Sakthi biriyani powder - ½ tsp
Coriander powder – 1 ¼ tsp
Homemade sambar powder - ½ spoon
Aachi red chilli powder - ¾ tsp
Garam masala powder - a generous pinch
Water, used to soak rice - 3 cups
Basmati rice - 2 cups

For garnishing:

Chopped mint and cilantro - 1 tbsp
Sakthi biriyani powder - a pinch
Ghee - a tsp

Instructions

Wash and soak basmati rice in water for 45 minutes. Drain and save the water.
Chop the vegetables and soak it in turmeric water.
Cut and chop onions, tomatoes, mint and cilantro.
Heat a pressure cooker with ghee and oil. Add biriyani powder and bay leaf.
Increase the flame to medium and add onions. Sauté until they turn translucent. add ginger garlic paste and sauté until raw smell disappears. Add tomatoes and cook for a couple of minutes. When they turn mushy add in the vegetables. Stir for a minute and add in green chillies, chopped mint and cilantro. Stir well for a couple of minutes and add all the masala powders. Mix well and add water. check for salt and bring it to boil. Add the soaked rice and allow them to boil. When the water is ¾ th observed and when you see the rice on top, garnish with mint, cilantro, sakthi biriyani powder and ghee especially on the sides. Cover the lid and dum cook in low flame for 10 minutes.
After 10 minutes open the lid and check if the rice and vegetables are well cooked and all the water is observed.
Serve hot with any raitha of your choice. Enjoy!!! 

Notes

1.Always use freshly ground ginger garlic paste to reach a good taste.
2.You can substitute olive oil with vegetable oil.
3.I tried using organic garlic for this recipe. You could use the regular one.