Homemade Chocolate Fudge Sauce

For the final day of this week's marathon under 'bookmarked recipes', I have this delicious Chocolate Fudge sauce. I made it couple of months ago and finally got a chance it post it here.

 Recipe is from Brown Eyed Baker. This chocolate sauce keeps for a very long time in the fridge and is great to drizzle over ice cream or fruit or pound cake or just eat it by the spoonfuls.

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Lemon Rasam

Blogging Marathon#66: Week 4/ Day 1

Theme: Bookmarked Recipes 

Dish: Lemon Rasam from Nalini

We are starting our final week of blogging marathon today and my theme for the week is 'Bookmarked recipes'. For the first day I made this simple yet very tasty Lemon rasam from Nalini's blog.

Nalini made it for the April mega marathon and I bookmarked and made it right away. It took this long to post the recipe here. Rasam in our households is made with tomato and tamarind. Toor dal or any kind of dal is not usually added. Our version is rather watery and is usually eaten along with a thicker dal.

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Avocado-Palak Roti

Blogging Marathon# 66: Week 3/ Day 1

Theme: Kid's Delight -- Lunch Box Recipes

Dish: Bean Burrito with Potatoes
For the final day of this week's marathon, I have a healthy roti for the kids lunchbox. I was planning to make Nalini's Avocado roti but then had some baby spinach in the fridge that needed to be used up, so that's how these avocado-spinach rotis were born.

Avocados are very healthy and provide nearly 20 essential nutrients, including fiber, potassium, vitamin E and folic acids. I like it quite a bit but my husband is allergic to it, so I usually eat it by myself but never make it for the family. But I wanted to at least see how the kids like it.

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Potato Rice for Lunch box (Aloo bhath)

Blogging Marathon# 66: Week 3/ Day 2

Theme: Kid's Delight -- Lunch Box Recipes

Dish: Potato Rice with Spice powder 
Both my kids love potatoes and can eat it every single day without getting bored. I'm the one getting bored to make them the same potato curry. So when I saw this recipe on a cooking show, I noted it down and made it for my kids.

This rice has crispy fried potatoes mixed with a homemade spice powder. The use of lentils (dals) in the powder adds some protein to the dish. Serve it with some yogurt for a filling meal.

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Bean Burrito with Potatoes

Blogging Marathon# 66: Week 3/ Day 1

Theme: Kid's Delight -- Lunch Box Recipes

Dish: Bean Burrito with Potatoes

We are starting a new week of blogging marathon today and my theme for this week is 'Kid friendly-Lunchbox dishes'. I am hosting Valli's Kid's Delight event this month with the same theme. Packing lunches for my kids is quite a task since they are quite picky and it gets really challenging to come up with dishes they would eat in school.

Both my kids have very different tastes. My son likes pasta, sandwiches or wraps to school whereas my daughter prefers rice with broccoli, brussels sprouts, carrot etc. With such varied tastes, it becomes so difficult to make something that both of them would enjoy. Luckily until last year, my little one was going to school only 3 days a week, but come September she will be going full time, which means packing lunch for both for the whole week.

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Thai Tofu Pizza on Spelt Crust

Blogging Marathon# 66: Week 2/ Day 3

Theme: Pizza

Dish: Thai Tofu Pizza on Spelt Crust

For the last day of this week's marathon, I have an interesting pizza recipe. The base is a No-rise spelt flour crust and the topping is spicy peanut sauce with crumbled tofu. I was in an experimenting mode and found these recipes -- crust recipe from Vegan Richa and Thai tofu topping recipe from Nasoya -- and wanted to give them a try.

No rise instant pizza crusts seem to be the common theme for all three days this week (check out the instant-pizza crust and chickpea flour crust). This spelt flour pizza base doesn't need any rising time and is ready to roll once you have the topping done. Richa's original recipe has BBQ tofu topping, but I used the Thai style peanut-Tofu instead.

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Chickpea flour Pizza with Pesto

Blogging Marathon# 66: Week 2/ Day 2

Theme: Pizza

Dish: Chickpea flour Pizza with Pesto

After yesterday's Instant pizza recipe, I have another instant pizza today too. This one's made with chickpea flour or besan. The crust tasted a lot of cheela to me, but instead of cooking on the stove top, the crust here is baked in the oven. Apparently this chickpea crepe is also associated to France where these are called Socca and are a popular street food usually served with frosty-cool rosé.

As I was looking for instant pizza bases, I found this Socca Pizza recipe on Cookie and Kate blog. The chickpea base in baked under the broiler until set -- so the longer it bakes, the more crispy and browned the pizza gets.

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Saag Pizza (Indian Style Spinach Pizza)

Blogging Marathon# 66: Week 2/ Day 1

Theme: Pizza

Dish: Indian Style Saag Pizza

We are into 2nd week of blogging marathon and my theme for this week is 'Pizza'. With the kids home on summer vacation, I knew they would be very happy if I made some pizza at home, so picked the theme. First up is a Indian style pizza topping on an Instant pizza crust.

I have quite a few pizza recipes on the blog and most of them are traditional crusts that need at least 3 hours to up to 18 hours of rise time. So I wanted to try a crust recipe that doesn't need too much time to make. This recipe from Mel's Kitchen worked out perfectly. It needs just 10 minutes of rise time and then you are ready to make pizzas.

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Vankaya Perugu Pachadi (Eggplant in Yogurt gravy)

Blogging Marathon# 66: Week 1/ Day 3

Theme: 3 Veggies that are Fruit

Dish: Vankaya Perugu Pachadi

For the final day of this week's theme '3 veggies that are fruit', I have a dish made with eggplant -- you know I can't miss an opportunity to try and post a new recipe with my favorite veggie. I watched this yogurt based eggplant dish being made on a Telugu cooking show.

I planted a few eggplant saplings in my backyard this year and they just started to flower and grow. My daughter counts the flowers and the tiny eggplants everyday. Hopefully I'll have more eggplant dishes for you this summer.

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Tomato Cheese Sandwich with Pesto

Blogging Marathon# 66: Week 1/ Day 2

Theme: 3 Veggies that are Fruit

Dish: Tomato Cheese Pesto Sandwich

Tomato is probably the most popular vegetable that is in fact a fruit. Today I have a simple sandwich recipe that needs just a few ingredients but tastes absolutely amazing -- Tomato Cheese Sandwich with Pesto.

This dish doesn't really need a recipe. Assemble the ingredients listed in the name, pile them on bread and enjoy as is or if you like the cheese melted and the bread toasted, then grill the sandwich. I like it toasted, so that's how I served it.

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Creamy Cucumber Gazpacho

Blogging Marathon# 66: Week 1/ Day 1

Theme: 3 Veggies that are Fruit

Dish: Creamy Cucumber Gazpacho

Can't believe it's July already and half the year passed off so quickly. We are starting a new edition of blogging marathon today and my theme for this week is dishes made with 'Veggies that are fruit'.

Technically speaking fruit is a part of the plant that develops from a flower. It is also the section of the plant that has seeds. Other parts of the plant are considered vegetables -- like stems, leaves or roots. Good example of  'veggies that are fruit' are cucumber, eggplant, tomatoes, peppers, squash and so on. But from a culinary point of view, vegetables are more savory and fruits are sweet.

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Peach Ice Cream (Eggless Recipe)

Blogging Marathon#65: Week 4/ Day 3

Theme: Bookmarked Recipes 

Dish: Peach Ice Cream

I didn't know that peach ice cream existed until I had it at a dairy farm last summer. It tasted so fresh and full of peach flavor. I was looking for an opportunity to make it and when I saw peaches on sale in our local grocery I bought and made this yummy ice cream.

When buying peaches, look for fruit that smell like what you want them to taste like. One good thing about peaches is that they ripen even after they have been picked. So you can buy them slightly ripe and finish ripening at home. But make sure to buy peaches that are heavy for their size but are not too hard (these will never ripen).

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Coconut Peanut Sesame Chutney

Blogging Marathon#65: Week 4/ Day 2

Theme: Bookmarked Recipes 

Dish: Coconut-Sesame Chutney from Priya

I'm always looking for different chutneys to serve with idli, dosa or upma. So when Priya did a whole month of Dosa-chutney recipes for the mega marathon, I knew I will have a lot of interesting chutneys and dosas bookmarked to try. 

I really wanted to try her jackfruit savory dosa and the breadfruit peel chutney, but haven't had a chance. Do check Priya's space from some amazing Indian and International dishes, her bakes are out of this world.

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Wheat flour Kuzhi Paniyaram

Blogging Marathon#65: Week 4/ Day 1

Theme: Bookmarked Recipes 

Dish: Wheat flour Kuzhi Paniyaram from Sandhya

We are starting the last week of blogging marathon today and my theme is 'Bookmarked Recipes'. This happens to be one of my favorite themes because it gives me a chance to try some of the recipes that I bookmarked. First up are these delicious Wheat flour Kuzhi Paniyaram from Sandhya.

Sandhya made these instant paniyaram for the mega marathon and they looked too good to pass up. So I bookmarked them and tried them right away. Paniyarams are usually made with leftover idli batter, but this instant version uses atta (or whole wheat flour) and doesn't need any fermenting.

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Chettinad Beet Kola Urundai (Indian style Beet Croquettes)

Blogging Marathon# 65: Week 3/ Day 3

Theme: 1 Vegetable -- 3 Dishes

Dish: Beet Kola Urundai

For the final day of this week's marathon, I made these delicious Chettinad style Beet kola urundai. Some of my BM friends have made them during the last mega marathon and I thought they were very interesting but I wasn't sure how they would taste.

These urundai can be made by soaking and grinding dal like in Gayathri's recipe. But I wasn't really prepared to make this dish the day I made them, so went with Nalini's recipe for an instant recipe which uses ground roasted gram to hold them together.

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Beet and Quinoa Salad

Blogging Marathon# 65: Week 3/ Day 2

Theme: 1 Vegetable -- 3 Dishes

Dish: Beet and Quinoa Salad with Spinach

I have another salad with beets today. This one's with quinoa, carrot, edamame and other delicious and nutritious super foods.

Recipe is from Cookie & Kate. Original recipe suggests using spiralized beets and carrots. Spiralized vegetables are quite a craze these days. I have one, but I haven't figured out how to use it yet. But grating the vegetables give the same salad almost same texture.

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Indian Style Beet Salad

Blogging Marathon# 65: Week 3/ Day 1
Theme: 1 Vegetable -- 3 Dishes
Dish: Indian Style Beet Salad

We are starting a new week of blogging marathon today and my theme for this week is to pick 1 vegetables and make 3 dishes. My favorite eggplant and the family favorite potato were fighting to get into the spotlight this week, but I wanted to give the less favored Beets a chance, so this way I can add new recipes to my repertoire.

I am not a big fan of beets but at the same time I don't completely dislike it. The whole family is against it -- the color doesn't attract them at all, I think it actually make them go the other way. Anyway my husband liked this beet salad that I made during the detox diet (I guess he was forced to like it after eating the same dishes 3 days straight), so that is one of the main reasons for picking Beets for the week.

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Easy Bananas Foster with Homemade caramel sauce

Blogging Marathon#65: Week 2/ Day 3

Theme: 1 Sauce -- 2 Dishes

Dish: Easy Bananas Foster with Homemade caramel sauce

For the final day of this week's marathon, I have a very simple and very delicious dessert with banana, caramel sauce and vanilla ice cream. It is called Bananas Foster and is a dish that was created in New Orleans, Louisiana.

Traditionally bananas are cooked in butter and sugar until browned and then alcohol (rum or banana liqueur) is added and ignited. This cooking process of adding alcohol to a hot pan and creating a burst of flame is called Flambé (which means flamed in French). This dish puts on quite a show when served this way. But today's recipe doesn't have any alcohol or the special effects in it.

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Almond Rice Pudding with Homemade Caramel Sauce

Blogging Marathon#65: Week 2/ Day 2

Theme: 1 Sauce -- 2 Dishes

Dish: Almond Rice Pudding with Salted Caramel Sauce

I LOVE rice pudding but hardly ever make it because of my husband is not fond of milky desserts. When I saw this rice pudding with caramel sauce, I was initially skeptical to try because I feared it was going to be too too sweet. But it was probably the best rice pudding I ever made.

I had some almond milk that needed to be used, so I used it to make the rice pudding. You can use regular or other non-dairy milk. But the creaminess of the dish might suffer a little bit with some of the milk alternates.

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Homemade Caramel Sauce

Blogging Marathon#65: Week 2/ Day 1

Theme: 1 Sauce -- 2 Dishes

Dish: Caramel Sauce

We are starting a brand new week of blogging marathon today and my theme for this week is '1 Sauce -- 2 dishes using that sauce'. I clarified with Valli if the sauce had to be savory and she said sweet sauces are also fine. I made this caramel sauce couple of months back and it has been in my drafts. So posting the recipe for caramel sauce today and I have 2 absolutely decadent recipes using this sauce coming up in the next couple of days.

Making caramel has always intimidated me, I burnt quite a few pans and quite a bit of sugar that I even stopped trying. But then happened to see this easy to make caramel sauce recipe on Food52 and I gave it a try.

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