Last month as a part of the Blogging Marathon #94, a few us had selected the theme “Sweets without Refined Ingredients”. Since the theme is of particular interest to me, I decided to take up the opportunity of doing the round-up of posts for this theme. As you can see below, there are some amazing recipes from some lovely bloggers of sweets that you can enjoy, without feeling too much guilt. A word of caution though – sweets are sweets, and will be calorie laden, how much ever you try to keep them “healthy”, so enjoy in moderation and exercise caution. 😉 So here is the snapshot of all those lovely bloggers who contributed to this very interesting theme… Gayathri’s Cook Spot: Sathu Maavu/ Multi Grain Flour Cookies Kadalai Parippu Thengai Urundu/ Peanut Coconut Balls Bajra Gur Roti Bhavana of Code 2 Cook: Dates Oats Laddu Gajar…
Wheatgerm Cookies
 If there is something that can be baked within 30 minutes, then there is no points for guessing – cookies! Even muffins can be done in that time, but totally dependent on the density of the batter. Cookies also have its condition – that the dough can be used to bake immediately, which is usually not the case for cookies like chocolate chip ones.  While wondering what to come up as the third post for the “Meals under 30 minutes” theme for the Blogging Marathon #94, my eyes fell on these delicious cookies that I had baked recently. There was this box of wheatgerm that I had bought and was approaching its best before date. Bloggers and cooking fanatics would definitely appreciate how that feels! Even though I have truncated my purchases so much now unlike before, I still have such issues coming up once in a while….
Paneer Dahi Bhalla
 OK, so when you are on a quantified diet and you need to eat as per what is in your list, what do you do to cravings? Twist and tweak them as per your diet! 😀 So today, under my theme “Meals under 30 minutes” for the Blogging Marathon #94, I have to share something that I ate “God knows how many times” of late!  The first time I had Dahi Bhallas (or vadas) was at Humi’s place, when I went to meet her the very first time – that was around four years ago. I was never a chaat fan – the first time I had chaat at the insistence of my colleague P, I almost puked out at the combination of sweet and sour – please do not beat me! Gradually, it caught up on my taste buds and now I love it! But still not…
Idiyappam | String Hoppers
 When Valli’s mail came for the themes for this month’s Blogging Marathon #94 and my eyes fell on “Meals within 30 minutes”, I really wanted to do it. I am currently building up my “Under 30 Minutes” recipes on the blog and the theme was perfect for adding three more. I have chosen three recipes that fits into different courses, so that it doesn’t feel like you get only drinks within that time. 😀  The first one are Idiyappams or Nool Puttu, as we call it. “Nool” is thread, and definitely these are thread-like rice dumplings, steamed and served. I never realized how much my girls loved this till they literally ate my head asking to make it. I thought it was a really complicated process and would just ignore it. It was one Instagram story of Fami which prompted me to try these. I pulled up my…
Chocolate Zucchini Muffins | Gluten Free, Refined Sugar Free
 After the Honey Yogurt Cheesecake and the Dates Bliss Balls, here comes my third recipe for the theme “Sweets without Refined Ingredients” for the Blogging Marathon #94. Keto and Low Carb are big words these days. Every second person seems to be going on Keto. Hehe… I somehow have a mental block towards that diet, but then it is one of the diets that is causing a lot of people to lose weight really quick. I firmly believe that any diet followed in moderation will do good, but totally giving up on one part of the food chain is not sustainable in the long run. Anyway, to each, their opinion… 🙂  I have some coconut flour in my pantry that I bought out of enthusiasm, only to discover that I wasn’t liking it much! I tried making pancakes with them and they became a dud. I was somehow…
Dates Bliss Balls
 While I chose the theme “Sweets without Refined Ingredients” for the Blogging Marathon #94, I had no doubts in my mind regarding this particular one I am making today. Dates bliss balls have been doing rounds for all obvious and good reasons!  All ingredients that go into making it are very healthy – whether it’s the dates, the nuts, coconut oil or cocoa powder. It is one of the safest bet to get your sugar fix when you really crave for it. All you need is one ball – take it in your hand, choose a comfortable corner, and slowly chew to enjoy it. It makes you feel really good after eating and your sugar cravings get fixed without a hint of sugar! How cool is that! 🙂   Dates is something I always have at home, but making these balls took too much time. I made…
Honey Yogurt Cheesecake
 Time for the Blogging Marathon #94! As usual I am participating two weeks this month too. The first theme I chose was “Sweets without Refined Ingredients”. I guess the title is so apt with the way I am trying to adjust my relationship with sugar and sweets in general. The quantified eating done for a majority of this year has actually refined my tastebuds quite a bit. I can still take sugar in little, but I can’t take it if it goes overboard. I simply can’t touch it! Of late, I have been hating ice creams from out, since I feel it is overtly sweet. The latest I loved was Godiva, which was mildly sweet and creamy, but thanks to its price, I will keep it as a occasional treat! 😉  So coming back to the theme, we had to make sweets that didn’t have any refined ingredients,…
Wholemeal Banana Bread
 I always feel it isn’t necessary to make something fresh for breakfast like the Muhalla or the Capsicum Olive Omelette, for the Blogging Marathon #93 theme I chose for this week, “Easy Breakfast”. I am somebody who loves to bake something and keep ready for breakfast at times, be it on weekdays or even better, for weekends. This Wholemeal Banana Bread perfectly fits the bill for a delicious and healthy breakfast without much effort in the morning!  This recipe appeared on the King Arthur site as the recipe for 2018. I love their website and refer it to a lot of times for perfect recipes. So I was sure that this bread would be a winner too. I hardly made changes to the recipe – used wholemeal flour for baking it, reduced the sugar a tad bit and used a mix of oil and butter, since I feel…
Capsicum Olive Omelette
 I love eggs for breakfast – period! When I started quantitative nutrition, the best thing I loved is that I could eat eggs everyday to cover my protein and fat requirements. Yaay! 😀 So when I do a post for the Blogging Marathon #93 under the theme “Easy Breakfast”, what is easier than having an egg meal? I have already posted a couple of my favorite omelette recipes here and here, but this one takes the cake!  I love capsicum and try to include it into most of the meals I can. I keep a small bowl of chopped capsicum so that it becomes easy in the rush to just sprinkle them on while making the omelette. A bottle of sliced green olives is also a part of my pantry, since the whole family can finish a bottle in one sitting. Combining both these vegetables into this delicious…
Muhalla | Mhala ~ Emirati Date Crepes
 You may have noticed that when it comes to selecting themes for the Blogging Marathon, I always go for something easy so that I can accommodate it in. 😀 This week, I have chosen a theme for version #93 that I am generally bad at – “Easy Breakfast”. Even though everybody tells you that breakfast is the most important meal, there are so many opinions coming up on how much important that meal can be. No doubt, if you need to feel at your best, you need to ensure that your tummy is in tact. This case goes really true with kids.  Schools start so early these days, that eating is a task. My girls have just a cup of milk or sometimes breakfast cereal and go. Sometimes they eat oats or upma but nothing more than that. If I make, they keep grumpy faces. So I literally…
Paneer Capsicum Rice
 For the third post for the Blogging Marathon #93 theme for the week, “One Ingredient, 3 ways”, here is a rice that I have fallen in love with recently! Not only because of its taste, but because of its simplicity to cook it! Like I mentioned earlier, even since I have been on quantified eating, I have been prepping my meals a lot. One of it is the rice. Cooking little quantity of rice everyday can be daunting, so I cook the rice for the whole week, weight them individually for days and pack them in dabbas. By doing this, it used to make my life easy.  Since I had to have paneer for my protein, and some form of vegetable, this combination of capsicums with paneer became my favorite. I guess majority of my nights, my meal was this. I never clicked it because I never thought…
Paneer Matar Masala | Matar Paneer
 For this week’s Blogging Marathon #93, the theme I had chosen was “One Ingredient – 3 ways” and the ingredient I chose was “paneer”. After the first recipe of the Kadai Paneer, here is another paneer gravy.  If you really go to see, there is one standard way of making paneer gravies. A ground paste of onion and tomato is used as a base and the seasonings are adjusted as per your needs. Since paneer in itself is rich, you can skip the use of cream in the gravy. But to make paneer taste and look more tempting, the use of cream or yogurt – to make it more guilt free – is always recommended. I would like to emphasis on the use of kasuri methi. A sprinkling of crushed kasuri methi just lifts up the whole spirit of a simple paneer dish. So whatever said and done,…
Kadai Paneer
 I always look forward to doing the Blogging Marathon. Last month, the group had a mega marathon of 26 flatbreads and every one who participated did an amazing job with compiling them on their blogs. I, for one, would never be able to do it! Sometimes, with the way my interest in cooking is spiralling down despite cooking on and off, I sometimes wonder if I will be able to pull up even posts for the BM. Hehe… I guess we all go through such a phase in life where we just loose our interest. I am trying hard to hold on to it and hopefully it doesn’t slip through my fingers… 😉  Coming to the topic I chose for the next three days for this first week of Blogging Marathon #93, it is “One Ingredient – 3 ways” and the one ingredient I chose is paneer. There…
Omelette Paneer Roll
 Do you see some connection here? While doing the posts for the Blogging Marathon #90 for the theme “Wrap and Rolls”, I unconsciously went with all egg recipes! Whether the Kolkata Egg Rolls or the Egg Toasties and now this one, all are with eggs! 😀 So it feels like I did a theme within the theme! Hehe…  I had mentioned earlier that at the moment, I am on a quantified diet, ie. I get to eat limited stuff within my macros. Alhamdulillah, I have been able to steadily lose weight and am very happy with my progress. I now have the last block of weight to lose and I am pretty much sure that my body would not want to let it go. 😉 I am targeting this year end to get to my goal, InShaAllah. Definitely it will need a close watch on my diet plus…
Umma’s Egg Toasties
 Food that makes you miss childhood is the best food. Would you agree? While I was brainstorming myself of what to make next for the Blogging Marathon #90 theme of “Wrap and Rolls”, my mind kept loitering around the egg toasties that umma would make almost every second Thursday. Thursday is weekend here, and we would have no madrassa that day, so naturally, we would be hungry around tea time. Umma would make toasties every single Thursday, alternating the filling with eggs, chicken or frozen mixed vegetables.  I feel today’s generation is pampered with too many ideas that we are lost as to what to make for our kids, but our mothers had simple ideas and simple dishes, that were cleaned up. I guess many of you would agree to this fact of life. I had some bread sitting in the fridge and I wanted to use it…