Dear Didi and Daibi,
So it has been a year or more that we have touched this blog. Niloy says, Google must have archived it because we have not updated it for a while…but I still found it on the first page of the search, which is not bad, right?!
So to start things again on this blog I thought I will share a simple recipe, which is a healthy take on a traditional recipe. Although, I must say my relentless efforts to cook healthy stuff have often ended up as some Faux Pas moments! For instance, once I made apple muffins with super tiny amount of sugar. When the muffins were ready, we tasted them, and thought they needed more sugar. So I decided to sprinkle them with some sugar granules. Now in Australia, the white sugar and salt look identical as they have almost the same size of granules. And at that time I was also storing sugar and salt in two identical jars. So instead of sugar, I sprinkled the muffins with salt!! Niloy had planned to take some muffins for his office colleagues and I, with all my pride told him, “here are my lovely sugar kissed apple muffins for your friends!!” Later he called and told me that although everyone loved the muffins, some people asked, ‘did your wife use salted butter?’ 😛 Then is dawned on me…I had sprinkled salt instead of sugar!!! hahhahahahha…super funny!!
Then there was another time when I added parsnips and carrot in a sabudana khichdi (which is made of tapioca pearls and peanuts). Some authentic sabudana khichdi making friends called it a sacrilege! Niloy has still not forgiven me for that!! Be it poha (flattened rice cooked with onions and spices) or Maggi noodles, I keep adding peas, corn, beans and carrots to everything possible. In return I get Kolkata style ‘cholbe na’ type protests from Niloy too! But I continue my journey of healthy cooking.
So this morning I made Spinach and Cauliflower uttapam from an Adai batter. 
Traditionally adai is made with rice+chana daal+toor daal+urad daal+moong daal. Its a great source of iron, protein and some say even vitamins. I make it according to the daal collection that I have at home then. Last week I made a big batch of batter with half cup each of toor daal, green moong, urad daal, masoor daal and 2 cups of brown rice (major dose of roughage!). I also add a tsp each of fenugreek seeds and cumin seeds to this. As I was using brown rice instead of normal white rice, I soaked it separately for a half a day extra and then soaked the pulses in a separate bowl. It is vital that rice and pulses are soaked and ground separately. Next morning, I made a batter by grinding the rice and pulses in two different batches, and then mixing them together.
I usually divide the batter into 2-3 portions. By doing so I can add different things to each to make a variety of things such as dosa or uttapam or even idli. For example in one portion, I would add ragi powder to make crispy dosas and in another I could semolina to make uttapam or rava dosa depending on the mood. Really, these batters are so versatile that you can make anything and everything from them!
Today I had one portion of the batter left and decided to add chopped salt, spinach, green chillies and onions to it. Then I remembered that there was some minced cauliflower in the fridge – so that went on the top of the uttapam too! While the bottom side was cooking on the pan, I gently pressed the cauliflower and then after about 30 seconds, I flipped it over with a few drops of oil/ghee.
Honestly they turned out really nice. For someone like me who loves the aroma of fried cauliflower, this was divine!
You can really add anything in these batters..apart from capsicum and carrots that are normally used, I think sweet potato or pumpkin puree, cabbage, beetroot, or even bottle gourd (lauki) would go really well with it! Just adjust the consistency according to the vegetable you add and if its too runny, 1-2 tbsp of ragi powder would hold it all together. Didi, am sure Rizi would love to eat his vegetables in this form. What say? 🙂 Am sure some other healthy cooks would add flax-seed or quinoa, but I think I will refrain from adding these as too many healthy things together may be a bit heavy for the stomach, right? 😛
So you see, there are some hits and some misses in my kitchen, but I think that is what makes food so exciting!! Isn’t it? As Julia Child says, “No matter what happens in the kitchen, never apologize,” 😛
Tell me what you guys think about this and seriously, let’s start writing again instead of only gorging on everything we create!!
With love and hugs,
Dakhina
The Curry Cousins 