Side dish

by

Sugarless Spiced Fig Jam

If you have a fig tree and don’t know what to do with them and you don’t want to make sugary jams then you will love this idea. My fig tree is in full bloom and I was running out of ideas. I don’t like to make things with so much sugar so I made jam once and that was all. 

One fine day which is today, I realized figs are naturally so sweet and once all water is gone, they are more sweet and then why the hell am I adding more sugar? Duh…and no, I don’t want to preserve jam for years. I dehydrated figs to eat in winter. Ok so visited fig tree and it gave me so many nice ripe figs. I also saw some animal poop and wonder who is visiting and eating figs. May be deer. I don’t mind them eating figs. There’s plenty for everyone and no reason to be greedy. So this is what I did and result I liked.

  • Chop figs roughly after washing.
  • Put it in a pot. Throw few cloves, a piece of cinnamon stick and 1 torn red chili. Teaspoon of fresh lime juice.
  • Stir now and then .
  • Cook until Most of the water is gone on medium heat.
  • Taste it. Mine is little sweet, sour and hint of spice. 
  • You can add a teaspoon of chia seeds after it cools down and you want it to be thicker.
  • You can eat this fig jam or whatever you want to call it with thepla, bread, cracker , vanilla icecream, or throw some on yogurt .
  • How long will it stay good? I don’t know. I will eat it up and will share with friends.
  • Enjoy!
Advertisements
by

Spicy Cucumber 


Summer is almost here and if you end up with lot of cucumbers either from garden or store and tired of salad, sandwiches here’s 1 more idea. Cook it with spices. Here’s my recipe:

  • Heat oil and crack few mustard seeds and methi seeds.
  • Add chopped garlic and sauté for few seconds.
  • Add chopped cucumber. Remove skin if it’s too thick.
  • Add turmeric, red chili powder, cumin-coriander powder and salt. Mix well.
  • Add some crushed raw peanuts. It will get cooked with cucumber. If you have roasted peanut , then add at the end when cucumber is all cooked.
  • Garnish with cilantro leaves.
  • Makes a good side dish to go with roti.
  • Enjoy!
by

Chinese Bitter Gourd

Bitter gourd has lot of benefits and amazingly older ppl don’t mind eating them. They have been used to eating it. Most of us don’t eat now a days. Lot of ppl don’t even know what bitter taste is like. But when Indians get diabetics, they start using it. It’s a good vegetable to include in diet for it’s bitter flavor. Try few times to start liking it. Here’s how I have been cooking and it’s turning out good. You can use Indian bitter gourd too.

  • Use coconut oil to cook this. After heating oil, add some fennel seeds which are sweet.
  • Add chopped bitter gourd. I remove seeds. You can also add chopped potatoes . Add dry spices and salt.
  • Once cooked , add sliced onion and cook until onion is little cooked . Won’t take too long.
  • If I add potatoes, I don’t use onions. If no potatoes then add onions.
  • Chinese variety is more like squash with little bitter flavor.
  • You can also cook and put it in omelette.
  • Enjoy !
by

Snow Peas Curry

Most of us eat snow peas in Chinese , Thai food and may be only at restaurant. But we can make Indian style curry out of it at home or you can just stir fry it for a side dish.Here’s how I made it and it’s so quick.

  • Had some green onions left so sauted in olive oil. But before that did mustards seeds, cumin seeds seasoning.
  • Add snow peas after washing , cleaning and removing top, bottom and sides. 
  • Add ginger, garlic paste and dry spices, salt.
  • Let it cook little bit covered and then add chopped tomatoes. Cook few more mins and that’s it.
  • You can also add potatoes , any beans like peas, cowpeas to it too.
  • There’s absolutely no need to use pressure cooker for this. We Indians are so used of pressure cooker that everything just goes in. 
  • If you don’t like Indian spices then just sauté it in olive oil with some chopped garlic and keep it crunchy. I think it will taste good.
  • Enjoy !
by

Fig Salad


Had to share this fig salad b/c it’s so good. It’s same kind of ingredients as fig pizza but still couldn’t resist to post.

Arugula, chopped figs and goat cheese. That’s it. Didn’t add any dressing . Make sure each bite has all 3 ingredients which won’t be hard. Very very tasty.

Do give it a shot if you can find figs. It’s a fig season so if you will look around , am sure you will find. Where there’s a will , there’s a way.:) You might have to just pay more.

Enjoy !