..SouthAsiaRocks..

MasterChef Australia is a great show!  When it's on, we get it 5 days a week.  There are TONS of episodes.  The thing that makes it really cool is that the judges and contestants are all so nice!  The contestants don't stab each other in the back and they even help each other!   Anyway, the other night (a couple of weeks ago) some friends of ours were in town and wanted to go to Chili's, so we went over to the mall to eat :)  When we got there we saw that the bookstore had the Judges (and very famous chefs/restaurant owners) inside signing cookbooks!    When we got inside, they had just closed off the line, so we weren't allowed to go through the line and get them to sign a cookbook or get a pic with them :(    So... we stood as close as we could and took pics :) haha!  (and I didn't have my camera, only my phone to take pics)... Here's Gary...    Here's George with my friend Amy :)  And my at...

You ever wonder what to do with these weird veggies? I never ate beets growing up. The only time I ever saw them was on a salad bar. I would always try them (they looked so cool and colorful) but never liked them. Even now when I see them in the market they kinda gross me out. The long part looks like a rat's tail to me! When my sister was in town she taught me a fun recipe with beets that I love, so I'm going to share it with you :) I actually eat this for fun!! I have no actual recipe. But basically I pealed and cut in half 5 beets. (if you don't want your nice cutting board to be permanently pink, cut them on a plate or something else :)) Then I steamed them (you could boil them too if you wanted). Then I got out my mini food-processor. I put a little less than 2 of the beets in the food processor with a small handful of cashews, a tablespoon of olive oil and 2 tablespoons of balsamic vinegar and blend it up. I repeated that until all the beets were beat :) h...

One of the interesting things they eat here is the Lotus Root. It is very unique! If you look below you can see what it looks like :) Picture from Google Images You can learn a lot of interesting things about the Lotus Root if you click here . There is one snack that I really like to make out of the root. First you use a peeler and peel the outside of the root. Then you slice it very thin (using a v-slicer or mandolin is helpful!). Then you deep fry them and salt them. They're a fun yummy snack! I forgot to take an "after picture, so this is from Google Images so that you can see what they look like ;)

I thought it was time for another South Asian Foodie post :) Having a new baby means that I'm still not out and about as much as normal which means this blog is a little more boring. It also means that food is one of the things I have pictures of and I'm posting :) haha! So, one of my favorite places to eat is called "Haldiram's". It's basically a restaurant full of "snacky" foods. You can eat them as a meal though and they'll really fill you up - very cheaply! One of the things I love is called: Aloo Tikka (in the picture below). It can look a lot of different ways. It's basically a potato patty that's full of seasonings and spices and fried. At Haldiram's they put a sweet & spicy sauce over it and a coriander (cilantro) sauce. It's so yummy! Here's a recipe for Aloo Tikka if you want to make it :) or here's a video of how to make it if you like that better :) One of the treats I like to get at Haldiram...

I've really gotten into cooking more lately :) You basically have to cook everything from scratch here. I really don't know how we survived our first 3 years... but the last year and a half I've actually learned how to cook :) Aashini eats the National food at school and loves it, so I thought I would learn to make some of the foods she likes at school. Yesterday I made: Tamatar Paneer It's super easy! I should have made it long ago :) First you do some tempering. Put a little oil in a skillet and add Yellow Mustard Seeds & Cumin Seeds. Cook them for a little bit (until the mustard seeds have turned a very light brown). Put in 5-6 finely diced tomatoes along with coriander powder, cumin powder, turmeric powder, salt, minced garlic & some chilies (optional - I leave these out for Aashini). Cook it until you've made a nice curry (the tomatoes should be almost a chunky paste-like consistency). Chop up paneer into small pieces (if you can't get paneer...

This is probably one of those posts that's better to be on the other blog, but this blog is neglected, so I thought I'd post on here :) We made sugar cookies the other day! I got a lot of fun cookie cutters for Christmas and we just needed to make cookies! Aashini LOVES cooking!! The icing turned out really great and really bright! Aashini got to "paint" her cookies! It started off really pretty... Then it got a little messier... By the end, her cookies were pretty brown looking :) haha! Actually by the end she realized she could eat them, and ate a LOT of cookies! haha! Here's the finished product! You can see Aashini's "sprinkle placement" on the dinosaur below... I think that was the only cookie she did that got sprinkles... after that she realized she could eat them and just ate all the sprinkles we gave her :) haha! Here's the recipe in case you want it :) INGREDIENTS 2 3/4 cups all-purpose flour 1 teaspoon baking soda 1/2 teaspoon baki...

Pumpkin ROCKS!!! This time of year there are so many pumpkin recipes out there. I don't know if it's pregnancy or just the fun pumpkin time of year, but I've been trying them all! haha! It doesn't feel like fall here (in the 90s today), and they don't celebrate the same fall holidays here that we do in the US, so it's a fun way to make it feel more like fall here :) Starbucks Pumpkin Spice Lattes 2 cups milk 1 cup strong coffee (I used 3 T of grounds to make 1 cup) 2 T canned pumpkin or fresh 2 t vanilla Sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg and cloves to taste Mix all ingredients in pot, co ok over low heat until steaming. YUM! I'm more of a decaf girl - this is good with decaf too! ............................. A lot of pumpkin recipes call for pumpkin pie spice. I haven't seen it here in South Asia Land, so I made up my own batch :) PUMPKIN PIE SPICE 1 1/2 tsp ground cinnamon (dal chini) 1/2 tsp ground nutmeg (jaiphal) 1/4 tsp ground cloves (laung/lavang) 1/2 ...

We have to make pretty much everything from scratch here (b/c that's pretty much our only option). It is hard to find good "from scratch" recipes that are super quick and easy to make. I like to cook, but not every day and I don't like to spend a long time in the kitchen this time a year (it's 100 degrees in our kitchen right now). So anyway, I made this the other night and it was yummy and super easy so I thought I'd pass it along :) Black Bean & Corn Taco Salad! - Cook up some black beans (if you have canned black beans then just drain and rinse them - if you are in the Capital I can tell you where to get them, or you can just get them in Thailand). If you don't have black beans you could probably use the little red beans or black-eyed peas - it would taste different but would probably be good :) - Cook some corn (or un-freeze it or de-can it and rinse and drain) - Cut up onions - depending on your taste - I love onions so I usually put a lot! - Put...

I'm not a breakfast person... I don't like breakfast foods... I know, I'm weird :) So some days I don't eat breakfast and them I'm hungry again at 10:00 and then I eat and it throws the whole day off :) Well, the other day my friend Kelley had a recipe for some breakfast bars... they sounded good so I thought I'd give them a try: Oat & Almond Breakfast Bars 1/2 c vegetable oil 1/2 c honey 2 tsp vanilla extract 1 lg egg 2 c old-fashioned oats, uncooked 3/4 c all-purpose flour 1/2 c packed light brown sugar 1/2 c sliced almonds (if you can’t slice them, then chop or grind) 1/2 c toasted wheat germ 1/2 c raisins Optional: ½ cup Mini Chocolate Chips (highly recommended) Walnuts 3/4 tsp salt 1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Line 13" by 9" metal baking pan with nonstick foil (If not using nonstick, lightly grease foil). 2. In 2-cup liquid measuring cup, stir oil, honey, vanilla, and egg until mixed. In large bowl, with fork, mix oats, flour, sugar, ...

I thought I would try something fancy this Valentine's Day and make some sugar cookies :)  As I was cooking them, I realized that I haven't blogged much about our kitchen - it's pretty different than American kitchens.  So, this will be the first kitchen post :) So here is our oven (with our microwave on top that we got from  J&K  after they left :))  It's a lot smaller than the typical American oven but it heats up very fast!  It does take a while to make cookies though - since the oven only holds about a dozen cookies :) Aashini LOVES sweets!  (I think she got that from me :))  As I was making the cookies she kept looking at me and saying "cookie, cookie!" over and over (but it sounded more like "kuh ker") :)  Although it's not a great picture, you can see below that Aashini was quite upset when I didn't give her a cookie right away :) She followed me all around the house chasing after the cookies and pointing and saying "cookie...

OK, so I LOVE any kind of sweet yummy coffee drink... BUT the caffeine in coffee makes me crazy hyper and then I come crashing down -- so I tend to be a decaf person :) Anyway, on a friend's blog the other day, they posted a recipe for Starbucks Pumpkin Spice Lattes - so I thought I'd pass it along it is super yummy!! :) Starbucks Pumpkin Spice Lattes 2 cups milk 1 cup strong coffee (I used 3 T of grounds to make 1 cup) 2 T canned pumpkin (or maybe 3 T of South Asian Pumpkin) 2 t vanilla Sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg and cloves to taste Mix all ingredients in pot, cook over low heat until steaming. Onto another favorite of mine... PIZZA!! Our South Asian friends think that Americans only eat Pizza & Burgers :) haha ! We do eat our share of pizza :) I was trying to figure out an easy way to make pizza... check this out! OK, all you need is a can of those pop biscuits (you know the can that pop when you open them?)... Get just the plain biscuits, the sweet ones make it taste kinda...