36: Fresh Green Potato Salad and Green Bean Pasta

A refreshing potato salad to perk me up after a long and gloomy Monday...

For this salad you will need,

6 small red potatoes
1 tsp chopped Parsley
1 Tbsp Olive oil
1/2 cucumber chopped (medium size pieces)
6-8 cherry tomatoes, cut into halves
Baby spinach
Black olives, crumbled feta cheese and a vinaigrette based dressing

Boil the potatoes in a pan of boiling water for 10 minutes until lightly soft (you do not want the potatoes to become mushy). Peel the potatoes (or leave skin on) and cut the potatoes into halves. Season the potatoes with the olive oil and chopped parsley and salt. Add the rest of the ingredients and toss the salad. A wonderful and refreshing salad for a summer day...

Green Bean Pasta.... I came up with this recipe as I had a lot of green beans at home and wanted to make a whole meal with it. I have always made green bean casserole and was looking for something different. This recipe is just a result of me trying to play with different  flavors.

You will need,
1 cup cooked pasta (I used the bow tie pasta)
1/2 cup blanched green beans (green beans cooked in boiling water for 3-4 mins)
6-8 cherry tomatoes, cut into halves
5 pieces of sun dried tomatoes
2 Tbsp red wine vinegar
5 cloves of garlic
5 Tbsp of Olive oil
grated Parmesan cheese

Grind the sun dried tomatoes, 2 cloves of garlic, the red wine vinegar and 3 Tbsp of olive oil to a paste. In a pan heat 2 Tbsp of olive oil and add the remaining cloves of garlic. Add the blanched green beans and salt to taste and stir for 3-4 mins until the beans no longer have a raw taste. In a large bowl mix the pasta, the ground paste, the beans and cherry tomatoes and mix well. Garnish with Parmesan cheese.

Love the freshness of these recipes and I must say I have a new found love for cherry tomatoes. I find myself using them in almost everything I have been cooking lately.....from salads, pasta, omelets, to sandwiches....they just are great with everything...

7: Finger licking Good Comfort Food

Both my sweetie and me have been feeling a little under the weather since yesterday...And all I could crave for today was hot dal, rice and ghee...and my sweetie thought making 'dosakaya' (yellow cucumber) dal would be just perfect. I have never made this before. But I think when one can make tomato dal, dosakaya dal should be no different. I decided to just improvise on the go.

I had 2 yellow cucumbers which I peeled, cut and cleaned the insides and then cut into small cubes. I then pressure cooked toor dal with green chillies and half the cut cucumber and half a tomato. Heat oil/ ghee (I use ghee for the flavor) and add mustard seeds, cumin seeds, curry leaves and 1 garlic clove. Then add finely chopped half onion, add a pinch of salt and fry until onion is lightly browned. Add the remaining cucumber cubes and fry until the cucumber turns translucent. Then add the cooked dal and salt to taste and bring to a boil. I add a spoon of ghee and some fresh curry leaves at the very end for taste.

I also made a quick and easy aloo-tomato sabzi. Pressure cook 2 large potatoes. Heat oil and add cumin seeds, green chillies and 1/2 onion (finely chopped). Fry until onion turns brown, then add tomatoes and 2 tablespoons of coriander powder and fry until you do not have any solid pieces of tomatoes in the mix. Then add the boiled and diced potatoes and fry for 10 minutes. Garnish with chopped coriander and a hint of lime juice.

I must say, there are two happy and content stomachs in the house today...

P.S: A little fact about Dal I did not know until recently, the term Dal is a Sanskrit word which means "Split"