Watermelon Granita

My watermelon granita is a sweet and fluffy ice crystals that melts in our mouth giving a cool and refreshing feel.

This is one my favorite low fat dessert to enjoy any time of the day. Love to have granita ready in my freezer, so that I can gulp a spoonful when ever I need something cool and sweet.

Once the watermelon is cut and the left over are stored in the refrigerator for few days, the fruit will loose some of its sweetness. Or some times the fresh watermelon by itself will be little bland in taste, granita and watermelon juic are the best way to use up these watermelons.

Ingredients :

Watermelon chunks (seedless) - 5 cups
Sugar - 2 tablespoons or less depends upon the sweetness of the fruit.
Lemon juice - 2 teaspoon

Procedure : 

Puree the watermelon chunks and strain the pulp. Mix sugar and lemon juice to the watermelon juice. Taste the juice for sugar.

Now pour the juice into a wide bottom pan and freezer for an hour. Now remove the pan from the freezer and with the fork scrape the ice crystals. It will be like a shush at this stage. Return the bowl to the freezer and again in one hour scrape it again. Scrape totally for 3 times for every 1 hour. At the end of 3 to 4 hours the slush will look like flavored shaved ice. Now scoop the ice in serving cups.

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Chilli Cheese Toast

Who wouldn’t like a hot, bubbly and gooey chilli cheese toast for the snack time??

This is one my favorite snack right from my collage days. We used to have this toast as a sandwich in our college canteen. It was baked in the sandwich maker. Almost everyday day evening me with my dear friends used to have a lot of chit chat with this toast.

Nowadays I started doing it as a open faced sandwich. It is so fast and easy to make with the broiler oven. Love to have this toast hot with ketchup any time of the day. They are great as party snackers also. For parties I make it in a small bite size toast…..............

This is going to Mansi of Fun And Food Cafe. For the event "Magic Bullet Giveaway".

Ingredients :

Thick Bread Slices - 5 (I used ciabatta but baguette would also work good)
Shredded Mozzarella Cheese - 1 cup
Green Bell Pepper - 1 small (De-seeded and diced)
Thai hot green chilli - 2 (Finely minced)
Salt and Pepper

Procedure : 

Preheat the oven to broil mode. Low setting is fine…

In a bowl mix together all the above ingredients except the bread slices. The cheese should be a little mashed.

Now spread the cheese mixture generously on the bread slices. Line them on a cookie sheet and place it on the top rack of the oven.

Let the cheese melt and become bubbly. Remove and serve with ketchup.

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Plum Swirled Pops

This is a low fat ice pop recipe for this hot summer.

Last Sunday, while shopping I found some fresh plums at my local grocery store. So I immediately garbed some and that have transformed into these pops. We loved it so much for both its taste as well as its healthy too.

This is going to Yasmeen of Health Nut.For the event "I scream for Ice cream challenge".

Ingredients :

Plums - 5 (I used both Black and red plums)
Sugar - 2 tablespoon (Depends upon the tartness of the fruit)
Low Fat Sweetened Vanilla yogurt- 1 cup

Procedure : 

Place plums in a blender. Make a puree. Add sugar and blend it well. Pass the mixture through a sieve and strain. Collect the plum juice.

Now layer each ice pop mold with yogurt and plum puree. Start with plum pure and end with plum puree. Next with a skewer make swirl and mix yogurt and plum together.(Don’t mix completely, the white and red color should be seen)

Insert the popsicle stick and freeze it for more than 5 hours. So when needed, run the mould under some warm water and slowly release the pops from mould and enjoy….

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Tropical Smoothie

This is a cool, refreshing and power packed smoothie not only for breakfast but good for any time of the day.

There are many combination flavors in tropical smoothies. This is one of my favorite. Most of the days in summer this my breakfast. This is so energetic and good for health. BTW they are good for skin nourishment.

I am sending this recipe to Show Me Your Smoothie event. Divya of "Dil se" is hosting this event. All the best Divya......

Ingredients :

Pineapple - ½ cup
Mango - ½ cup
Papaya - ½ cup
Low fat yogurt - 1 cup or more
Ice cubes - ½ cup
Sugar - 1 to 2 tablespoon

Procedure : 

Add all the above ingredients into a blender and blend until every thing smooth and silky. Taste it and adjust the sweetness.

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Spinach Toast

This is a savory type of French Toast.

One of my favorite breakfast is bread omelet. Often I make bread and spinach omelet for our quick breakfast on weekdays. This was the inspiration for this spinach toast. They taste good and filling kind of breakfast.

I am sending this recipe to the event Global Kadai. Priya of "Easy N Tasty Recipes" is hosting this months global kadai for the theme Indianized French Toast.
All the best Priya....

So talking about the recipe, It can be prepared with any kind of bread. I tried with French baguette. It turned out good. Another important step is that all the ingredients used must be minced very finely so that they stick to the bread easily.

Ingredients :

French baguette - 4 to 5 slice
Spinach - ¼ cup cut into fine strips
Red onions - ¼ cup finely minced
Green chillies - 1 finely minced
Egg - 1
Turmeric powder - 1 pinch
Coriander leaves - 2 sprigs minced very finely
Olive oil - 2 teaspoon
Salt as required.

Procedure : 

Slice the baguette in ½ inch thickness. Slice it in an angle.

Heat 1 teaspoon of oil in a pan and add the onions and chillies and saute it for few seconds. Then add the spinach, turmeric and salt and stir it until the spinach is wilted.

Let the mixture cool completely. Now add the egg to it and whisk together.

Heat oil in a griddle. Soak the bread slices into the egg mixture on both sides and place it on the hot griddle. (make sure the spinach sticks on both sides of the bread).

Flip over in 1 minute and the let the egg cook on the other side also. Now remove from griddle and serve hot with ketchup or any other sauce.

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Bisi Bele Bath

Bisi Bele Bath is a very rich and aromatic rice delicacy.

Though the main ingredients are rice, dal and some masala items, each of us will have there own version of bisibellabath. And this is my version, half the recipe was adopted from my mom and the other half from my aunt.

BTW, Rushil is still keeping me busy, These are all the recipes I made and clicked before some time. Got a chance to post all those recipes I made and kept without posting.

Ingredients :

Raw rice - 1 cup
Toor dal - 3/4 cup
Water - 5 to 6 cups
Cooked Vegetables - 2 cups (I used carrots, peas, beans, potatoes )
Shallots - ½ cup
Tomatoes - 2 chopped
Tamarind juice - 1 tablespoon or more if needed
Turmeric powder - 1/2 tsp
salt

Bisi Bele Bath Masala powder:

Red chillis - 5 to 6
Coriander seeds - 2 tablespoon
Cumin - 1 teaspoon
Chana dal - 2 tablespoon
Fenugreek seeds - ¼ teaspoon
Cinnamon - 2 inch
Cloves - 3
Hing - around 1 teaspoon
Dry coconut powder - 1 tablespoon

Dry roast the above ingredients except coconut. Let is cool and add the coconut and make fine powder. (if making fine powder is not possible, add some water and make a fine paste)

For tadka:

Mustard seeds - 1 teaspoon
Cumin - ½ teaspoon
Red chilli - 1
Bay leaves - 2
Curry leaves
Ghee - ¼ cup

Procedure : 

Cook rice, toor dal and turmeric powder with 5 cups of water. If cooking in pressure cooker, cook until 4 whistles.

In a wide pan heat ghee and add the tadka items. Let the mustard seeds splutter and all other items release aroma. Now add the shallots and fry for few minutes. Next add the tomatoes and cook for a while. Now reduce the flame.

Next add the rice mixture, cooked vegetables and mix well. Add the Ground masala powder or paste. (Paste will mix easily into the rice mixture). Now taste and add needed salt.

Next add the tamarind juice and mix the whole mixture for 5 to 10 minutes or un till all the flavors are combined. Remove and serve with some ghee on top as some papad as a side.


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