Madhu Knits and Cooks

Semi-Improvised Greek Salad - Easy and Flavorful Light Main Course or Side Dish

Toward the end of our brief Misfits Market run, we found ourselves with a lot of lettuce.  A ton of it.  Well, maybe not a literal ton, but certainly a lot - and of many different varieties.  We started to dream of getting creative with this lettuce bounty (stir-fried lettuce, grilled lettuce, etc), but instead ended up making a lot of raw lettuce salads.  

Perhaps the best salad that I attempted was a modified version of Cook's Illustrated Greek Salad.  The modifications were numerous, but it was a very forgiving recipe base and I was very happy with the results.

To fit the ingredients that we had on hand, I approximately halved the ingredients; used dried oregano instead of fresh; substituted green bell pepper for red; substituted yellow onion for red; and omitted the mint, olives, and tomatoes.  The result still tasted like a restaurant-style Greek salad, thanks to the tangy and flavorful vinaigrette.

This was my first time of marinating the onions and cucumber in the dressing before tossing with the rest of the salad, and this technique did decrease the sharpness of the fresh onion.  I will use this approach with other salads involving raw onion in the future.

Two Sleevers Palak Paneer - An Unfortunate Miss

It saddens me that my latest Two Sleevers Indian Instant Pot cookbook attempt was a bust for a few reasons.  First, I'd love to find an amazing new Palak Paneer recipe.  Second, I would love if I could find an amazing Palak Paneer recipe that is as easy to make as this one.  Third, I have been really liking my past Two Sleevers attempts, so it's unfortunate to break that positive streak.

Fourth, I can't fully identify what we didn't like about this final dish.  It was well-spiced, maybe slightly overly so, but also somehow lacked something to bring it all together.  It also had this slight tang that I didn't quite like.  Unless I figure out how to soften this taste, I'll probably continue to search for other recipes.

The recipe is quite simple to put together - saute most of the ingredients together, and then quickly cook on high pressure before quick releasing the pressure.

This was my first time using the quick release feature, which was a bit scary and fun to see all the steam so rapidly escape from the pot.

You then blend the cooked spinach mixture with an immersion blender, before adding the paneer and serving.  I do think that reducing the water by about half would also been good in the future to avoid too watery of a sauce.

Super quick and easy for a weeknight - sadly, it just didn't work.  Back to the drawing board!

Two Sleevers Paneer Biryani - Delicious Weeknight Side or Main Course

The Two Sleevers Indian Instant Pot cookbook continues to outperform with a seemingly untraditional, but delicious, paneer biryani recipe.  

I used a pre-made garam masala blend, which made this dish a complete breeze to put together.  Basically, saute some onions in oil, and then add the ginger, garlic, and chiles.  

Add the spices, paneer, and frozen vegetables, and then without stirring, pour the pre-washed rice on top of the vegetable / paneer layer.

Pour the water over the dish, and set the Instant Pot to cook for 5 minutes.

Let the pressure release naturally, and voila, perfectly spiced and delicious paneer biryani!

The only change I may make moving forward is to add an additional quarter cup of water because the one cup called for the recipe didn't quite submerge the amount of rice I had and my husband thought the rice was undercooked.  I liked the more stiff rice (felt more like authentic biryani), but I'll probably try this slightly increased water approach to see if I can please all of the palates in our family.

This is both a great weeknight dish, as well as a fantastic dinner party dish.  Look forward to making it again!

Instant Pot Chana Masala - My First Two Sleevers Recipe!

Several month ago, a friend raved about the Instant Pot recipes that he and his wife had been trying from the Two Sleevers blog.  Hearing my friend's voice in my head during a browse on the Queens Library website, I decided to order the Indian cookbook authored by Two Sleevers blogger Urvashi Pitre.

The first recipe I made from the cookbook - Chana Masala - was fantastic, even though I made a number of modifications to fit my even lazier cooking schedule than the easy-to-follow recipe allowed.

First, I ended up cooking the chickpeas a few days before I made the chana masala because the day I pre-soaked the chickpeas, I was just too tired at night to put together the full recipe.

Second, instead of pre-making the onion masala, I concocted my own fake onion masala (just sauteing the onion, tomato, etc. in the Instant Pot immediately before adding the cooked chickpeas).  It seemed to work completely fine for the end result, so I think I will keep doing this moving forward.

Because I omitted the Instant Pot-made onion masala, I didn't really need to use the Two Sleevers recipe because the Instant Pot was only critical for cooking the chickpeas.  I do think I will continue follow this recipe though because the inclusion of pre-made chana masala powder really brought the dish together.  I had never thought of using store-bought until reading Pitre's strong guidance that the ready-made blend was close-enough to the real thing to offset making your own.   

So the pre-made spice blend and Two Sleevers approach have won the chana masala recipe war!  This will be my go-to moving forward.

Post 500! My First Real Frittata - Broccoli and Feta, a Great New Go-To Recipe

Post 500!  It has only taken 12+ years, but today is that day!  Thank you to all of my readers and supporters for encouraging me to blog over the past several years - this wouldn't have happened without you!

Today's milestone post features another milestone cooking accomplishment - my first real frittata!  Some of you may recall my disastrous attempt at a frittata last year, when I attempted to "flip" the frittata instead of putting it in the oven for the traditional finishing step.  That frittata-like outcome still tasted good, but looked like a total mess.  

Well, enter into my kitchen a new nonstick pan that can go into the oven without fear!  And the frittata recipe I tried with this new pan - Cook's Illustrated Broccoli and Feta Frittata for Two - couldn't be easier to construct on a weekend morning or weekday evening.  Start by sautéing the broccoli in a hot pan with some seasonings (red pepper flake, lemon juice, lemon zest, salt and pepper).

When the broccoli starts to brown, add in the egg mixture and crumbled feta, and lightly stir until the eggs begin to cook up.  I didn't have milk on hand for the egg mixture, so used some sour cream and water (why not?) instead.  Transfer the pan to a preheated oven and cook for an additional several minutes until the frittata is set.

Then let sit 5 minutes, cut and serve.  The frittata was great both immediately and in leftover form - great saltiness from the feta, and nice firm broccoli chunks throughout.  I will definitely continue to make this recipe moving forward.

Improved Pearl Barley Risotto - Fantastic Spring or Winter Meal

Having some leftover pearl barley from two recent Ottelenghi recipes, I wanted to use up the remainder before an upcoming move.  It seems like the most popular approach these days, per the internet, is pearl barley risotto, but unfortunately the recipes I found all were a bit more complicated than what I wanted to invest in - particularly with a move coming up.

I ultimately decided to improve a recipe, and I could not have been happier with the result.  The risotto had a bright herb flavor, and the consistency was substantive and creamy.  I also really liked the pearl barley as the main ingredient as it resulted in a vegetarian risotto that felt like a true main course, instead of the arborio rice versions which always strike me as side dishes.

Needless to say, this will be a recipe repeat.  Current recipe below - I will post any updates or modifications as I make them!

Pearl Barley Risotto

Ingredients

• 1.5 tbsp. olive oil 
• 1/2 onion, diced
• 1 stalk celery, diced
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 cup pearl barley, rinsed and drained
• 2 cups vegetable broth
• 1 cup water
• 3/4 cup frozen green peas, defrosted
• 1/3 cup parsley, minced
• 2 tsp. lemon juice
• parmesan shavings (optional), salt and pepper to taste

Directions

• In a medium pot, heat olive oil on medium-high heat.  When hot, add onion and celery and saute for 5 - 6 minutes or until soft.

• Add garlic and stir for another 30 seconds.  Stir in the pearl barley and saute fairly continuously for 3 - 4 minutes to toast.

• Add the vegetable broth, and bring mixture to a boil.  Reduce to a simmer, and cook until liquid is almost completely absorbed by the barley.  When that happens, add the remaining one cup of water and cook until partly absorbed.

• Stir in the peas, parsley, and lemon juice and cook until liquid is almost completely absorbed and barley dish appears creamy. 

• Add parmesan, salt and pepper to taste and serve while warm.

Simple Hard-Boiled Egg Arugula Salad with Balsamic Vinaigrette - A Few Firsts

This salad - which I prepared way back when - provided me a series of firsts.  It allowed me to finally try some fantastic balsamic vinegar a friend had brought us from Modena, to attempt hard-boiling eggs, and to try my first "60-Minute Gourmet" recipe. 

Until I had stumbled upon this recipe, I was completely unaware of the 60-Minute Gourmet series, Pierre Franey's weekly New York Times column which ran from 1976 to 1993.  It was interesting to find this piece of recent culinary history as I think it may prompt a new exploration in my kitchen - what recipes have withstood trends of modern America and can really live through the ages?

Part of that new exploration may be because this simple arugula salad with balsamic vinegar was pretty bland for my taste.  The ingredients, which individually were flavorful, didn't quite come together.  Basically, it tasted like arugula with red onions and a hardboiled egg.  With some balsamic vinaigrette on top (tasty vinaigrette though to be clear).  

In addition to trying a new, solid salad dressing recipe that was pretty easy to put together, I also got to learn how to make a hardboiled egg, which I found easy on my first go after extensive how-to research.  I followed the Simply Recipes approach, which was pretty easy and I will likely default to in the future.

Awadh Matar Paneer - Too Spiced for My Enjoyment

I haven't done a good job cooking out of my growing set of cookbooks.  Instead I've been too often relying on library-borrowed cookbooks or the Internet, as past posts indicate.   To break this streak, I decided to bring out my Phaidon India: The Cookbook to find a complement to the Milk Street Tomato Rice recipe. 

I settled on the Awadh Matar Paneer recipe, which would rely entirely on ingredients I had in my pantry.

While the dish was quite easy to put together - pre-cooking the paneer, and then tossing it in the spices that have been bloomed in the same saute pan - unfortunately it didn't quite have the flavors I tend to like.

The spices were just too overpowering for me, especially because they weren't cut by any tomatoes, cream or other vegetables besides the green peas, which were added to the end of the cooking process.  My husband did like this recipe though, so it might be a recipe repeat on his end!

Milk Street Chinese Chili and Scallion Noodles - Simple and Mild Weeknight Dish

Interested in simple, mildly spicy and sweet Chinese noodles on a weeknight?  The Milk Street Chinese Chili and Scallion Noodle recipe, courtesy of my library Milk Street New Home Cooking cookbook, delivers.  I'll caution that Sichuan enthusiasts (like myself) may find this dish a bit bland, but for those new to Chinese cooking, this is an easy entry point.  

I made a few slight modifications to this recipe to fit my tastes.  I halved the sauce, especially as I was using a slightly smaller portion of noodles (~8 oz. instead of 12 oz.) and I definitely found a smaller sauce-to-noodle ratio beneficial as I had a fair amount of sauce leftover after I consumed the noodles. 

The leftover sauce pooled at the bottom was also probably the result of how thin the sauce was - maybe in the future, I should mix in some cornstarch or another thickener to have it bind better to the noodles?

In any case, the sauce was easy to whip up - combine the required liquids, cook the sesame seeds and chilis until lightly browned, and then toss together with some chopped scallions.

And then toss together with some quick-cooking noodles (Chinese Egg Noodles in my case), and you have dinner!

Ottolenghi Barley Risotto with Marinated Feta - A Tangy Rich Meal

Oh Ottolenghi, how I can't quit you even though you ask for SO many ingredients in your dishes, and the construction of said dishes can often be more complicated than the effort I want put in.

 

The latest siren's call from Ottolenghi island was the Barley Risotto with Marinated Feta in the cookbook Jerusalem.  The recipe called for a number of items that I didn't have at home, but provided me with the intriguing opportunity of cooking with pearl barley for the first time.

 

The pearl barley ended up being quite easy to source (at every nearby grocery store), but the passata tomatoes proved impossible to find (with my admittedly limited effort at three stores, but one of those was a Whole Foods, so I'll go ahead and call this impossible).  

 

My laziness / confusion about what I had in my cupboards also led me to substitute in fresh lemon feel, oregano for caraway seeds (why not) in the marinated feta, and one can of tomato sauce for the passata.

 

 

The result was really good - my husband in particular loved it.  While I was paranoid that I had way too much liquid in for the amount of pearl barley the recipe called for it, but the pearl barley absorbed the full amount of liquid really well.  

 

My main hesitation about making this dish again was how tangy and slightly sour the risotto was.  That strong flavor was nicely cut by the marinated feta, making them truly a great combination, but I still found the risotto to be too tangy to consume the leftovers over the coming days.  I eventually froze the risotto, thinking I would later want to eat it, but I recently threw it away knowing that it just doesn't suit my palate.