Tomato Rice - a one pot meal!

There’s nothing as comforting as a one-pot meal on busy weekdays or on lazy weekends. Infact if I had it my entirely my way I would have only cooked one-pot meals all the time and be done with my cooking. But sometimes the husband doesn’t prefer that and wants his rice separate, curry and thoran and blah blah all separate…oh! well, thank god he isn’t very choosy and picky about his food, but there are certain things that he’d rather have the traditional way.

When I say one-pot, I mean just that, from start to finish the entire dish is cooked in just one single pan and well if your pan is fancy enough just serve it right out of that ;-)

2 years ago, the beautiful summer of 2013 we had a lovely and flourishing vegetable garden that my wonderful dad grew in our backyard  and we had a bounty full of vegetables for almost an entire year. Tomatoes grew like wild fire and we had so much that we had to infact give away so many bags of tomatoes to our neighbors and friends. We ate the juicy red fruit raw in salads, made pickles, chutneys , masala curries and even froze a whole lot and still we had plenty more.

This Tomato rice was one of the many dishes we made with our organic Tomatoes. And yes, these pics were taken 2 yrs ago when I made this dish with our garden bounty but I still make it exactly like this with any tomato whenever we are in the mood for some tomato rice.

Spicy Tomato Rice

You’ll Need

3 cups Basmati Rice

5 ½ cups water

6-7 large Red Tomatoes, chopped

1 large Red Onion, chopped finely

4 Green Chillies, slit lengthwise

1 Tablespoon Ginger-garlic paste

For tempering

Whole spices – 2 cardamom, 1 cinnamon stick, 4 cloves, 4 black pepper, 1  star anise, 1 bay leaf

2 Tablespoons Oil

2 Tablespoons whole Peanuts

1 tesapoon Cumin Seeds

3 Dry Red chillies

8-10 Curry leaves

Spices used

½  teaspoon Turmeric powder

2 teaspoons Kashmiri Chilli powder / regular Red chilli powder
1  teaspoon Garam Masala powder

A pinch of Hing (Asafoetida powder)

Salt – to taste

2 teaspoons chopped Coriander leaves for garnish 
1 teaspoon chopped Mint leaves for garnish 

Directions:

1. In a large pan, heat oil and add the whole spices, roast until fragrant. Add the peanuts and roast until they turn slightly brown. Then add Cumin seeds, Dry red chillies and curry leaves.

2. Add the Ginger garlic paste and sauté for a minute. Add chopped red onions and green chillies. Add a pinch of salt and sauté until the onions turn soft and pink.

3. Add turmeric powder, red chilli powder, garam masala and hing and mix well. Then add in the chopped tomatoes and cook until tomatoes are soft. Do not over cook.

4. Finally add the Basmati rice, mix it well with the tomato- masala mix and then add water. Cook until the rice is cooked through. Garnish with some fresh coriander and mint leaves on top and serve hot.

This dish is definitely a one-pot meal and it's spicy, tangy and just wonderful. Just serve it with some cucumber raita and pappad and you’re done. Oh! Btw, we had it with chutta pappadam (not fried ones)…I love chutta pappadam, just place the dried pappadam over a flame until it bubbles and curls up a bit. Don’t make it too charred though… :-)

-Manju

Lauki Biriyani (BottleGourd Biriyani)

Lauki or Bottlegourd is a quite an under-used veggie in my household. We eat it not because we really like it, but just for the nutrition it might give our bodies and b'coz its just one of the few other indian veggies we get in the indian stores here. And I'm not at all a fan of buying frozen veggies when you can buy fresh ones unless they are not at all available fresh. 

I very clearly remember the time I first tasted lauki, it was after my dad was diagnosed with Type 2 Diabetes. His blood sugar was just a little off the normal range but that was enough to shake up my mom who was a nurse btw. They both went and met with her hospital dietician and decided on menu plans etc and wanting to make sure his sugar level never goes beyond the normal range she put him and apparently the family included on a strict diet that included sprouted legumes, lots of bitter gourd, whole grains, very less rice, more salads and yes, lauki :-P 

Dal with Lauki was one of the dishes mummy started making where she cut down on salt and oil, even the spices so I must say it wasn't a very tasty first try with Lauki. It had a very mild almost cucumber like taste and did not really appeal to us much. Although daddy's diabetes improved a lot with the diet, our tastebuds never liked Lauki.
To be honest I don't think daddy enjoyed the dal curry much either so he named it 'Kooshmandam Curry'. I have no idea how the term kooshmanadam and lauki are related b'coz the malayalam term for lauki is Churakka, but me & my sis loved the term and used it to tease the veggie and the dish mummy made which was our least favorite! **naughty daddy n his girls** ;-)

It's very recently that I came to know that you can make so many different varieites of dishes with lauki like halwa, kofta, dry subji, paratha, pickles, even lauki juice etc etc. Lauki is very very nutritious and a filling veggie specially for people watching their diets. I have made few of these dishes and they were really good. 

Now last week I came home from work tempted to eat biriyani and had my mind stuck to it so I went ahead anyways. I had no time to defrost the chicken and there was no other veggie in my fridge other than lauki...So Lauki Biriyani was born :-P And until I made this biriyani, I never knew you could make Lauki Biriyani either, so it was a pure experiment and a tasty one at that!

I made it the same way I make my Chicken Biriyani but instead of cooking the masala and rice separately and layering them, I cooked it all together, almost like a Pulav, so mayb you can call this dish a Pulav Biriyani...hehe! 
A one pot meal in no time with no compromise on flavor. The whole dish was ready in perhaps an hour and in time to feed my hungry lil'Appu who really was hungry I must say, coz he ate up the whole plate I served him with some yogurt though he complained it was spicy, but ate it nevertheless :-)

LAUKI (Bottlegourd) BIRIYANI
Recipe Serves - 4 

You'll Need
Lauki (Bottlegourd) - 1 medium sized
Red Onion, chopped finely - 1 large
Ginger-Garlic paste - 1 Tblsp
Cinnamon sticks - 2
Green Cardamom - 3
Cloves - 3
Black Pepper - 5-6
Star Anise - 1
Bay leaves - 1
Canola Oil / Olive Oil - 2 Tblsp
Grind together:
Tomato - 1 large or 2 medium
Cilantro leaves - a handfull
Mint leaves - a handfull
Green chillies - 2 or 3
Yogurt - ½ cup
Masala powders:
Red chilli powder - 1 or 2 tsp
Turmeric powder - ½ tsp
Biriyani masala powder - 1 or 2 tsp (optional)
Corriander powder - 2 tsp
Garam masala - 1 tsp
For the rice:
Basmati Rice (soaked in water for ½ hour) - 2 cups
Water - 4 cups
Salt - to taste

Directions:
1. Start by washing and then soaking 2 cups of Basmati rice in cold water for half an hour.
2. Wash the Lauki, remove any seeds and chop into bite sized cubes with skin on.
3. Grind together - tomato, mint,cilantro leaves, green chillies and yogurt into a fine paste.
4. In a large pan heat the oil and add the whole spices (Cinnamon sticks,Green Cardamom,Cloves,Black Pepper,Star Anise) and saute until you smell the lovely aroma.
5. Then add ginger-garlic paste and red onions. Add a pinch of salt and let the onions cook until soft.
6. Then add masala powders - Red chilli, turmeric, coriander powder, garam masala and biriyani masala and mix well on medium heat.
7. Add the Lauki, give it a stir and lower the heat and slowly add the tomato-yogurt paste and cook it on low heat until well combined.
8. Increase the heat to medium-high and keep cooking until the gravy thickens or reduces (almost 10-15 mins).
9. Drain the rice and add it to the lauki masala and stir gently.
10. Add 4 cups water, season with salt, stir well and cook it on high flame until the water starts bubbling. Then cover with a lid, reduce heat to medium and cook for 12-15 mins. The rice should be well cooked by this time.
11. Turn off the heat and let the rice rest for few mins before serving.

** As the biriyani is spicy, its best served with some cool yogurt or raita!

Suggestions:
1. You can also grate the lauki, squeeze out the water and use the water in the biriyani while cooking and add the grated lauki if you prefer.
2. Try to reduce/thicken the gravy as much as possible (in step 8) else when you add water to cook the rice the liquid quantity might be too much, or else reduce water to 3½ cups.
3. If you want to be elaborate, you can garnish the biriyani with fried onions and/or cashew nuts-raisins etc.

The biriyani was superb...spicy and flavorful and the chunky bites of lauki were seasoned with all the spices and it was quite a treat! The skin of the lauki also becomes soft after its cooked. Manish had never tasted lauki biriyani either and he was quite surprised how well it came out... 

It's a quick fix meal, so do try it out and don't forget to share your experience with me :-) 

Oh! and this Sunday is Mother's Day...so wishing all the lovely mom's out there a very Happy Mother's Day!!  If it wasn't for my mom I would have never eaten lauki and in turn would have never tried making a biriyani out of it...So this dish is for you Mummy...Muah!! Will make it for you when we come to India next time...hehe!

-Manju