Our Own Kitchen

Ingredients:
Milk - 1 cup
Sugar  - 1/2 cup
Thick coconut milk - 1 cup
Finely chopped apple -1/4 cup
Medium size banana smashed - 1
Dates - 8
Raisins - 10
Cashews- 10
Apricot - 4 slices
Ghee - 1 tbsp
Method:
In a small cup of hot milk, soak 4 dates for 1/2 hour, later grind it into thick paste.
Boil milk and add sugar, mix it well and let it cool nicely.
Cut dates and apricots into small pieces.
Roast cashews and raisins in ghee.
In a big bowl add coconut milk, boiled milk and sugar, chopped apple, smashed banana, ground dates paste, cut apricots and dates, and roasted cashews and raisins.
Fruit payasam is ready in few minutes without much cooking. 
You can serve this immediately or serve it cool.

This is the easiest recipe and my kids favourite. It requires minimum ingredients to make.
Ingredients:
Pori/Puffed rice - 5 cups
Elachi/cardamom powder - a pinch
Jaggery/ achu vellam - 1 cup
Water - 1 cup
Ghee - 1 tsp
Method:
Heat jaggery with water till it is completely dissolved. Filter jaggery water from impurities.
Take a heavy bottomed pan, heat jaggery water, elachi powder and ghee till you get one-string consistency thick syrup.
One string consistency is when you one drop of jaggery syrup in water, it forms a ball.
Now the syrup is ready, add pori immediately and mix it nicely with the syrup. The pori should be coated nicely with the jaggery.
Apply some ghee on your hand, start preparing small tight balls while the pori is warm. 
I made about 15 pori urundais. 

This is a healthy snack, you can make it in large and store in an airtight container. This last for days when refrigerated. 
Ingredients:
Oats - 1 cup
Whole wheat flour - 1/4 cup
Milk powder - 1/2 cup
Cashew - 1/2 cup
Raisin - 1/2 cup
Pitted dates - 1/2 cup
Almond - 1/2 cup
Pistachios - 1/2 cup
Walnut - 1/2 cup
Honey - 1/2 cup
Water - 1/2 cup
Method:
Roast oats slightly. Except honey and water, blend everything in the blender. Coarsely grind it.
Add honey to the ground ingredients, blend it well. Finally add water little-by-little till the mixture becomes gluey. Add water as required, no need to add the whole 1/2 cup.  
Preheat oven to 200 degree celsius, pour the mixture in the greased baking pan and bake for 20 minutes.
Let it cool and cut it into pieces. Store the energy bar in an airtight container. Munch it whenever you have a craving. This provides immediate energy, better than junk foods.

Ingredients:
Paneer - 200gm
Potato Medium size - 3
Green chillies - 3
Coriander leaves - 1/2 cup
Cumin seeds - 1 tsp
Chilli powder-  1 tsp
Coriander powder - 1/2 tsp
Turmeric powder - 1/2 tsp
Garam masala - 1/2 tsp
Onion - 1
Tomato -1
Salt as required
Oil - 2 tsp (since i air-fried, i required oil only for brushing)
Method:
Boil, peel and smash(or grate) potatoes. Scramble paneer. Take paneer, potatoes, chopped green chilli, 1/4 cup of coriander leaves, required salt in a bowl. Mix everything nicely. Make small balls.
Fry paneer balls in hot oil in low flame till it becomes light brown. You can even bake or air-fry the paneer balls to make it healthier. I air-fried the balls.
Chop onions into small pieces, grind tomato into thick paste.
Heat a tsp of oil in a pan, add cumin seeds, saute for 10 seconds, add onion and saute till it becomes transparent. Add tomato puree, saute for a minute, add chilli powder, coriander powder, garam masala, turmeric powder and salt. Add 1/2 cup water. Let it mix and cook for 5 minutes, till the gravy thickens. Finally drop the balls, coat it with gravy, don't over-mix since the balls tend to break. Garnish with coriander leaves. 
Serve hot with roti.

Ingredients:
High quality bitter-sweet chocolate - 115 gm
Butter - 115 gm
Sugar - 170 gm
Eggs - 3
Cocoa powder - 50 gm
Method:
Melt chocolate and butter using double-boiler method, its lot more safer than microwave. Let it cool a bit.
Meanwhile beat eggs and sugar together till it form foam, then add cocoa powder, blend nicely.
Add egg mixture in the chocolate-butter mixture and whisk nicely to blend all ingredients.
Preheat oven to 180°C ,grease a baking pan and pour the cake batter, bake it for 25 to 30 minutes till a thin crust is formed on top of the cake.
Remove the cake from the oven and let it cool before serving. 
You can dust sugar, cocoa powder or anything you desire.

Ingredients:
Cashew - 1 cup
Chilli powder - 1 tsp
Salt - 1/2 tsp or as required
Honey - 1 tbsp
Olive oil or vegetable oil - 1 tsp
Method:
Heat oil in a pan (preferably non-stick), add cashews and roast till it turns slight brown. Use low flame while cooking as cashews burn quickly. 
Add chilli powder and salt, give nice toss to the cashews until it is evenly coated.
Finally add honey, give nice stir and remove cashews from heat.
Serve it with hot coffee. This is a nice evening snack on a cold day. 

Ingredients:
Fleshy fish - 400gms
Boiled potato - 1
Onion - 1
Chopped coriander leaves - 1/4 cup
Green chilli - 1
Chilli powder - 3/4 tsp
Ginger-garlic paste - 1 tsp
Turmeric powder - 1/2 tsp
Bread crumbs - 1/2 cup
Salt as required
Method:
Boil fish with salt and turmeric, peel the skin and mash it nicely.
In a bowl, add mashed fish, mashed potato, chopped onion, coriander leaves, chopped chilli, ginger-garlic paste, chilli  powder and salt.
Mix everything nicely. Make small balls, flatten it to form patti. 
Coat patti nicely with bread crumbs.
Heat 1 tsp oil in a non-stick tawa, arrange the patties, flip and cook on both sides, remove the patti when it turns brown.
Serve hot with sauce or chutney.