Mango Mastani

The name suggests what this beautiful recipe is about. Before I start, I have to say that this has been one of my most awaited recipes ever. Living in USA, along with so many things that we have to get accustomed to, one is being away from Mangoes. Trust me, its one of the most difficult things to be, almost like celebrating Eid without family, ….if not same then close. So, this drink is from Mangoes and I waited almost 2 years to make it. Yupp!!! sounds funny but its true.

So, the internet was all hyped with this Mango mania with Mango Mastani making to the top of the chart. I still remember drooling over the pictures and wanting to make it so bad. Now the twist in this is, that I am not a big fan of Mango. Yeah!!! weirdo right??? But I am not, prone to breakouts I kind of stayed away from the King of fruits since teenage, and as much as I love taking a bite or two, I never let my heart fall in love 😉 . But the point is that I have desperate urges to cook things even if I am not the one who will eat it and this happened to be one of those dishes and it took me 2 years to get my hands on good quality mangoes. I am so happy that I finally made this amazing Mango delight which honestly cannot be expressed in words.

The amazing flavor of Mango shake which has been made using Vanilla ice cream and milk, giving it thick and smooth texture, topping it with sweet and soft Mango pieces, adding crunch of sliced nuts and cover it with a few dollops of vanilla ice cream. You are allowed to go all out when it comes to decoration. Unfortunately, I tried making this at quarantine time and didn’t really have proper supplies to decorate it the way I’d love to but I think I managed pretty well considering my hubby felt it looked wonderful and he was pretty impressed. So, a few fruits, fresh or frozen to cut out the monotonous look of mangoes and mango shake with vanilla ice cream, so a few raspberries, strawberries, or whatever looks great with the combination, for that matter even mint leaves would go great. I even chopped up some pistachios, which actually went great with the look and flavor. I got my hands on some colorful cake sprinkles, so they made it to this mango mania too. So, basically go all out, anything and everything that you feel can look good and will blend in with the flavors of mango can join this party.

This recipe should not take more than 10 minutes and is an easy one to impress guests who drop in without a prior notice. Just don’t serve it to someone who counts calories…this is for the brave heart. Enjoy!!!

Plain Shrikhand

When I was in school, I had a friend from the southern part of India. Her father was in a transferable job and he happened to be in Jodhpur for a few years. We were good friends and we used to have playdates. The family had a maid, who was an old woman and she traveled with them wherever they went. She was from their hometown and she was a super amazing cook. The people in the family, including my friend, lovingly called her “Amma”. My first experience of trying Shrikhand was at my friend’s house and I remember not liking the first look. Then I was told that its yogurt with sugar and I was convinced since I loved my Dahi-chini.

First, bite into that yummy dish and I loved it so much. I was ten years old then and I still came home and told my mom everything I gathered, but unfortunately, the information wasn’t enough for her to recreate that sweet magic.

And, then came in a company selling their flavored shrikhand in the market, and of course, we were the first few buyers in our closest store in the neighborhood. A store-bought product is something that was made weeks or even months ago, contains preservatives, has been refrigerated, thawed, and refrigerated, may taste great, but you know your portion has to be very controlled and you can’t eat it as carefree as it would be with something homemade. The difference between the first Shrikhand I tried at my friend’s house and the store-bought one was the texture of the Yogurt. While the Shrikhand at my friend’s house was a little runny, the store-bought one was thick and creamy.

I, then started experimenting and tried making my own Shrikhand at home, following all the advice of hanging the yogurt for at least 30 minutes, using castor sugar, and grinding cardamoms to a perfect powder. But, nothing would match the taste. There was something that was lacking and I just couldn’t figure that out. With time, my zest to perfect my Shrikhand took a back seat too.

A few years later, after I am settled as a homemaker, I try my hands on it again. This time my experiment had two new ingredients, Vanilla essence, and Rosewater. Now for those of you who love making Shrikhand at home, the rule is to always hang your Yogurt in a muslin cloth so it takes away all the excess water. If you do not have a lot of time in hand, since hanging the yogurt requires anywhere between 45-60 minutes, you can also use Greek Yogurt. Greek Yogurt is thick and 15 minutes in muslin cloth is enough to drain out the excess moisture. Now, you might already be adding rose water, but the addition of Vanilla essence just makes it a whole lot better. Vanilla essence not only enhances the sweetness but also the flavor adds a lot of freshness to this sweet dish.

So, don’t wait to try this awesomely delicious and super easy, no-cook, no-bake sweet dish and impress everyone around you.

Gulab Jamun

Every time someone mentions these awesome, sweet, sugary balls, people either tend to get them from a sweet store or if they are home made, most times they are made from the popular mix pack that has you add a few easy ingredients from home, like sugar and milk and fry them and you all set to serve them. But, little do you know that you don’t really need that little pack or run to the store. Making Gulab Jamuns at home, with ingredients you will find at home, is pretty easy and not at all time consuming. The only thing you need is a perfect recipe.

Now, if you ever thought Gulab Jamuns is a gift of India to the world, you are wrong. Gulab Jamuns are actually a gift from the Mughals. All these sweet dishes that used Orange Blossom water or Rose water or screw pine water with saffron are all delicacies that came in from the Middle East and were introduced to Indian cuisine during the Mughal Era.

As the history says, the Gulab Jamuns were first prepared in the era of medieval times in India, derived from a sweet fritter recipe that a Central Asian Turkish invader brought to India. One theory also claims that it was accidentally prepared by the Mughal emperor Shah Jahan’s personal chef. All in all, it is a sweet dish inspired by the Middle east.

The word “Gulab” is derived from the Persian words gul, which means flower and āb, means water, referring to the rose water-scented syrup. Jamun is also defined as a fried delicacy in dipped in sugar syrup. A middle eastern dessert Luqmat al-qadi is very similar to gulab jamun, though it uses a different batter.

These outstanding Gulab Jamuns have a remarkable depth of taste and texture achieved very carefully combining few ingredients to form balls. Fry them slowly in ghee or oil, further soak them in syrup. With such detailed recipe, its hard to go wrong.

Mango Cream

Like most Marwaris, I also grew up eating Fruit cream as a fast and go to dessert. As much as its an easy and impressive dessert to impress your guests and loved ones, its not everyone who can make it the authentic way. Now, every time I use the word authentic for “Fruit cream”, people usually give me a very confused look. But what they fail to understand is its not just mixing in fruits, sugar and cream.

A fruit cream is best when the cream is whipped with sugar making those stiff peaks and making it fluffy at the same time. Your fruits should always be fresh and the additional sugar should be based on the fruits you are using and how sweet they are. Small little things and make big changes to your dish.

But here, we aren’t making fruit cream, I am making Mango cream and that too with a little twist. My first time trying to make Mango cream was whipping the cream and mixing in a few mango pieces. I wouldn’t say it wasn’t nice but it was definitely not satisfying as a chef.  Instead of making the whole serving with just mango flavor, I divided into half vanilla and half Mango.

The recipe below might remind you of Mango Panacotta, though similar but its very different. Panacotta requires a little more effort and cooking time where as this is you to go recipe and can easily be made in a rush with almost no prep time.

Gajar ka Halwa with Vanilla Ice cream

Gajar ka Halwa is our winter favorite. The lovely sweetness of carrots mixed with sugar and milk and a hint of cardamom with desi ghee leaves you taste buds asking for more.

We always loved the idea of warm Brownies and vanilla ice cream. In fact, my kids are big fans of warm brownies/ cake with Ice cream. Its a desert that they would give away their lunch for. Anyways,  Mr. Parveez happens to be almost  the same when it comes to warm Brownies with Ice cream. With time he wanted try warm halwa with cold ice cream. I wouldn’t have tried making this had it come from someone else, but since it was my biggest food fan, I had to try it.

Warm Halwa and cold ice cream is a super awesome combination. Its something you will only understand after you try it. In this recipe I am sharing the recipe for Gajar ka Halwa and how I combined it with Vanilla ice cream. You can always check the Vanilla Ice cream recipe in the Dessert/ Sweet section.

Malai Kulfi

This is one of the first Kulfis that I made. Super amazing, super delicious and super easy. Everyone who have tried Malai Kulfi, have always requested for seconds and it melts everyone’s heart.

I believe the start of Kulfi must have been with malai kulfi. A standard Malai Kulfi does not have any nuts but I added some to mine to make it thicker and also to add a little crunch to it. Adding nuts and types of nuts is optional and doesn’t make a difference to the taste of the Malai Kulfi .

Anjeer Kulfi

Figs / Anjeer are a big part of dry fruit family. Sweetness of their own they are a splendid source of fiber while they taste great. After making lovely Kulfis with Almonds, Pistachios and saffron, I felt that figs would be a great choice for the next flavor.

Figs are sweet, healthy and rich in vitamins and minerals. Doctors suggest that consuming figs with milk is an excellent source of nutrition. I am not a big fan of figs by themselves, but trying them for Kulfi was one of the best decisions I ever made. It really enhances the flavor and as much as I was apprehensive at first, I was proud with the finished product.

One thing that you need to pay attention to is adding sugar. Figs are sweet and the longer they cook in milk, they keep oozing their sugar out, bit by bit and I always advise to add sugar towards the end, since you will get a perfect sweetness.

Another fact is about making a puree of the figs. Making a puree of half of the figs and chopping the other half to small pieces is better than making all puree. First reason being that all puree makes the milk extra sweet and second is that little chunks of Figs in your mouth while eating the delicious kulfi.

Choco Banana Split

Banana split is always a special treat for Ice cream lovers. When we talk of Ice cream and children, chocolate flavor is the first thing that comes  to our mind.

Mr. Parveez and I loved taking walks to a wonderful Ice cream shop near our first home and that’s when we got the hang of Banana split. Though our life before children, we would get a scoop of chocolate, vanilla and strawberry. After our boys joined our Ice cream lovers club, the scoops changed to chocolate only. Usually, the chocolate Ice cream would be finished by my boys, and Mr. Parveez and I would enjoy the Banana…I guess joys of Parenthood…LOLzzz. Now, this was only when we went out for ice creams. At that time, I couldn’t even imagine that I would be making so many varieties of Ice creams myself, some day.

And, then one day I started with my Ice cream experiments. Initially my Ice cream recipes contained egg. Though the Ice creams came out fantastic, but somewhere I felt they weren’t just as good as I desired them to be. Also, the fact that I knew they contained eggs made me feel that I was eating raw egg…LOLzzz. Not just that, I could never decide if I could actually smell the egg or was it just in my mind. So, with all that confusion, I decided my Ice creams had to be egg free. I started experimenting more, and after numerous failures came up with a recipe as good as store bought. I did come down to the conclusion that for that perfect creaminess Gelatin or Agar Agar has to be used in the recipe. I used Halal Gelatin, but if you are using the vegetarian substitute, Agar Agar can be used in same amount as Gelatin.

After that, one day I felt the mom in me felt that my kids weren’t consuming enough fruits and I started coming up with various ideas of making them eat more fruit. This is when I decided that I should serve then Banana split when I give them Ice cream on weekends. And thus, this Ice cream recipe. Enjoy!!!

Badaam Kulfi

Kulfi is an Indian Ice cream and is favorite to ice cream lovers. My family has always loved eating or ordering kulfis from our favorite kulfi shop. There used to be one particular Kulfi shop that sold the best “marwari kulfi”. That shop is still by the clock tower in Jodhpur and it still sells the most authentic marwari kulfi.

Though in last few years, a lot of new ice cream shops and kulfi places have opened and become popular too. But, for people like me, we still go back to that old shop to get the traditional and delicious kulfi.

Being far away from home, we yearn to have those flavors and no matter which restaurant we go to, the kulfi doesn’t taste the same as what we get back home. I always craved for the creamy texture and nutty flavor which I never found anywhere around.

And then one fine day, I decided to start making my own. Trust me, its one of the best decision I ever took. After this, it was no looking back. I experimented with loads of different flavors and made a huge variety.

I feel there is nothing better than having your kulfi homemade. See, there is nothing that can beat the freshness, the quality of the products that you use plus the shelf time. When you buy them from the market, you have no idea how many times, they have been defrosted and refreeze again and don’t forget all the preservatives added to them.

As much as its hyped with all the recipes given of how to get a perfect kulfi, trust me there is no big deal to it. Its simple and comes out delicious. Just follow the simple steps. It doesn’t require too many ingredients and it would turn out more delicious than your favorite store brand.

If you have questions, feel free to ask.

Arabian Biryani

Mr. Parveez’s is from a family of Pathans and the family is believed to be the descendant of the Mughals. As much as the relationship is defined by few asharfis and some ancient utensils that are still owned by the family, and endless tales through “Baats” [people who keep records of families and generations in India]. The Indian version of ancestry. Mr. Parveez is very proud of the fact that he has Mughal blood line, and some how is connected to the fierce Mongolians.

I have lived in Jordan for around two years and I loved the delicious Jordanian food. During those days, I tried a dish called Maqluba, which is made with Rice, chicken, Potatoes, cauliflower and a few other vegetables. The spice level was low and decorated with nuts and raisins. Though I still don’t have the authentic recipe till date for Maqluba, and I do wish to make it some day. But till then, I thought of trying something close.

So, I got down to trying the Biryani that’s more connected to Mr. Parveez’s roots and that when I came up with the recipe of this Biryani. The inspiration came from different dishes cooked with Rice and Chicken in the middle east, specially Morocco and flavors used in early Mughal era. Hope you enjoy te recipe as much as I did.