Tag: recipe

#20 Postcard – Homemade Hummus

There was a Mediterranean restaurant two minutes from my Atlanta apartment where I ate at least once a month, and I loved their hummus and all their homemade dips.

I’ve tried a couple of store-bought hummus since then and found they all have added preservatives that my body doesn’t take well, and recently found how quick and easy it is to prepare hummus. It only takes 10 minutes to make it at home, especially if you can buy pre-cooked chick peas (get the canned chickpeas if you can so you can use them straight off the can).

The recipe turns out to be economical if you’re making large batches for a party or so, it compares to the price of the store-bought version if you’re only preparing it for two people.

Mine (in the picture) lasted 8 days, I simply stored it in the fridge and didn’t do anything else to preserve it. It was as creamy on Monday morning as it was last Sunday, and didn’t develop a crust at all.

I thought it’d be interesting to do a price breakup like they do on vegan YouTube channels, but the recipe mostly uses partial ingredients (and I’m tired after the week). One full bowl comes to around ~$2.50 and there’s easily more than 15oz of it. To compare, store-bought hummus costs $3.34 for 10 oz, minus washing the dishes and blender etc.

You need two tablespoons of Tahini sauce (recipe below) for 1 can of chickpeas, but I dunked in more than that. It turned out well 😀

Recipe

Ingredients

Chick peas – One can (15 oz) $1.22. You don’t have to remove the skin if you don’t mind it, the canned ones usually get well blended.

Garlic – three or four big cloves, more if you love garlic like me! ($0.25/4)

Tahini (2 tablespoons)

Sesame Seeds – almost one-third of a 35oz jar for Tahini sauce. Basically enough to make at least 2 tablespoons of Tahini

Olive oil – 2 tablespoons

Lime juice and salt – to taste

Tahini : Blend sesame seeds, olive oil, lime juice and salt to a paste.

Blend chickpeas and garlic to a rough paste (I added just a bit water to help), add tahini, add more olive oil if you’d like to make it richer. Blend until it’s smooth or reaches the texture you like. I like mine a little gritty to have with toasted bread 🙂

Spread on toast or enjoy it as a creamy dip with pita bread, chappathi or even kebab!

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#10 recipe – tuna sub roti at ~$1

Student economics : Tuna subway roti at 1 dollarish

(This is for when it’s sunny out and you feel like you can achieve anything in the world, or for when you’re stuck at home and have canned tuna in your shelf.)

In Fall, I used to get footlong tuna from Subway very often, it was the closest thing to Old’s Cool’s tuna sub which was (and still is) my favorite.

So I’ve been home for 14 days now and earlier this week I was trying to find new recipes to cook, ended up breaking this thing down. (Really, it was supposed to be beef and rice this week with premium meat from Austin’s farm but we have a lockdown in Atlanta and my friend is hence happily stuck at home so tuna it is. Woeful days.)
The only toppings I ever get from Subway are onion, lettuce, bell pepper, pickles, tomato but even otherwise putting it together should be easy enough. I’ve also never done such a thorough cost-breakup before so this was fun.
Never doing it again.

Ingredients (and price break-up)

Roti : 30 nos. for $8ish from Halal store (they’re small but they’re Haldiram’s so stop complaining)
[$0.267 each]

Tuna : 5oz can at $3.68. I had earlier used half of the canned tuna to make a coconut + tamarind curry (if you saw the shredded fish in the gravy you’d deem it a desecration but there’s nothing like craving meencurry during a quarantine. Also never doing that again.)
This is approximate but you’d need 1/8 of the can for a generous topping on a roti.
[$0.46]

Bell Pepper : $0.99 each. Used one half for 4 portions, chopped into cubes. I also I cannot believe they were Rs. 4 each in Karol Bagh. They were like Rs. 10 back home, but that seems okay now. Also, too much green in your topping is a sham.
[$0.12]

Onion : $2 for a 2lb bag with 6-7 onions. I diced around one half.
[$0.17ish]

Ketchup, mayonnaise.

Kitchen Equipment : Microwave, included with the apartment so add your monthly rent here. Jk. I will not let you sabotage my student economics.
Including taxes, it adds upto $1.1ish or less.

How-to

Scour the surface of the roti with a fork/knife so it doesn’t puff up in the microwave*. Heat roti in microwave for 1min 30sec so it’s crispy and can hold the tuna salad topping.

Mix tuna, bell peppers and onion in mayonnaise, spread ketchup on roti and top with as much tuna mix as you want. I can’t eat more than two at a time, that’s too much tuna for me which is also why I don’t get the footlong anymore.

The first bite was so similar to a Subway that I was disappointed – do they really use canned tuna from Walmart? I guess getting Subway sandwiches only makes sense if you get better toppings on yours, I’m just the sad boring customer.
It was in fact better than my subway because I could finish it faster so the bread would never get soggy from all that salad.
Missed pickles, did not miss tomato. Maybe if I broke down more dishes they’d come out nice too.

* Giving credit where due : Roti pizza from Bon Appetit.

#9 spring break/quarantine – recipe or something like that

Spaghetti with mushrooms and other things. Also, quarantine and cooking.

This past week at home I’ve cooked more meals than I have this entire semester. Right before spring break and the coronavirus going crazy in the US, I did depend rather a bit much on frozen meals for long (how do you not get tired of your own cooking?). Mashed potatoes and steak in sauce and corn, most of the corn I’d throw out, and some of the steak too. But they’re a better recourse for when I get back from class on Tuesday night than a pack of ramen.

That is not to say that I haven’t been cooking this sem. I almost always have shredded spinach in the bottom drawer of my fridge, and at least one cooked dish. It sits there for a week, while I survive on bread and wheat tortillas and chappathi and ramen and frozen meals and Subway until I finally throw it out. Then I cook another dish to replace it and continue with my bad eating habits.

Coronavirus had me frantically chomping down red rice because somehow it makes me feel healthy and ready to fight illness. In fact if I do get sick, my line of defence is just going to be kanji, but more like red rice in boiling water. I hope it doesn’t get to that.

Recipe

https://photos.app.goo.gl/QFQKYX9vN7MSvtFr7 (I tried to upload the video but WP has issues with me posting stuff. It’s 3 seconds and you’d spend more than that getting there but anyway.)

Cooked this earlier this week. No, it didn’t taste as good as it looks. Next time, I’m frying the beef in a different pan, getting rid of the fat and only adding the meat to the dish. Too fatty for my liking. Also, next time I’ll try to make this a soup, sans fat.

Ingredients : Carrots, mushrooms, spinach, ground beef, spring onion.
I seasoned the beef separately with salt & pepper, spring onion to get rid of the distinct smell of red meat. Not enough. If anyone does something to effectively mask the smell, please do let me know. Coming from somebody who once contracted gastritis simply from the aroma of beef cooking in our kitchen. I just can’t.

Also, Pasta.

Seasoning : crushed black pepper, red chilli flakes, salt
Garnish (and brightens it up flavor-wise) : more spring onion but cut diagonally for aesthetics

Cook all the ingredients in a wide pan, boil pasta separately. Add cooked pasta to the pan when done.
I restrained myself from using soy sauce, I don’t know if it might’ve made the dish better, I always add too much or too less such that it never does any good. Also cooked spinach for far too long, they were heavily shrivelled, bitter and the last of the vitamins left my kitchen by the time I plated.
Do not repeat my mistake, add them at the very end. I mean ender than the end.

Maybe I shouldn’t do recipes, I’m not very good at these.


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