Kerala style chicken roast

This is my version of the kerala style chicken roast.

Ingredients:
1/2 kg chicken
3-4 medium sized onions, thinly sliced
2 tomatoes
1-2 green chillies, slit in the middle
1 tbsp ginger-garlic paste
1/2 tsp Turmeric powder
3/4 tbsp Chilli powder
2 tbsp Coriander powder
2- 3 tbsp Pepper powder
Salt to taste
Vegetable Oil

Method:
1. Marinate the cleaned and washed chicken in salt and pepper
2. Heat the oil in a pan/ wok
3. Fry the chicken (shallow fry) till it is cooked and starts to turn brown. Remove from heat and keep aside
4. Heat a few tablespoons of oil in a pan
5. Sauté the onions in the oil till it turns translucent
6. Add the green chillies and stir for a bit
7. Add the ginger-garlic paste and sauté for a little more time
8. When the onions start to brown, add the turmeric, chilli and coriander powders.
9. Keep stirring well till the raw smell of the powders go away
10. Add the chopped tomatoes now and the salt
11. Stir for a while till the tomatoes are soft
12. Add a little water to bring the mixture together and boil till the water evaporates.
13. Add the fried chicken when the mixture is thickening and stir well
14. Cook for another minute over a medium flame.
15. Remove from heat

Chicken roast is ready to serve.

I had the roast with dosa. But it can be had with rice as well.

Home-made vanilla and honey ice-cream

I was fascinated with a cookery show where they made ice-cream. Seemed easy enough so I thought I'd give it a go. I liked this... :)

Ingredients:
300 ml thick double cream
2 eggs, separated
50 gms sugar (approx)
2-3 tbsp honey
1 vanilla pod

Method:
1. Beat the egg whites till they are stiff.
2. Add in the sugar bit by bit and keep beating till all the sugar is incorporated into the mixture
3. Pour the double cream into a saucepan and put over a medium heat.
4. Slit the vanilla pod in half and scrap the seeds from inside. Add this to the cream
5. Bring the cream to boil while stirring continuously. Add the egg yolks to this mixture and mix well. Remove from heat.
6. Add the honey to the cream and mix well.
7. Pour the cream into a freezer proof dish and gently fold in the stiffened egg white mix
8. When well mixed, place the dish in the freezer.
9. After an hour or 2, remove from freezer and mix the ice-cream mixture thoroughly. Only the sides would have begun to set by this time. I think this stops the formation of ice crystals and makes the ice-cream creamer.
10. Repeat the churning process after an hour.
I churned it 3 times in total and then left it to set fully for 2 hours. The end result was creamy soft ice-cream. Mission success :) Had mine with warm apple crumble

Carrot halwa (Gajar ka Halwa)

This yummy rich Indian dessert can be made in numerous ways but I somehow like the following recipe a lot. It's a bit more manual labour than some of the other recipes but in the end, I think that its all worth the effort!!

Ingredients:
2.5 cups finely grated carrots
1.5 cups sugar
4 cups milk
7 cardamom pod, seeds only
2 tbsp ghee (clarified butter)

Method:

1. In a heavy bottomed pan (I used pressure cooker but a non-stick pan is ideal), put the grated carrots in and let the moisture evaporate over a medium flame. Ensure you keep stirring so that the carrots don't burn.
2. Once the moisture evaporates and the carrots start to clump together, add a tbsp of ghee and fry the carrots for a minute- the colour changes and this indicates that the carrots have absorbed all the ghee flavour.
3. Add 3 cups of milk, all the sugar and cardamom seeds. Stir till the sugar has dissolved. Cover and cook on a high flame for 10-15 mins.
4. Remove cover, add in the last cup of milk and stir well.
5. Reduce flame to low and simmer. This slow cooking means that the carrot gets cooked well and you don't have to hang around full time.
6. Stir the mixture every 15-20 minutes.
7. When the mixture has reduced to a thick consistency, add the tbsp of ghee and increase the heat.
8. Keep stirring continuously preferably with a long handled spoon. The thicker the mixture gets, the more it will spit till its more solid than semi-liquid. Be careful not to have any hot halwa splatter on you.
9. In around 10-15 mins of constant stirring, the halwa will thicken and will not stick to the bottom of the pan. This is when you know the halwa is done.
10. Remove from heat and spread into a flat dish. This will help you cut it into pieces easily.

Carrot halwa is ready to serve. You can serve it hot or once its cooled. I like it hot just plain on its own or with a dollop of vanilla ice-cream.

Hope you enjoy this dessert :)