Turnip 'subzi' and the recipe for Blogger Aid Cookbook

I have been lagging badly in posting my recipes in the last few weeks. But, I know you all know such situations. Now, I have a long list of things to post about and so little time. Let's see when I manage it all. In a couple of weeks sunnyboy's birthday is coming and I'll again get busy planning about how and what to oraganise for the party which I want to do at home, at least this year, he's going to be four now. How time flies.
So, coming to the vegetable of the day: Turnips! Yes, I dared to buy them. *grin* Turnips are called weiße Rüben or also Speiserüben here. In all these years of living in Germany I never ever thought of buying them. I never liked turnips in India. When my mom did cook them (she didn't do it so often 'cause none of us, my dad included, liked it! LOL!) I did eat it, but it was always a "horrible" experience. :D But, they had a much stronger flavour in India.
Turnip is a very seasonal thing here and actually you don't come aross them in the supermarkets here, but either in small grocery shops or the farmers market. I had seen them a number of times before but knew for sure that I didn't want to try it. I had felt the urge to try making an Indian pickle with them when I saw them this year, though, but the lack of sun has never given me enough confidence to try it until now. But, it is on my list of things to do. Maybe next summers. I just have to remember it in time.

Turnip greens Nutritional value per 100 g (3.5 oz)
Energy 20 kcal 80 kJ
Carbohydrates 4.4 g - Dietary fibre 3.5 g Fat 0.2 g Protein 1.1 g Vitamin A equiv. 381 μg 42% Folate (Vit. B9) 118 μg 30% Vitamin C 27 mg 45% Vitamin K 368 μg 350% Calcium 137 mg 14%
cooked, boiled, drained, without salt Percentages are relative to US recommendations for adults. Source: USDA Nutrient database

But, after having tried this very new turnip variety recently I had never seen before, I got to realise that I must try turnips atleast once too and see how they really taste. And my hunch was right: they did taste quite different than the ones I had eaten before. Infact, these tasted wonderful! I almost feel stupid for not having tried them before.
Here is some information from Wikipedia (source) on the nutritional value of turnips:


Turnip subzi

Recipe by PG of My Kitchen Stories

Ingredients:
1 bunch turnip greens, thick stems removed, washed throughly and chopped finely
1 large turnip (DE: weiße Rüben), peeled and cubed
1 inch piece ginger, peeled and grated (I used 1/4 tsp dry ginger powder, as I didn't have any)
1 heaped tsp carom seeds (ajwain)
1/2 tsp turmeric
1-1/2 tbsp coriander seeds, ground
1/8 tsp red chilli powder (or to taste)
2 tbsp rapeseed oil for frying
salt to taste

Method:

• heat oil in a pan and splutter ajwain
  
• add ginger, turmeric, ground coriander seeds and red chili powder, and stir shortly
  
• add turnip cubes, mix everything
  
• keep cooking covered on medium heat
• once the turnips are almost done, add the turnip greens
  
• cook covered for a few minutes till the greens turn slightly darker and shrivel (the volume will reduce a lot)
  
• serve with hot rotis or rice along with some daal.

For me this was a wonderful replacement for "Muli ki bhujiya" (stirfried radish greens) which I love, they tasted almost the same. I always cried that I don't get radish greens. These are again a seasonal thing and you have to go to the farmer's market for that. But, now I know that I can fullfill my wish to have this comfort food by simply buying the "weiße Rüben" now which are much easier to find than radish greens. Happy, Happy, Happy! That's what I am.

And now one more thing. I have been thinking for long now what to send to the Blogger Aid Cookbook.

After I made this dish (see below) and reliased that it is my very own version of a potato salad which I have learnt to make (and perfected :) ) after experimenting in the last few years, I felt this to be a good choice and here it is, another of our family favorite and one recipe for which I always get appreciation from family and friends on get-togethers. Especially in our barbecue parties this salad is never missing, though with small changes where I leave out the vegetables in it and add some cheese variety instead.

Brussels sprouts with kidney beans

Brussels sprouts is in season and is growing in plenty here. I have been making Brussels sprouts practically the same way since I tried it the first time, using a recipe from a German book, by cooking it with carrots, onion and garlic slices and a can of tomatoes and at the very end adding some parsley and after switching off the heat topping it with about 50 g of Gouda until it melted. I make some modifications sometimes by leaving out Gouda and making it a bit Indian by adding cumin, turmeric and ground coriander seeds to it in the very beginning. A few days ago I felt that I need to make a proper Indian curry with it and was surprised at the thought that in all these years I never tried it.
The next day I bought Brussels sprouts and also found a nice looking fresh coconut and again couldn't resist buying it, even though I have had bad experiences with it the last two times I bought it and had to practically throw them away. This time luckily after I opened it, it was all OK and looked very good. The water was so tasty that I even gave it to sunny boy to drink and he happily drank it all away.
So, I knew I would like to use coconut in the gravy and started thinking of how it would look like and got going that afternoon and was very pleasantly surprised by the wonderful results.

Brussels sprouts with kidney beans

Recipe by PG of My Kitchen Stories

Ingredients:
350 g Brussels sprouts, outermost leaves peeled and the stems (the base) cut off, and halved if desired
3 medium potatoes, peeled, and cubed about the same size as the Brussels sprouts
1 can kidney beans (250 g), rinsed in water and drained - use more if desired
2 carrots, peeled and sliced into thin rings (optional, I left it out this time)
1 small can (300 g) tomatoes, chopped coarsely
2 tbsp rapeseed oil or olive oil
salt to taste

Spices:
1 tsp cumin
1 tsp black mustard seeds
1 large pinch asafoetida, crushed
2 red chillies (optional) - I kept them separate as sunny boy doesn't eat hot food much yet
10 peppercorns
1/2 tsp turmeric
1/2 tsp sambhar powder - home made (use 1 tsp if not using garam masala)
1/2 tsp garam masala (use 1 tsp if not using sambhar powder)
a few curry leaves (I used dried leaves)

Onion-coconut paste (grind with a blender):
1 yellow onion, chopped coarsely
1-2 large garlic, chopped coarsely
1 " ginger, peeled and chopped coarsely
3 square inch piece of fresh coconut, grated

Method:

• clean and cut the vegetables, prepare the onion paste
• heat oil in a large saute pan, reduce heat if required and add the mustard seeds when the oil is just about hot so that they splutter
• to check if the oil is hot enough, add one or two seeds first and see if they splutter, if yes, then proceed, but keep the vegetables handy so that the spices don't get burnt
• after adding the mustard, while it is spluttering, add the cumin and let both splutter for a few seconds and add the asafoetida, peppercorns and turmeric, mix once
  
• immediately add the onion paste, fry on medium heat till it gets a nice light brown colour
  
• add potatoes and stir everything to mix and cook for about 5 minutes covered, stirring in between
  
• add Brussels sprouts and carrots and stir
  
• add the sambhar powder, garam masala and the curry leaves, stir
• add 1 cup water and cook further till the vegetables are almost done, stirring in between
• add the kidney beans and cook for another 5 minutes
• serve warm with steamed rice

We ate the beans and Brussels sprouts with steamed rice. Honestly, none of us in my family is a big fan of Brussels sprouts, but we try to cook it at home as it is a seasonal vegetable and I believe that seasonal vegetables should always be coming on our plates, even if not too often. So, I always try to make them in some or the other way. But, this is the first time that I heard from hubby that he liked it and I also felt that it had turned out so good. All the ingredients blend so well with each other.
Apart from the coconut, what made this dish so special was the use of the kidney beans. They made the dish perfect and wholesome. I was very happy to have had this idea of adding the kidney beans. To me it was important that I add some legume, as without the legumes, if you want to keep the dish vegetarian, the meal is not so wholesome because of it being quite low and imbalanced in amino acids - the protein building blocks, especially when you also have a child at home.
Back home in India, I grew up with eating a legume dish every day as a vegetarian. My mom made it a point that we eat every day at least one katori (a small bowl) of Dal, which is any of the legumes, skinned or with skin, but split into the two halves -the cotyledons of the seed - a bean here). In India vegetarianism is a way of life, since ages. But, in a vegetarian diet it is very very important that one uses different sources of proteins to cover the complete variety of the 24 amino acids which our body requires to grow (for children) and maintain our body healthy. That is why I always try to cook legumes at least 2 times weekly, even though I do cook fish and chicken every now and then.
Now, I actually had planned to submit another dish, a daal, for the MLLA event, but after I made this dish I knew it had to be this one. So, here is my entry to this month's My legume Love Affair created by Susan of The Well Seasoned Cook and being hosted this time by Suganya of The Tasty Palette (I know her mainly through a number of her wonderful shots in the CLICK events of Jugalbandi).

Uttapam, my very first ever!

Uttapams are one of a wide variety of savoury pancakes made from a fermented thick batter of rice and skinned black gram originating from the southernmost part of India, the state of Tamilnadu.

It is my very first ever trial at making uttapams and I think I wasn't bad at all. It is a very good option for a healthy meal 'cause of a higher protein content through the use of skinned black gram.

Now, what I like so much more about uttapam, just like idlis and dosas for example, is the fermentaion process which to my belief makes them so healthy and tastier too. The process of fermentation not only increases the flavours in the food manyfold, but also helps remove so many different phytotoxins through microbial action. And we all know the positive effects of these 'good' bacteria on our digestive tract. And, now after reading this at Wikipedia, I realised the importance of fermentation to preserve the foods in the earlier times when there weren't any refrigerators. And I believe, despite that the health aspects of these foods remain the same even today, if not even more with our lifestyles.
I always use every chance to try out different fermented products. One of the newest being Tempeh, which an Indonesian colleague and friend of mine used to bring to the Institute, while I was working there. It was delicious! Tempeh is also on my list of things to try once again on my own, as a few years ago my efforts to cook tempeh was a disaster! I believe that the tempeh wasn't fresh anymore.
Coming back to uttapam...
Now I admit that this picture does not show the best Uttapam I made and that I took the picture a day later, so it also looks a bit dry, but I still relished it to the full the next day as my usual "leftovers - lunch", as I call it, as I am usually alone at home to eat it.
The inspiration for this recipe came completely from my sister, who posted a simple and easy basic recipe of Uttapams on Healthy and Tasty! which gave me enough confidence to try out this recipe. And I was surprised how easy it really was, even though it requires a bit of planning when making them.
I was a bit afraid when I started pouring the first laddle of batter on my French cast iron pan I especially bought to use for such Indian pancakes and breads. By the second round I was already more confident. I had to add a litttle more water to the batter, as it seemed a bit too thick. But, I was very careful so as not to add too much to make the batter too thin. But all went right and we ate a lovely meal of Uttapams on that day with sambhar, a variety of podi and freshly made coconut-peanut chutney, which turned a bit brown this time as I could not remove the peels from the peanuts completely, even though I had roasted them for long. But, it did not disturb the good taste of the chutney, to my relief! As I love coconut chutney. And also the gun powder, which really wasn't as much a gun powder as I cannot add much chillies to it because of my son, but it tasted so good that both of us just kept licking it with our fingers, me and my son!

And not only that, I even made my very own Sambhar powder, YESSSS!!
I don't know if I sound like a braggart, but I was so happy that I finally actually did something which I had been thinking of since long now - to make my own sambhar powder, as every time I used this packed one from the market, hubby would complain as he did not like the taste of the sambhar and it was always too hot for my son to enjoy it and I could take the amount of chilli I wanted so as not to make it too hot. So, it was all worth the effort. Now I have enough for a couple of next rounds too. The recipe , after searching for a number of them, I found this wonderful recipe from this great mother-daughter blog many of you might know - Aayis Recipes. The only difference to the recipe is that I reduced the amount of chillies a lot, for my son.
Now, to those who don't know what is on the plate, clockwise from bottom: uttapam (fermented pancake), coconut-peanut chutney, gun powder - a not so hot version - therefore so yellowish brown in colour (I've added a bit too much of sunflower oil, bad estimation- but still very enjoyable!), and sambhar in th bowl. All of it made at home!
The recipes for the gun powder and chutney are from my older post, here.

So, here are the recipes:


Uttapam:

Soaking time: 4-5 hours
Preparation time: 30 minutes
Fermentation: overnight (8 -12 hours)
Baking time: 2 - 5 minutes per uttapam

Ingredients:

2/3 rd cup skinned black gram (Urd)
1/3 rd cup brown rice

3 cm piece of ginger, peeled and chopped
1/8th tsp Asafoetida, ground coarsely
1 tsp salt

1 cup vegetables of choice, required at the time of baking the uttapams:
1/2 cup finely chopped zucchini
1/2 cup finely chopped red bell peppers or paprika, as per choice
some grated fresh cocnut (didn't have it this time)

Method:

• Wash and soak the urd-rice mixture in a deep bowl for 4-5 hours or overnight.
• Wash with water in betweeen or the next day and drain before grinding
• Add the remaning ingredients to the bowl and grind everything in a blender to a paste, adding a few tablespoons of water, if required
• Let it ferment, covered, overnight
• On the next day, add some water to make a thick batter which is good to spread on a tava or griddle, being slightly thicker than the batter of a pancake
  
• Add the chopped vegetables and stir
• heat a griddle and pour a laddle of the batter on the hot griddle and spread in slow circular movements, moving outwards to form a circular pancake
• cook on this side until the upper side is no more fluid and the lower side is not burnt or too brown
  
• For this, keep the griddle temperature at around medium or a little more, and turn the uttapam with the help of a spatula and cook until done and shows brown spots on other side as well
• Serve warm with coconut chutney, some podis, sambhar (see below) or any other Indian curry
  

Sambhar:

Ingredients:

1 cup Arhar (Toor) daal, washed and soaked for 2 hours or longer in water
1 carrot, diced
1/2 cup peas
1/2 cup aubergine, diced
1 tsp Sambhar powder
1 -2 tsp tamarind paste (I left it out, as I didn't have any)
Tadka:

2 tbsp oil or ghee
1 tsp mustard seeds
1 large pinch asafoetida
1 large onion, finely chopped
1 inch piece ginger, grated or finely julliened
1 large clove garlic, crushed or grated
1/2 cup large thinly sliced coconut flakes
1 pinch red chilli powder
a few curry leaves
1/2 tsp Sambhar Powder
1-2 large tomatos, finely chopped

1 tbsp lemonjuice (to replace tamarind paste)

Method:

• soak daal for two hours or longer and change water in between
  
• cook daal with the cut vegetables in 1 1/2 cups water in a pressure cooker or a deep pan with lid until done
• prepare tadke by heating oil / ghee in a frypan, add mustard seeds and let splutter
• adding the remaning ingredients in the given order, stirring each time on high heat without letting them burn, reduce heat if required.
• after the tomatoes are done, add to the daal and stir, add the lemon juice and serve warm with sides like rice, dosa, idli or uttapam. Rotis also make a wonderful combination.

Typically tamarind is also used in a good sambhar recipe, but since I did not have any, I had to do with tomatoes and lemon juice. But, the whole combination with coconut-peanut chutney, gun powder and sambhar along with the yummy uttapams made a wholesome meal which we all enjoyed a lot. Rishab, like so often did not want to eat daal (sambhar), but munched on the
uttapams along with the gun powder. But, I made him eat some sambhar telling him that I didn't make it so hot just so that he could eat it. That made him agree to eat a few teaspoons of it atleast. Now this was a successful experiment for me. And everyone who hasn't tired making uttapams must try once!

Yummy Soya nuggets Curry!

I loved soya nuggets as a child. These munchy chewy chunks of soya and the flavour of the spicy curry coming out of it evey time you bit onto the chunks. It was thorough pleasure. It was one of my favorites. I had made them here before, but the only soya nuggets I always found were these no-name packets from the chinese shops, which never turned out good somehow. They would very often remain hard in the middle despite my frying them before. And hubby disliked them totally. But, then I recently discovered organic soya nuggets here which were much better. Though smaller and irregular shaped, but much softer in texture after cooking. I still didn't make them so often, as hubby did not appreciate them so much despite that.
Recently I was going through a new blog I came upon : Tongueticklers with lovely photos and lovely recipes. And I found a recipe with soya nuggets there, which looked so good that I had to try it once. As I personally feel soya nuggets are a good way of compensating for the needed proteins. And I rahter have a vegetarian option than always having to cook chicken for that.

So, here is how I made it:

Serves 3-4 people

Ingredients:

1 cup green beans
2 large potatoes, peeled and cubed

Ground to a paste:
1 large garlic, chopped coarsely
1 inch piece of ginger, chopped coarsely
1 red onion, chopped coarsely

2 large tomatoes, pureed

2 generous handfuls soya nuggets (about a cup and a half)
3 tbsp oil
1 tsp cumin seeds
1 pinch crushed asafoetida
1/2 tsp each ground corinader and cumin seeds
3/4th tsp turmeric
1 pinch red chilli powder

2 tbsp chopped coriander leaves (optional)

Method:

• Clean and cut the begetables
• Prepare the onion-garlic-ginger paste and the tomato puree
  
• Heat 1 tbsp oil in a large sauce pan (I used a pressure cooker) and roast the soyanuggets on medium heat till the take a light brown colour, stirring with a wooden paddle in between
• Take out the soya nuggets and set aside
• Heat 2 more tbsp oil into the pan and add the spices : cumin seeds, and asafoetida, stir once and add the rest of the ground spices. stir
  
• Add quickly the onion-garlic ginger paste, stir on medium heat till the moisture reduces and it starts to turn brown
• Add the chopped beans and potatoes, stir for short on medium heat
• add the soya nuggets and the tomato puree, stir
• add water and salt, stir
• If using the pressure cooker (European), then close the lid and wait till the whistle comes and reduce heat to little less than medium (on a ceramic cooktop) and switch off the gas after 5 minutes
• If using a regular pan, then cook till the potatoes are tender and the green beans are soft and no more green (otherwise they are toxic), stirring in between
• Serve garnished with chopped coriander leaves along with bread or warm rice

Now, you might ask, what did hubby say. No, he didn't complain and infact said that it tasted very good. And that is a very very very good compliment! :D And my son enjoyed it too, which isn't always the case now a days. He is getting finikier by the day. And since I had pureed the onions, he enjoyed it even more.
So, sunshinemon, thanks a lot for this wonderful recipe!

Note: Typically this is eaten with Indian flatbreads, like roti, paranthas or puri, or warm basmati rice, but tastes excellent with Oriental or Turkish flat breads and as good with just any of the different varieties of different European breads, toasted or plain, like baugette or brown and black breads or the typical British breads.

Fenugreek Puris

This is another creation of mine which is a result of my fenugreeek fever! - Thanks to Redchillies event! ;)
After making puris the last time (fenugreeek fever) successfully, I felt like making them again and my family agreed readily too. As, this might be the last time that I make puris this year. So, this time i trie the idea i had in my mind of adding kasuri methi, dried fenugreek leaves, into the dough. This is something I have tried a number of times with paranthas, but never with puris. Well, I make them only once a year, if at all.

This time I had made the dough a bit softer, which made it more difficult to roll them out as easily like the last time. Typically the puri dough contains some oil and is stiffer than a roti dough, both were not the case this time. But, these were no less delicious than we made the last time, and we relished them to the full. Rishab was munching on them just like that.

Methi Puri

Ingredients:

2 cups whole wheat flour or whole wheat atta ( I used whole wheat flour and whole grain missa atta* in the ratio 2/3 and 1/3)
1/5 tsp turmeric
2-3 tbsp kasuri methi (dried fenugreek leaves)
1 tsp ajwain
1 tsp salt
1 tbsp rapeseed oil (I left it out)
1 pinch red chilli powder
water
* whole grain Missa Atta: whole channa (with skin) and whole barley in rougly 2:1 proportions.

Method:
see my last post on Urd daal puris for details

• mix all the ingredients for puri thoroughly
• add water slowly and knead into a stiff dough and keep aside for 20 to 30 minutes
  
• heat about 600 ml of oil in a wok or deep frying pan for frying the puris on high heat, reduce to about medium-high later, if required
  
• In the meantime make small round balls out of the dough
• flatten them with your fingertips using some oil and roll out round, uniform and thin puris with a rolling pin and using drops of oil when required on a clean and smooth surface
  
• deep fry in hot oil and take out with a skimmer and let drip on two layers of kitchen roll before serving

Aloo subzi

Ingredients:
4 large potatoes, boiled with skin from the day before, peeled and cut into small pieces or as per taste
1 large onion, chopped
1 inch piece of ginger, peeled and finely grated
1 tsp cumin seeds
1 large pinch crushed asafoetida
1 tsp turmeric powder
2 tsp coriander seeds, ground
1 pinch red chilli powder
1-2 tbsp rapeseed oil
salt to taste

Method:

• heat oil in a fry pan and add cumin and asafoestida, sothat they splutter, stir once
  
• Immidiately add the chopped onion and ginger, stir
  
• add turmeric and coriander seeds powder and sautè everything till onion are golden brown in colour
• Add the potatoes and stir fry, adding the chilli powder and salt after a while as well, till done
• serve with rotis, paranthas or puris
  

Guten Appetit! As you would say it here, or to put it simply: ENJOY!

This is my second entry to Redchillies' Herb mania- Fenugreek!

Sunny Corn muffins !

I think, I'm not overdoing it when I say these were the best muffins I ever made and ate.
The combination of corn and coconut made this simple recipe into something so special!

I dedicate this recipe to my dear Advik, my nephew, who needs a gluten- and dairy free diet.
He was about 7 months old when I first met him. He was the most beautiful baby I had ever seen. So sweet and chubby with large black eyes. It was so much fun playing with him. All you had to do was stand in front of him and do something funny or stupid and he would start giggling, moving his whole body with excitement! And I still remember so well, when I would sing him a lullaby, instead of falling asleep he would look startled with wide eyes and lift up his head to listen! So, I usually had to stop singing, lest I may make him totally awake. :)
But, time flies and he is going to be 7 now. I was so surprised last month to realise that he is already so old. "Seven!", I thought. And since about three years he is on this diet and it has not been easy for his mom, my sister, to take on this challange, which it still proves to be for her, when you have to exclude anything from their daily diet plan which does not clearly indicate to be or is not obviously diary- and gluten free.
Since we live so far apart, living on two different continents, across the ocean, I wanted to be a part of it in some way and I thought of making and finding recipes which are gluten and dairy free. So, from now onwards, every now and then, you will see such recipes without gluten and dairy on my blog. Thanks to the internet and the blogging trend, I already have a couple of good sources for such recipes. And I would surely appreciate, if you have tips for me in this regard.

So, here goes the recipe of these mouthwatering and flavourful corn muffins:

Preparation time: 45 minutes
Baking time: 20 minutes (in preheated oven)
Oven temp.: 160°C convection (180°C electric)
Makes 6 muffins
(To make 12, double the quantities)


Ingredients:

Wet ingredients:
125 ml hot milk (soya milk)
1 tbsp vinegar (any variety)
80 g cornmeal (gluten-free)
1 egg (optionally correction: 3 tbsp applesauce)
60 g sugar
60 ml oil

Dry ingredients:
60 g cornstarch(or any gluten-free edible starch)
2 tsp cream of tartar baking powder (56% cream of tartar; gluten-free)
50 g grated dessicated coconut
50 g raisins
50 g dried soft apricots, quartered

Method:

• Soak the corn meal in hot milk in a large bowl for half an hour, keeping it warm
• In the mean time mix the dry ingredients in a separate bowl and set aside
• Place muffin liners in the muffin tins
• Preheat convection oven to 160 °C (electric : 180°C)
  
• Add the rest of the wet ingredients and stir shortly just to mix, don't mix for long!
• Add the dry ingredients and mix quickly just to wet all the ingredients
  
• Fill the muffin tins with the batter using a tablespoon and place in the preheated oven
• Bake for 20 minutes, check if baked through and then take out immediately
• Don't leave in the oven for too long!

Note: To make it eggless, replace the quantity of egg with applesauce, roughly 3 tbsp for each egg. This is a standard procedure with wheat muffins. I haven't tried it with these ones.

They are best eaten when still warm. I did not use any flavouring agents like vanilla or any other aroma, as the aroma of coconut and the combination with corn made it unnecessary.
You can take any filling you want. Fresh fruits like apricots, peeches or even dried plums would be great.
Although, on the next day, I just poured one or two tbsp water over them and microwaved them for 15 secons for each muffin and they were great to eat! The reason they get too dry is the cornmeal which does not swell enough and dries up with time. Have to optimise it a little bit more with regard to the soaking of the cornmeal. Maybe I should let the cornmeal soak in the hot milk on the stove and add more milk maybe next time.
Hubby, like so often, refused to eat it initially, looking very sceptically "corn muffins...?!". But, I know him better now, after I offered a small piece of the hot muffin to him, he was all for it ("Ya, gib mal her!" translates to something like: yeah, give me one!) and ate two of these straight away! :D

Tofu stirfry

Last week I very spontaneously bought tofu from my local market, which offers very good organic tofu. Now, it's actually been ages that I have made tofu. Usually I have problems with frying it as it breaks into pieces or sticks to the pan (I've stopped using any non-stick pans). But, this time I knew I had to be careful with the temperatures to get it right, as I had an awakening while making paneer the last time! :) . So, I just checked the fridge for the other ingredients - the vegetables, and got going....

Ingredients:

1 packet (250 g) Tofu, cut into squares and pat dried with a kitchen roll
10 florets Broccoli
2 small carrrots, cut into small and thin slices
12 pieces crimini Mushrooms, quartered
1 small green bell pepper, cut into small and thin slices
a few scallions, cut into rings, along with the fresh green parts
2 cloves garlic, peeled and finely grated
3 cm piece ginger, scraped and finely grated
1 tsp fresh whole green pepper seeds
a few tbsp oil
soy sauce
sherry vinegar (it was an expensive but excellent replacement for rice vinegar)
2 tbsp corn starch (or any edible starch)
1/2 cup water (divided)
1/2 tsp shrimp paste (optional)

Method:

• Fry the tofu pieces on medium heat till they get a light yellowish tinge on one side, turn them around to fry both the sides, add some soy sauce and a few drops of sherry vinegar, stir gently and take out of the pan and keep warm
  
• Blanch, or just cook for short in some water, the carrots and broccoli.
  
• Stir fry green bellpeppers, scallion rings, and the carrots and broccoli in some oil on high heat. Add some soy sauce and a dash of vinegar, stir and take out and keep warm
• Stir fry the garlic and ginger and mushrooms, on high heat until they get a crispy brown colour
• Add the reremaining vegetables back to it and stir gently. Add some more soy sauce, if required
  
• Add some soy sauce, vinegar and a few tbsp water to corn starch in a small bowl to mix and them add rest of the water tp make a thin soupy mixture, add shrimp paste to it
  
• Add this to the pan and let cook covered, first on high heat and reduce heat immidiately to low, stir once gently and cover for another 2 minutes
• Serve with warm rice amd some chopped coriander leaves (cilantro)

This turned out quite good, better than I had expected and left us all quite satisfied after the meal. And although shrimp paste is not a typical ingredient of chinese food, it was not at all out of place and added very much to the taste, but can be easily left out as well.
One thing I plan to try out in the future is the fermented black bean curd. I'm learning!