Tilapia Red Curry

Experimenting with white fish has been my recent craze. Couple of weeks back I got my hands on a fish named tilapia. This is a freshwater fish inhibiting in rivers and lakes. For a moment I was like "Well! What can I make with this fish". Then Ashay listed numerous items which can be prepared using this white fish.

In some places you might not find tilapia, in that case you can try this very same red curry with other white fish available locally. The taste of this red curry is very much similar to thai curry. If you like Thai food then go ahead and try this one out. I am pretty sure you wont regret wasting your time.

Lets start with the preparation first because once you get all the basic things first then the rest is just child's play.

Ingredients:

• 1 large tomato
• 1 cup coconut milk
• Tilapia filet
• 1 large onion
• 3 green chillies
• 2 red chillies
• 5 cloves of garlic
• Coriander leaves
• 3 strands of spring onion
• 1 tbsp ginger garlic paste
• 1 tbsp cajun masala
• 1 tbsp goan garam masala
• Pepper powder
• 1 tbsp ginger paste
• Parsley leaves
• Salt to taste

Serves: 4

Cooking time: 30 minutes

Method:

• Cut tilapia filet into small pieces,marinate with ginger garlic paste,salt and keep aside
• Heat oil in a saucepan, add finely chopped garlic cloves until they turn golden brown,make sure you dont burn garlic,add finely chopped onion and saute till the onion also turns golden brown.
• Add ginger paste and cook for a minute and then add finely chopped green chillies and red chillies.
• Add finely chopped spring onion,tomato and cook for 2-3 minutes.
• Add coconut milk and stir the mixture for a while.
• Add salt,cajun masala,goan garam masala,parsley leaves,pepper powder and cook again for 2-3 minutes.
• Now add the marinated fish filets and cook for 5 minutes.
• Add corriander leaves. Serve with steaming hot bowl of Rice.

Trip to NYC

Last month in January, I visited New York City also known as Big Apple, the most happening place on Earth. New Yorkers call this place as the land of opportunities because once you enter in this part of the world, you are exposed to sundry of things which you can experience and try out. There are myriad options for people like us. You will be amazed to find different people belonging to different cultures, countries, race, speaking multiple languages including some we might not even be aware of.

Since it was my first visit, we decided to explore all the touristy and historic places. During our entire trip we were staying at our cousin's place in Jersey City, New Jersey. Jersey City is separated from NYC by the Hudson river. Considering the traffic it takes 45 minutes from Jersey City to reach NYC. After researching a bit more about the place I was all excited to commence our journey and to try out some new local dishes. We took a train from Journal Square station in New Jersey and reached NYC, World Trade Center station in around 20 minutes. I was informed about the crowded trains and was startled to see that they were not wrong. The trains were congested with people in all cars and we managed to squeeze in one of the cars. I was bit relaxed after hearing the name of our destination.

The first thing I noticed as we stepped out of the station, was a magnificent sky scrapper towering over me. It was the Freedom Tower in Manhattan. After such a grand welcome we continued with our planned itinerary to see the Trinity Church, Brooklyn Bridge, New York Stock Exchange until we reached another beautifully designed giant building - The Empire State Building. My experience on the 86th floor open observatory of the Empire State Building cannot be explained in words. Pictures wont do justice to it. I was mesmerized for almost 30 minutes standing on top of a sky scrapper looking at the miniature view of New York City. It was breathtakingly beautiful, heaven on earth experience for me.

Another place I desperately wanted to see was Times Square - a major commercial intersection in midtown Manhattan glittered with bright lights. It was just amazing standing in the cold weather admiring the beauty of this man made marvel and also contemplating the wastage of energy to light this behemoth of a place. Late in the evening after a long tiring day, not to forget the cold weather we decided to head back home for a warm cup of coffee.

The next day we followed up with the lower Manhattan marvels by catching the sights uptown. We went to Central Park but alas, winter is not a good time to visit this giant park. We also strolled through Rockefeller Center, home of the NBC studios and finally went on a Museum journey to look at dinosaur fossils and other natural history artifacts.

After a short 2 days trip of NYC, we were relaxed and ready to go back to our mundane life with a hope of visiting NYC soon in the spring to explore and experience more of this breathtaking city.

Winter Experience in Boston

I landed in Boston on 25th December 2014. Before this I had never experienced a winter season where temperature drops below 0 degree nor had I ever experienced snow. I was informed that winters in Boston could be harsh at times. This was the first time I was going to experience such a horrid winter. I was pretty excited like a small kid. The initial few days were really awesome as it was not snowing at all and the temperatures were abnormal for this time of the year in the range of 5-6 degrees.

I was eagerly awaiting for the snow because this was the first time I was ever going to experience it. As the days went by, the temperatures started getting colder. On New Year’s Eve, my husband and I went to explore downtown Boston. However I was freezing my pants off and could not stand outside for more than a few minutes, so we ended up coming home early to the warm heaters. (Also we were jetlagged but that is a different story.)

By 20th January, Boston experienced its first blizzard of that year. I was jumping like a kid, taking pictures of the snow covered roads, describing the event to my sisters as this was a fun and exciting experience for me. The snow abated after almost 24 hours making the whole city look sheepishly white. It was an atrocious storm, unusual for the Bostonians too. The Government had to declare a state of Emergency as there was no public transportation. People were sealed up at home unable to move out. All I could see through my window were big piles of snow mounds, snow covered roads and snow buried cars in our neighborhood.
The ramification of that blizzard was dreadful. Walking along the road was impossible and we were confined to our house.

After a few days, as people were slowly getting back up after the first snowfall, New England was bombarded again with yet another blizzard. The little kid in me was now dejected. As if the two blizzards were not enough, Boston got hit again and again with couple more snow storms accumulating a total of 100 inches of snow for the year 2015. There was chaos in the city with no place to park the car, no place to walk, no public transportation to get around thanks to the heaps of snow all over the place. By mid-February, I was totally frustrated and waiting for the snow to get over.

Luckily since the last week the temperatures are rising again and we get to see the sun occasionally peering through the clouds and I am happy that I survived the winter. I am eagerly waiting for the next season now – Spring.

Egg Green Masala

Hello people! I am back with another relishing,mouth watering Goan dish. Goans are known to add lots of coconut in their cuisines. It may enhance the taste but its perilous to one's health.
For all the health-conscious people out there try this one. Very simple recipe,easy to make. Awesome combination of Goan spices mixed with egg. This is one of my mom's signature dishes.

Lets dig into the recipe.
Ingredients:

• 6 Eggs
• Coriander leaves
• 7 cloves of garlic
• 1 tbsp ginger paste
• Cinnamon
• 6 green Chilies
• 1 tbsp sugar
• 1 tbsp oil
• Salt to taste

Cooking time:30 minutes

Serves:4

Method:

• Boil eggs,peel,cut into 2 halves and keep aside.
• Heat oil in a saucepan and stir fry onion until it turns golden brown.
• Grind ginger,garlic,cinnamon,handful of corriander leaves to fine paste
• Add the paste to browned onion along with salt and 2 cups of water.
• Add sugar,stir and add eggs.
• Boil for 2-3 minutes.Serve with bread or chapati.

Customized Chicken Tikka Recipe

Recently when I told my friends about a recipe that I had tried, they were all curious to know about it. Before proceeding I want to tell you that its not an authentic Chicken Tikka recipe.When I was young, my mom used to customize some recipes and come up with her own stuff. This one is one of them.
So here I am, jotting down the recipe so that you can try it out. Its a simple recipe and I believe after trying it out you might want to bookmark it for your future reference.

Ingredients:

• 2 boneless chicken breast pieces.
• 1 large tomato
• 1 and 1/2 onions
• 4 green chillies
• Corriander leaves
• 4 strands of spring onion
• 5 cloves of garlic
• 1 small green pepper/capsicum
• 1 tbsp oil
• 1 tbsp garam masala
• Tomato ketchup sauce
• Soy sauce
• 1 tea spoon sugar
• Black pepper powder to taste
• Salt to taste

Cooking time: 30 minutes
Serves : 4

Method:

• Clean and cut chicken breast pieces into small cubes.Apply salt,ginger garlic paste,garam masala,marinate and keep aside.
• Cook the marinated chicken in oven for 15 minutes.If you dont use oven then you can shallow fry the pieces in a frying pan and keep it aside.
• Heat some oil in a saucepan,fry finely chopped garlic till brown,add diced onion and saute till brown.
• Add to the browned onion finely chopped green chillies and cook for 1 minute.Add finely chopped spring onion,tomato and green pepper/capsicum.Close the pan with a lid and leave it for sometime.
• Add 1 cup of water if required.Add salt,garam masala,sugar,black pepper powder,1 teaspoon soy sauce and stir for sometime.
• Add chicken pieces and boil for 2-3 minutes.Add corriander leaves and tomato ketchup sauce.Serve with bread or chapati.