Remember the time during Covid, when the internet lost its collective mind over the baked feta trend? The original recipe came from Finnish food blogger Jenni Häyrinen, whose “uunifetapasta” (oven feta pasta) went viral in 2019 and made its way into kitchens everywhere. It was a genius move: Jenni nestled a block of feta among… Read more »
There are salads that feel like afterthoughts – a little something green pushed to the side of the plate. And then there are salads that demand attention, the kind that get eaten first and remembered last. This one is firmly in the latter camp. Sweet roasted pumpkin, jammy figs, and salty little nuggets of feta,… Read more »
Have some salad leaves wilting in the fridge? Here’s a good recipe to use it for. Don’t have salad leaves wilting in the fridge? Maybe buy some to try this recipe then? My solidly convincing arguments aside, this salad is so delicious and takes 15 mins from start (washing your lettuce) to finish (forking it… Read more »
I’m a creature of habit when it comes to pastas. I don’t do many meat versions either. (A vegetarian husband requires that my meat component is always on the side, and never in the pasta itself.) To make it into our regular meal rotations I make sure my pasta dishes follow these general rules. 1)… Read more »
Even when I’m in the mood to just potter about the kitchen, I don’t (and I can safely say this) ever cook food that’s demanding. And by demanding I mean both skill-wise and time-wise. If something has to cook for a long time, it has to be minimal prep. And then it needs to cook… Read more »
Just learned that the phrase ‘easy as pie’ refers to how easy it is to eat pie, and not how easy it is to make one. Thank god for that minor clarification, the world makes sense again. Not that making a pie (quiche in this case) is hard, but it’s admittedly not as easy as… Read more »
Writing out this recipe was not fun. There are four different components here and although the instructions under each read “add all the ingredients to a bowl and toss”, it required a bit of uncharacteristic patience on my part to type out. The irony, since the dish itself comes together so easily. Start with the… Read more »
Whipped cheeses seem to be all the rage these days – feta, goat’s cheese, you name it and someone’s whippin’ it. I did a whipped paneer version not so long ago that turned out great, so feta seemed the obvious next choice. I love its saline hit especially paired with sweet and tangy elements. We… Read more »
Given that a major chunk of my life’s mission is to French toast and ‘casserole’ everything, I’m making a case for this caponata version today. Both French toasts and casseroles are ideal candidates to use up leftover bread. A stale/dried up loaf is actually a good thing in both cases. In French toasts, a dry… Read more »
I like my scrambled eggs just set. Holding its shape and all the watery bits cooked out, but with soft, large, barely-set curds. They cook in under a minute and you need a non-stick pan for the job (kudos if you’ve managed to do this in cast-iron; they come out like rubbery pucks in mine)…. Read more »
I’d like to think of myself as an organised cook. Relatively speaking of course (I use the term very loosely and my husband thinks even that’s a stretch). I meal-plan and cook using locally sourced and seasonal ingredients for the most part and also try to minimize waste as much as possible. And those… Read more »
Pears are surprisingly hard to come by in Chennai. Sure, you find the locally grown green ones—the ‘hill station’ pears—but those still run a certain seasonal cycle and you see them around for maybe one or two months of the year. These local varieties are usually not very flavourful however, and the texture is often… Read more »
This muskmelon and feta salad might be my favourite salad of all time (a tall claim considering how I feel about a Thai mango salad). As much as I like the more popular watermelon version, there’s just something about muskmelon here that gives it that substantial heft that you don’t seem to get from the… Read more »
I saw Nadiya Hussain make her version of what she calls ‘blender beetroot pasta’ on her new show on Netflix, and I was immediately taken by its simplicity, accessibility of ingredients, and if you know me—this gorgeous colour! She uses cooked beetroot, garlic, chilli, lemon juice and dill in her recipe, and I realize now… Read more »
Horse gram is a lesser known variety of lentil that is used a lot in South India. Chock full of nutrients, I often use them in place of the more common green or brown lentils. I find that unlike other lentils, they hold their texture upon cooking; meaning, they are slightly more forgiving when it… Read more »
