Rachael Ray

Last weekend, we hosted a sleep-over. All I could hear was giggling, little feet tip-toeing when they should have been tucked in a blanket, and lots of giggling. It was late, but why would I challenge their pixie moment? In keeping with their spirit, I decided to make a fun little breakfast for them. Cookie-Crusted French Toast. Since I also had a moral obligation to their mothers for being somewhat nutritious, I felt this was a good middle ground. This dish works with any cookies you have at home. All you needs is a few crushed cookies, bread, butter, milk, eggs and vanilla essence. Whilst the cookies add a playful edge, not to mention texture, there is another ingredient that takes [...]...

Four large russets. Is that is what my kitchen is being reduced to at this present moment, I thought? I looked in the refrigerator one last time, bit this was really it.  It is on days like this, that I am particularly thankful for a well-stocked pantry. My mother had trained me well.  With a full range of spices and canned tomatoes, there was no way dinner would be an after thought. One of the dishes I loved growing-up, was ‘tariwala alu’ – potatoes cooked in a  bold gravy of tomatoes and mustard seeds.  The dish uses a lot of spices from the South, with ingredients like curry leaves and black mustard seeds – benign looking black seeds that pop like [...]...

When mom declares Sunday lunch as Rajma-Chawal – you know the mood she is creating for her home. Shawl is rice and sloshed over it is rajma, a kidney bean stew, that starts with a sauté and flows on to a lazy simmer. It is North India’s ultimate comfort dish and almost always eaten at Sunday lunch. Why? You might ask. Because rajma for dinner is a work out for the system to digest and to have stew for lunch any day  other than Sunday is indulgent. I have yet to meet a person (young and old alike) who dislikes rajma. But why would it meet resistance when the beans become buttery and soft surrendering themselves to the gravy they are [...]...

This week has been nuts. Whilst ‘nuts’ brings with it an adrenalin rush, it also brings a lot of dodgy eating. Last week, my snacks were divided between hidden Halloween candy (wrong on more levels than one) and flavor-enhanced potato chips. Today enough is enough and I have decided to spend some time making snacks that will satisfy me without suspicious ingredients. One of the treats I am making is “Two-bite Falafels” - though some would argue that it takes but one. Yes, they are fried, but they are pretty much in and out of the oil and since I am making them, I know my oil is fresh. Falafel On The Go As for the falafels, time is of essence and [...]...

Saag Paneer is an Indian restaurant topper. This dish of spinach and cheese has a mass appeal to adults and kids alike.  There is comfort in saag paneer which stems perhaps from it’s familiarity and yet element of adventure. The spinach itself is like cream of spinach and the paneer appeals to our mouth memory in the ‘yes, I know your taste’ – slightly mozarella, slightly ricotta. And then of course, there is cumin that is used in a mild manner and brings us back to the Indian subcontinent. As much as I love to eat this dish, cooking the spinach separately first and then adding it back in, is a deterrent. It’s just one step and one dirty pot too [...]...

It is the Sunday mornings I miss in particular about being unmarried and living at home with my parents in good old Hounslow, our little suburb in West London. Staggering downstairs around 11am, dad would thrust a perfect cup of tea in to my hands whilst mum made the usual, savory-stuffed pastry ‘parantha’. Paranthas are Indian flat bread that are given a searing in butter for perfect crispness. The scene was pretty much replicated by our neighbors, my grandmother’s home 2 blocks away and my friend’s house across the street. We lived in a little Indian colony and to tear in to a parantha over a cup of sweetly spiced tea made it ‘Sunday as usual’ for most of us. Walking [...]...

Holi is one of India’s biggest holidays, arguably more popular than even Diwali. It marks the celebration of spring and what better way to do it than with an explosion of color – quite literally. Whilst the faint hearted should consider staying at home, those with a bit of ‘oomph’ put on their gleaming white apparel and join the their neighborhood of fellow white clad community outside. Like a block party, everybody joins in; kids, extended family members, neighbors, local vendors. And the dress code is specific with it’s serene white varieties of pants, t-shirts, saris and salwar kameez – yet what follows is anything but serene. The commotion starts. Kids fling chipkaris (little balloon bombs filled with colored [...]...

Yesterday afternoon, we had an impromptu invite from our friends Shilpa and Jayesh for Sunday dinner. We were at the cusp of a new week and decided to head over early, giving Monday a chance to start off the right way. When we got there, the kitchen table was filled with lots of little bowls. Sliced mushrooms, chopped chilies, finely-diced capsicums, onions, cilantro and market fresh mozzarella. Perhaps a late night ahead since dinner was not ready? I was starting to feel a bit anxious and chugged back some of my crisp white. Within a few minutes, Shilpa called us to the kitchen saying that dinner was ready. We walked in with the kitchen status not seeming to have [...]...

This weekend my neighbors are coming over for brunch. Whilst eggs are quick and not unreasonably demanding, they require a lot of live action cooking – as in right there and then. Not the kind of performance I am down with on a Sunday morning. Also, people get fussy with eggs - egg whites only, sunny-side up, no color, yes color, the demands just keep coming. This weekend, I am taking these choices off the table. The eggs will be cooking in the oven as they walk in, leaving me time to catch-up with them over a lazy Sunday morning playlist and clicking some random shots of us when we aren’t on our way out of the door [...]...