Elephant Yam Tikkis/Vegan Mutton Patties/ Karunai Kizhangu Cutlet

Elephant yam, is one among the favourite tuber we love at home after the famous potato and sweet potato, obviously whenever we go to Indian store, i'll never forget to grab this yam. Thank god we get super fresh elephant yam nowadays and not  the frozen one. Obviously we have various choice to make delicious dishes out of this tuber. I'll always make chips,mashed spiced yam, else pan fried yam roast, but this time for a change i tried making tikkis with elephant yam which i crossed in a one of my tamil magazine supplement few days back. This tikkis are very easy to make, you doesnt need bread crumbs. A simple spiced and mashed mixture of elephant yam with fried gram powder makes this excellent vegan friendly tikkis.

Barnyard Millet & Sprouted Greengram Pongal/Kuthiraivaali Ven Pongal

Cooking with millets became one of my favourite culinary experiments which i never ever want to give up for any sake.Actually am trying to add various millets which i carried all the way from India whenever i feel like feeding millets instead of rice to everyone at home. I have  tried various dishes with different millets and my small family started loving these healthy dishes. One of my recent trial with Barnyard millet aka Kuthiraivaali or Kuthiravalli is this super healthy,protein packed pongal. Pongal is a south Indian breakfast dish which is prepared simply by cooking both rice and yellow moongdal together, this dish sounds almost like North Indian kichadi eventhough the tempering part of this South Indian pongal goes for nuts and different spices than the usual tempering spices. Usually Pongal can be eaten for breakfast or for dinner, however i'll like to pack them even for lunch whenever i feel lazy to cook.

Purple Cabbage Kootu

Kootu, this vegetable and dal baed gravy makes an excellent side dish if they are  served along with rice. Whenever i cross a new version of kootu, i wont hesitate a second to give a try. During my India trip, i couldnt resist to collect few supplements we get with some weekly tamil magazines. While going through those supplements, i crossed the 30 varieties of kootu, immediately went through the book and got hooked to this purple cabbage kootu, this dish is quite easy to make. A spice mixture is prepared simply to flavor this kootu and this spice powder makes the difference from other kootus we make usually with the famous coconut,cumin and green chillies combination.An excellent dish to enjoy thoroughly with hot piping rice and pan roasted potatoes.

Apple, Chocolate and Lemon Lassi

Lassi,this popular Indian drink is simply prepared with curd, milk with sugar or salt depending upon one's tastebuds. However you can find lassi now with many flavors and the most favourite lassi for most of the Indians is the mango flavored lassi. Yea even i can drink a gallon of mango lassi and i'll never fail to make them whenever mangoes shows their heads in our Indian groceries here.Lassi,this refreshing thirsty quencher can be prepared in a jiffy. I make varieties of lassi, shakes or smoothies whenever the sun god shows his head here, actually having lassi, shakes or smoothies became a part of our daily routine if its too hot here. Its better to stick with healthy drinks than the sugar loaded store bought juices. Not to forget that lassi can be prepared easily at home with simple ingredients, obviously you can even prepare sugarless lassi just with agave syrup,maple syrup or simply with honey.