Vegetarian Tortilla

Tortilla is the favorite snack in Tenerife and is available in every bar and in a restaurant. It is normally an egg dish that is stuffed with assorted meat, fish or vegetables. I had blog earlier about this Spanish omelet. I had a guest from Panama city who had demonstrated her way of preparing this dish.

Since this requires egg, therefore this could be limited to non-vegetarian folks only, right?

Wrong!

Vegetarians can be quite creative and those who cannot eat egg will find a way to relish this dish by finding a suitable combination that will replace egg.

Today when I entered the kitchen, I saw M prepare the vegetarian version.

So what did she do to change it to a vegetarian dish. I walked closer to have a look. She was mixing 1 tbsp of wheat flour, 1 tbsp of corn flour and 1 tbsp of gram flour with 1/2 cup of water and 1/2 cup of milk.

Good enough, egg is the binding ingredient, well this flour batter would serve the purpose too.

So all she needs to do was to prepare the vegetarian stuffing.

She finely chopped the onions, red and yellow capsicum, coriander leaves and green chilies and set them aside.

Potatoes are must in a tortilla dish. Some use the boiled potatoes and some use deep fried. But M is the careful cook and tries to avoid fried stuff, so she diced two potatoes in small bits and steamed them.

For vegetable stuffing, she fried 1 tbsp of garlic in 1 tbsp of olive oil and then added chopped cabbage, carrots and mushroom, and stir fried till they were tender.

Now was the time to mix gently all the steamed potatoes, the stir fried vegetables, onion, red and yellow capsicum, coriander leaves, green chilies and avocado into the flour batter.

The mixture was gently transferred to a non stick frying pan, covered and cooked on medium flame for 12 minutes.

after 12 minutes, it was flipped over to other side and cooked for another 7 minutes

The Spanish enjoy this dish with hard drinks, vegetarians will enjoy this with fresh fruit juice. I tasted a slice....no difference at all, so much resemblance in taste too....

PS: But those who are still interested in using egg. You make take 6 eggs. separate the egg yolk and beat the whites till they are stiff. then add egg yolk and all the other ingredients and follow the same method.

Snacks and Finger Food Cooking Demonstration

Normally people enjoy finger food more than the actual dinner at social events. Most of the conversation takes place over drinks and one is not aware of the quantity one has consumed during conversation and drinks. Therefore making a variety of snacks becomes mandatory and involves lots of creative activity and playing around with ingredients to produce innovative dishes.

Making Samosas, bhajiyas and patties is become quite old fashioned, though they do appear on tables sometimes but a creative dish has a charm of its own. There are more dips and roasted snacks that are now preferred by diet conscious individuals and for people who want to spend more than two hours just snacking and drinking, the continuous supply of variety of snacks becomes important and is popular.

When I received an invitation to attend the snack and finger food cooking demonstration, it was one more opportunity to learn the same things different way. Since making a snack is a creative cooking, therefore one cannot actually learn but new ideas do crop up when we watch others cooking their own way. Chef Thomas Zacharias from Olive Bar & Kitchen was the host of this demonstration. I reached early and got to meet another food blogger who blogs on ingredients and does lots of research before blogging. It was nice interacting with her.

The table was laden with salt, pepper, mayonnaise, paprika and the different bowls that would be required during the cooking. There were four rows of four chairs each placed in front of the cooking station. A big LCD screen, ready with the camera focused on the demo-table occupied one corner of the small room. There were about thirty attendees, most of them house-wives and also some bloggers and food-writers.

The session began with Daredevilled Eggs

Chef gave us the tips on perfect boiling of the egg saying that eggs be immersed into cold water, adding salt and vinegar and then boiled till water bubbles, the fire is then put off and the eggs are kept covered for 14 minutes, then removed and transferred into ice-cold water.

He took 10 eggs and boiled them. The eggs are then sliced into two and the yellow is removed into the separate bowl. It is then combined with 1/2cup mayonnaise, 1tbsp spicy paprika, I lemon juice, 1 tbsp of mustard sauce, salt and pepper. It is mixed properly till it becomes creamy, then transferred into a piping bag and piped into the halved eggs. It is garnished with paprika and coriander leaves and refrigerated till it is ready to serve.

Boiled egg yolk combined with mayonnaise gave it a creamy feel and it melted immediately filling the mouth with its rich taste. I liked this snack because it can be made before hand and served cold; this gives us more time to spend with the guest.

This was followed by vegetarian Mushroom snack called Feta Mushrooms

This required large button mushrooms which can be cleaned in plain flour solution which helps extract dust from mushrooms. The stems are removed carefully so as to cause a dent for filling.

10 medium size mushrooms were marinated in the mixture of 1 cup Olive oil, 2-3 chopped Rosemary twigs, 2-3 chopped thyme twigs, salt and pepper.

A cheese stuffing was prepared by blending 1 cup feta cheese with 2 tbsp of Parmesan cheese.

Caramelized onions were prepared by sautéing 3 onions on medium heat till they become translucent. Salt, pepper and 3 tbsp of Balsamic vinegar is then added and cooked till all the water has evaporated and onions are caramelized.

Caramelized onions are used to stuff the dent in the mushrooms and is coated with mixture of blended cheese and baked in the oven till the top layer of cheese is browned.

Finally the Warrior Wings with Blue Cheese Dip

Blue cheese dip is made by mixing 1 cup of mayonnaise with ½ cup blue cheese, 2 cloves of finely chopped garlic, and 2tbsp of finely chopped celery, 2 tbsp milk, ¼ lemon juice, salt and pepper to taste. It can be stored in the fridge till it is ready to serve.

 In another plateful of 2 cups of flour, 2 tbsp of paprika, salt and pepper is added and 2 kg of chicken wings are dusted with this powder and deep fried then dropped into the mixture of BBQ sauce and Buffalo wings sauce.

Most of the people liked this chicken wings preparation the best which was slimy because it was being coated with sauce and then served with dip.

What new did I learn? Actually nothing new, I have prepared these snacks many times, often creating new snacks on the spot, of which I have no clue when people ask me for a recipe, or ask me to prepare again and I cannot repeat the taste even if I use the same ingredients. Nevertheless I do enjoy these demo, because I get to taste and compare my cooking with the professionals and come back with feel-good-factor-clinging-on-my-bonnet.

Romance with Eggs

Source:Google

During my growing up days, every holidays Mom took me to her brother’s house in Pune. That used to be her favorite destination. She enjoyed meeting her relatives and travelling around the city. I accompanied mom only to Pune city, but once there at my mamma’s house, I was left at home with my cousins.

I was very close to my cousins and we used to play together all day and sometimes late nights. Many times, when the elder went off to sleep, we would sneak out and go eat egg burji during late nights as late as 1am. There was one such hawker near the Pune railway station who made very tasty burji. He use to make on a large tava, stir frying onions, tomatoes, green chilies and coriander leaves in spoonful of butter. After a minute of stir frying he would break open the eggs on the top of masala and harshly mash up and mix. He would serve with buttered pav. It used to be great treat.

Surprisingly, we used to be hungry at all times of the day, and with our limited pocket money, egg used to the cheapest non-vegetarian dish.

Sometimes during evenings we used to go for half-fried eggs with sunny side up. With salt and black pepper, we would relish this with hot cup of cutting chai.

Source:Google

The romance with egg has been deep rooted and when I migrated to Spain, I discovered tortilla. In Spain, tortilla is very common and can be had cold (many people even take it for picnics) and it is also served in Spanish bar as accompaniment with drinks. Tortilla is the egg omelets that is made of the deep fried potatoes, mixed vegetables and also include olives, fish and meat. I had learnt to make Spanish omelet from my maid and this is my favorite must-have egg dish which I serve when I have guests. The whites of the eggs are beaten till fluffy before adding the other ingredients. It is made in a big pan and it is flipped at least three times to enable to cook from inside. I have a special cover, which is slightly larger than the pan, and makes the flipping and sliding it back into the pan easier.

Even the simple egg dish with just salt, if fried like a pan-cake and stuffed between the toasted bread, tastes delicious. I still remember the egg sandwiches that I used to feast on at the arrival lounge of Santacruz airport.

During my national tours, whenever we stay in the hotels, I always look forward to egg omelets that are served during break-fast. There will be variety of food that will include cakes, croissants, and Indian spicy breakfast like Idli-Sambar, Puri-Bhaji, but I always head towards the live-egg-preparation-desk where I choose the ingredients while the chef prepares a perfect omelet for me.

Except for Spanish omelet, I have never really learnt to make an egg dish, I just fried it without any experience and it turned out fine, but there are many people out there who still don't know how to fry an egg. How do I know that? Well, why else would there be tutorials on egg recipes? huh!

Okay I am hungry again…maybe I should go for boiled egg salad……