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.

The Restaurant Review - Govinda

When I call up my aunt announcing my visit to her, she complains that her maid has gone to her village for her holiday and since she has no helper at home, she would like to take me out for lunch.

No issues.

We drive down the Altamount road, pass through Pedder road, drive behind  Bharatiys Vidya Bhaavan and enter a tiny lane  just next to Mehta House  is the restaurant called Govinda

First impression

The first thing that impressed me was the fast food stall outside the restaurant that had Samosas, Pani Puri, sweets and vegetarian cakes and pastries,  a perfect place to have an evening snack. Inside the restaurant, there were the pictures of Lord Krishna Leela on every wall, it was small restaurant with dull lighting and most of the tables were occupied by lunch diners, some of them sharing one dish between the two persons.

We sat down next to the window which overlooked HareRamaHareKrishna temple which had a beautiful  intricately carved architecture. 

The food

The menu-card had large list of dishes, all vegetarian and mainly fusion food. It promised delightful experience that would harmonize body, mind and soul. Since we were just three of us, ordering too much variety was out of question. We ordered 2 plates of Chole batoorey, vegetarian Pizza and stir fried vegetable Dosa

The verdict

The food was awesome, and the quantity was good but the waiter did not warn us about the quantity and one plate of Cholebatoore was left untouched. Service was good and spontaneous. We didn't have to wait for too long.

Chlole Bature had serving bucket for serving chana, and I was so impressed that I am planning to buy this bucket for my collection of utensils.

Yummicious Pizza, I was really floored by melt-in-the-mouth Pizza which had exotic vegetables with olives and parsley as toppings. 

The stir fried vegetables of chopped carrots, onions, cabbage and sprouts with a crisp dosa covering gave the feeling of eating spring rolls, only the Sambar and the chutney was deceiving, but then I wouldn't touch that.

The bill

At Rs350 per head for heavy lunch, I found this restaurant quite reasonable.

There were no finger bowls at the end of the meals, which is quite disappointing.

I would surely love to come back again and also would recommend it to my vegetarian friends.