Ladled

Olympic sandwiches and Pascualina

Goodcheapeats Pumpkin biscuits, Cornbread Waffles, portobello Mushroom in place of bun, Cobb salad (at home, ooh..), pesto Bread sticks, Spiced pita chips, last-minute pizza sauce, Pita Bread pizza, French Bread pizza, red pepper hummus, cranberry- carrot salad, Herbed Polenta are all recipes with a spin that can be made quickly and still feel special because they are different from what you would cook normally.

How about lemon curd or custard in these  Baked pastry squares stuffed with jam recipe  ?

Barley Soup When the Costco ran out of the trifecta of frozen mixed vegetables - green bean, carrots and peas, I had to buy the Normandy version of it. They are huge chunks, so there is never a weekend I think when I put the vegetables to fry a bit while making sooji upma or semiya upma, I will wait till these big pieces cook a bit. Few days ago when I got tired of waiting for the bananas to ripen, I boiled the diced banana and made a curry of it. I stored the boiled water for soup. This quick Barley  was a snap to put together. I let the barley and vegetables to boil for upwards of 40 min and then they turned to pearls. Makes me think that Barley Bellam payasam will be great. While adding pepper to the soup, I found a pop tab can of tomato sauce. how convenient. Since I had way too much polenta in the morning and didnt feel hungry, so I could wait all the time the vegetables and barley needed.

This Damak chocolate with green pistachios on the white wrapper just called to me. The chocolate has a puffy look  and is filled with plenty of pistachios. Only problem is that its too sweet for me. next time I will go for a bittersweet or dark chocolate version if there is one.

berry pulav Vegetarian India: A Journey Through the Best of Indian Home Cooking by Madhur Jaffrey has lots of recipes. But with the pictures and variety of locations, Ms Jaffrey has done something wonderful. She's cracked the code of how to turn a cookbook into a travelogue. Taking the readers into kitchens grand like Falaknuma (when there's a spin like asking for a pomegranate Margarita to be made non-alcoholic. These kind of incidents paint a little picture about the author, bartender and the place) but also going to places where the good food flows like the Bombay dubba walla. The book focuses on different parts of India, so even if you are a vegetarian cook from India, you will still appreciate the ingredients and special mixes in the other parts of the country - eg Kasthundi. The berry pulav with its pink astonishing colours, looks so great that I want to try a variant of it with pomegranate.  I am going to try naan khatai too. It is more involved than a simple reci...

Delallo Instant Polenta cooks very quickly. It needs to be cooked just like the sooji upma. "Polenta is family food. Mama feeds it to her baby when his teeth are coming in. Papa feeds it to his mama when her teeth have fallen out". - Teresa Lust in  Pass the Polenta :  And Other Writings from the Kitchen

The picture doesnt do justice but in reality the Annie Chun's Seaweed Crisps are a novelty. They have a seaweed layer onto the brown rice crisps. The crisps are great but I couldnt get myself to like the seaweed itself. I have made sushi with sea weed sheets and had instant noodle snacks that have specks of seaweed in it. So I am not totally new to it but this intense seaweed reminded me of dried fish, a smell that I dont like. But I appreciate the idea and the rice crisps themselves are a star.

While reading more about Just Panela Artisanal Cane Sugar 100% Unprocessed, I looked up non-centrifugal sugar and found a familiar term - jaggery there. We use jaggery on and off in making some sweets - Polelu. Since the jaggery we buy is in a solid form, we have to grate it before we can use it. Even a sweet rice is made with rice cooked with jaggery. I saw recipes for jaggery tea that include boiling the jaggery in water. With Just Panela, you can skip all those boiling, grating and make it a quick affair to have tea or desserts with natural sugar. First day I thought the sugar had aftertaste but day two onwards, I didnt feel so. You can also get by with lesser sugar than the white one.

I first tried the Spicy Chili Lime of ProTings protein Chips. The flavor is so intense. You get the spice and then there's the crunch. Just what Indian palate craves for. They reminded me of chekkalu/appalu made with rice flour. It was a pinch myself and do they really taste like spicy snacks moment. Lime taste comes in like a refreshing breeze. The chekkalu made with rice flour are deep fried. So getting the same taste in a baked snack is a win win.

Cilantro Lime Hummus   - spicy and tasty, Margherita Pizza - the crust melded with the cheese, Chicken Fingers. Fries - wide and thin tasted good.

Chocolate Addiction  from French Bull. Tastes like adults chocolate. Not too sweet.

Having just had some much needed food, I was full of energy to make some donner. I know I have to use up green bell pepper and then I found some green onions. I could saute the bell pepper and add it to Paccheri and then thought how about blending it. And then thought why not have it two ways, blending half of them and keeping the rest as small pieces. I am happy to have tried it.

I added 3 sachets of the chili flakes from pizza places and some salt. And thats it. they are too salty like olives brined (at Costco, oveheard someone calling them the best they ever had. sp I tried. Please keep a glass of water next to you.). Congealed. tasted like starch. Diluting makes it better.