Bhuni Khichdi...inspired by the awesome weather in Bangalore

While turning the pages of my note book, I was quite confused as to what should be the first recipe that could be shared with my readers..! Even after thinking for a long time, could not come to a conclusion..and this is what exactly happens when you have too many things stored up your sleeves. I suddenly got distracted for a while when the raindrops started hitting my bedside window pane. For a second, the world outside looked completely serene and beautiful...Lovely is all I can say! Great is the creator and his creation... That is exactly when I realized, that Bhuni Khichdi is the only recipe that can do full justice to this weather...
This also happens to be one of my favourite recipes as I still remember Mom making it whenever it used to get extremely cold in Darjeeling. We enjoyed this recipe and Dad used to literally demand for it every other weekend, more so because Mom always came up with a new twist to it!!
I can assure this dish is very stomach friendly and extremely easy to prepare. This ones specially for all my bachelor friends out there..

Bhuni Khichdi

Preparation Time: 20 mins

Serves: 2

Ingredients: 

1.  Basmati Rice( 1/2 cup)
2.  Moong Daal (1/2 cup) * The deal is that the rice and the daal should be in equal propotions
3.  Vegetables of your choice
4.  Onion, ginger and garlic diced ( garlic is optional)
5.  Bay Leaves ( 2), Elaichi (2), Cloves (2), Dalchini (2)
6.  Dry Red Chili
7.  Green Chili
8.  Ghee
9.  Salt
10.Sugar

Steps to Follow:

• Dry fry the daal in a wok and keep it aside. Make sure that the lentils are just about golden brown. Do not burn it.
• Wash and strain the rice.
• In a big thick bottomed wok, pour 3 tablespoons of ghee. Then add the bay leaves, one whole red dry chili which is again optional, elaichi, clove and dalchini. Fry these for some time and please make sure not to burn it as the aroma of the spices gives a fabulous taste to the recipe. Add the onion, ginger and garlic dices to this and keep frying in medium heat for another 2 minutes. Now, to this add the chopped vegetables and again fry for some more time. Finally, add the daal and the rice and sprinkle some more ghee and fry till it becomes light brown. Add salt as per your taste and a few slit chilies now and mix well.
• Then  transfer the entire content of the wok in a pressure cooker. Here I would like to mention that the above mentioned process can be also done in the pressure cooker. Now, the tricky part..adding the water. Add about 3 to 4 cups of warm water to the mixture and close the lid of the cooker. My pressure cooker generally does its job in 4 whistles..but lets give one extra for the daal. Another pointer for this recipe is, as this khichdi is bhuni it has to be dry.
• Remove from the heat once done and garnish with coriander leaves and and dalchini/garam masala powder.  Serve it hot with diced brinjal/eggplant fry, papad, fish fry or even achaar/pickle.

Remember that you can do a lot of innovations with this recipe. So tell me what you have to it to make it even better!!
Hope you like the recipe and try it as soon as possible. Would love to hear from you..

Love,

Annie