The Cheat-Day - Spaghetti Frittata

There's just always leftover spaghetti at home.

This is the easiest cheat-day recipe I know.

SAUCE

Make some béchamel sauce like mentioned in the lasagna recipe. (Butter, flour, milk, cheese, seasonings). Chop up whatever meats/veggies you might want for toppings, like bits of bacon or sausage or throw in olives or mushrooms.

FRITTATA

Heat a tablespoon of oil in a pan. Take any sauced dry al-dente spaghetti and put it in the pan, and don't stir it or move it around; pour some sauce and toppings on top and then just let it sit there like a cake until the bottom browns and becomes crispy.

Put a lid on the pan and flip the pan so that the cake thing is now on the lid. Slide the frittata back in to let the other side fry. Let it cook and brown till you can move the entire thing around in the pan smoothly.

Slide it out onto a plate and serve with greens!

   

 

The Bombay

Yummiest vegetarian snack/dinner option ever.

Pav Bhaji

Boil, peel and mash potatoes. If you want you can boil peas and cauliflower and mash them in too. Grind onions into a pulp. Heat butter in a pan and add ginger, garlic, onion paste, and cook. Add salt and turmeric. Put in chopped or pulped tomatoes. Add chilli powder and pav bhaji masala (you get that in a store) and fry. Add mashed veggies, some water and kasuri methi. Simmer until it looks as thick or runny as you prefer it. Turn off the heat and add chopped coriander leaves, and top with raw chopped onions and a dollop of butter. Serve with butter-toasted pav (dinner roll) and lime.

Turn it into a cheese pav bhaji by garnishing with shredded cheese. Or not.

The Night-In

Night-outs are overrated. :)

CHICKEN WINGS

Marinate wings for a few hours in sauces of your choice. I used yogurt, salt, pepper, cumin, paprika, chilli sauce, some of that awesome mango habanero I had at home, garlic or garlic powder and a tiny bit of mustard.

Bake in the oven till cooked, and toss in a mildly greased pan on medium heat for 2 minutes. Shake in a closed box with a tiny bit of sauce of your choice so all wings are fully coated. Serve with blue cheese. I served my wings this time with french onion dip.

ONION RINGS

Cut onions laterally and make rings about half an inch thick. Cover in a mixture of flour and baking soda. Make an egg wash (whisk 2 eggs and a spoon or two of milk) and a plate of bread crumbs ready, and heat oil. Dip flour-covered onion rings into the egg wash and then into the bread crumbs, and deep fry.

Plate up and Netflix.

The Puri Sabzi

Because, I mean, puri sabzi!

PANEER SABZI

Saute onions with ginger and garlic in a little oil. Add salt, turmeric, cumin and coriander powder, and then add tomatoes and a little garam masala. Take off the heat and grind for 2 seconds so it's still pulpy. Return to the pan and add paneer. Cook till done; garnish with coriander.

PURI

Puri dough is similar to rotis, except there's oil involved. Knead whole-wheat like you would for aata except throw in a little oil. Knead it to be smooth and stiff, not soft like for rotis.

When you roll these, make them smaller than you would for rotis. Roll in one direction, and roll with oil instead of dry flour. Make sure the oil is very hot before you fry these. Gently lay one in flat and let it puff up. Switch sides and take it out before it browns too much.

Stuff your face.

The Tender Chipotle

A simple and healthy weekday dinner that we, later that night, followed with a double chocolate muffin because we are bad, bad people.

CHIPOTLE SAUCE

You could make a decent amount of this and refrigerate it for later use. Typically you'd use chipotles in adobo sauce for the recipe but only so many of us have that lying around at home. So here's a cheat recipe:

Throw into a blender chipotles (or chilli of your choice), garlic, vinegar, paprika, salt, cumin, some yogurt, and a little mayonnaise if you want, but I skipped the mayonnaise for a healthier sauce. I also kept the chilli amount to a low because my husband prefers less heat.

CHICKEN TENDERS

Coat tenderloins first in flour, then in beaten egg, and lastly in breadcrumbs, and bake in the oven till golden and cooked.

STIR FRY

Combine your favorite bunch of superfoods (yes, there's kale in there, that's the only way you'll see me ever eat that stuff) and toss on low heat in a little olive oil and a few drops of soy sauce.

Plate up, and serve with a 7-seeds dinner roll for a healthy crunch :)

The Lollipop

Street food YAYYYY

These are my favorite, along with momos (which I'll also eventually make, probably). In Bangalore, some chicken shops actually sell lollipop-cut wings, but most places don't, so you have to make your own. 

Get chicken wings, and cut into two at the joint. Chop off the end bone, and pull/scrape all of the flesh up. There's two bones in the wing; take out the thin bone, and gather all the meat at the top to make the lollipop.

Sometimes frying these raw leaves the inside uncooked, so boil for 5-10 min and add some worcestershire sauce.

Separately mix egg, chillies, soy sauce, chilli sauce, ginger-garlic paste, salt & pepper, garam masala, ajinomoto, a drop or two of red food coloring, flour (and/or corn flour) and a little water and make a batter. Dip chicken in the batter and deep fry. Serve with chilli garlic or schezwan sauce! YUM.

The Cheat-Day - Lasagna

Yay, more cheat days!

Not a quick recipe, but easy nevertheless, and totally worth it.

THE MEAT

Saute onions and garlic in a little oil before adding minced meat. At this point I like to add a tiny pinch of cumin and paprika (my little touch), but that's optional. Then add tomatoes/tomato sauce, and season with salt, pepper and oregano, and simmer till it thickens.

THE CHEESE

Make a bechamel sauce. Melt some butter and add some flour. Take off the heat to add milk and put it back on the heat. Add loads of parmesan cheese. Season and thicken.

COMBINE

Check whether your lasagna sheets require pre-cooking or not. Spread some of the meat sauce. Arrange lasagna sheets on them, and then layer with the cheese. Repeat: meat, sheets, cheese. Finish the top layer with a last layer of lasagna sheets and then cheese sauce and finally, freshly grated mozzarella on the top and bake till you see all that cheese bubble and turn golden.

Die from too much cheese.