Shahi Tukra Recipe | How to make Shahi Tukda | Step by Step Recipe | Cooking with leftovers

Shahi Tukra must be one of those dishes that I have been forever reading about and wanting to make. I guess almost ever since I started baking some 15 years ago. That's when I first started using Milkmaid and along with it I got it's recipe book that has such pretty food pictures. I used to literally drool over them and I have almost made of them till date. Except for few like this delicious Shahi Tukra. On reading it, I realized it sounds very much like the Bread Halwa that we make, of course with a major change that alters the entire taste.

Looks like I had to wait for an eternity to finally make this dish. As with all BM's I have been so without any ideas on both the themes I did this edition. However when compared with the first week, I knew I will be able to make the second week where I am supposed to dress up a leftover with new avatar! Imagine making something to become leftover and then creating this dish. I confess on few occasion, it was more of an idea than the actual dish being a leftover. But then I guess it's all fair in blog and war, if I may to borrow and change the cliche!

Coming back to the Shahi Tukra, do I have to say that Konda loved it? I almost thought that she was just giving me those expressions just to please. You never know right, just so that I confirmed with Hubby dear on the taste and he said the dish did match her ecstatic expression. I was happy hearing that naturally. And know that this is something that will be featured more often.

In spite of this being a rich and creamy dessert, I wanted to make sure I reduced and modified something in this. The bread is supposed to be deep fried. I wanted to avoid and shallow fried it. I seriously don't know how much of a taste that must change, but presume it to be a small bit when you consider the amount of calories it must otherwise give you.

And to make sure I fit the theme, I used leftover bread. I pinged Harini to confess if she was okay with me using a leftover bread. She was and that's the reason why you get to read about this Shahi tukda and drool over it.

Step by Step picture Recipe

Shahi Tukra Recipe | Shahi Tukda

Ingredients Needed:

For the bread

Bread slices - 4
Ghee - 2 tsp
Oil - 2 tsp

For the Cream Sauce

Condensed Milk - 1/2 cup or 4 tsp
Milk - 1/2 cup, more if you want
Corn flour - 1 & 1/2 tsp
Cardamom powder a pinch

For the Sugar Syrup

Sugar - 1/2 cup
Water enough to cover the sugar

Almonds and Pistachios, finely chopped for garnish.

How to make Shahi Tukra / Shahi Tukda

For the Cream Sauce:

In a bowl, take the corn flour and add 2 tsp of milk and blend well to form lump less liquid. Keep it aside.

In a pan take the condensed milk and add the rest of the milk. Bring to boil. When it starts to boil, simmer and slowly add the corn flour mix. It will thicken very fast so keep stirring constantly.

This takes only about 2 mins or so, you will have a thick mix in the pan. If required thinner the cream by adding more milk or condensed milk. Else keep it aside.

Notes: One way to get that creamy texture is to pulse this condensed paste in mixer for a smooth paste.

For the bread:

Trim the sides and cut into two or four squares depending on how you want to serve.

If you are going to shallow fry, then heat a pan add 1 tsp of ghee and oil. Once it's hot, place all the bread pieces and fry over slow flame. After couple of minutes, sprinkle the rest of the ghee and oil. Flip to the other side.

If you are going to deep fry, take a kadai with little oil and heat. When it's hot, deep fry the bread pieces in batches. You will have to add more oil/ghee as you finish up the whole lot as the bread will dunk more oil/ghee.

Deep frying will make the bread to be very crisp, while the shallow frying will take longer time to become hard.

Once done, remove and keep it aside.

For the Sugar Syrup

In a pan, take the sugar and water, bring to boil. Remove impurities if any.

Continue boiling till you get a sticky syrup which will be 1 thread consistency. Switch off the flame and remove.

Dip the fried bread into the sugar syrup and remove to a plate. When you are done with all the bread pieces, arrange in a plate.

Scoop a spoonful of condensed milk cream on each bread piece and garnish with finely chopped almond and pistas.

Serve hot or chilled.

These will make a great dessert for a party both for adults and kids as well!

If you want to make this a rich affair then you really won't be able to indulge in this frequently. I think this low fat, low calorie will suit all our requirement!

Sending this to Harini who is hosting Kid's Delight, themed on Dressing up Leftovers for Kids

With this we are done with the Blogging Marathon Edition #9

I did Indian Festival Food with Step by Step pictures for the first week

• Moong Dal Laddu | How to make Pesara Pappu Ladoo
• Pesara Karapusa | Moong Dal Ompodi / Sev
• Badam Katli | How to make Badam Katli in Microwave
• Chum Chum Recipe | How to make Cham Cham
• Thattai Recipe | How to make Thattai
• Chandrakanthalu Recipe | How to make Chandrakantha
• Besan Ki Burfi | How to make Besan Ki Barfi in Microwave

And the theme "Dressing up Leftovers for Kids" for the second week.

• Leftover Idlis with Spice Powder in Microwave
• Leftover Rice Pakodas | Pakodas with leftover Rice
• Leftover Chapati Pizza | Indian Style Quesadilla
• Paratha with leftover dal
• Leftover Vegetable Cutlet | Cutlet with leftover Vegetables
• Sweet Poli with Badam Katli | Cashew Almond Nuts Poli

Hope you enjoyed reading these as I had enjoyed making them.


Check out the Blogging Marathon page for the other Blogging Marathoners doing BM#9

Paratha with leftover dal | Cooking with leftovers | Step by Step Recipes

I wish all my readers a great Deepavali / Diwali!

Check out my Deepavali treats that we made.

For today's Marathon post, it was a simple paratha with Masoor dal. Konda had it for her breakfast and liked it a lot.

Parathas are always a great hit with kids. You can use anything that's leftover and mix into the atta to make parathas. These are ideal dishes for packing for kid's lunch box. I normally make with aloo, paneer, dal etc. You can just about add anything to the flour and make parathaas. Serve with curds and pickle. My daughter prefers this to other lunch boxes.

I used Masoor ki Dal

Take wheat flour, add the dal. You will need to add extra chili powder, salt and cumin powder as the dal will be bland when you use it later.

Knead to a stiff dough.

Heat a tawa. Roll out as parathas. Since kids like small rotis, I used a mold to cut out smaller parathas.

Cook on greased tawa on both sides and serve!

Sending this to Harini who is hosting Kid's Delight, themed on Dressing up Leftovers for Kids

Check out the Blogging Marathon page for the other Blogging Marathoners doing BM#9

Leftover Chapati Pizza | Cooking with Leftovers | Step by Step Recipe

For the third day cooking with leftovers, I finally made something I had forever wanted to make. I knew it will be awesome and it surely met the assumption. I had read about this idea during my initial years of blogging and loved it so much. I really wonder what made me wait for so many years to make it.

Somehow unlike all the previous dishes, I literally used leftover chapati and lentils that were made for the previous dinner. Amma had made these navarata sundal and had some leftover. I was happy that I was able to lay my hands on something so colourful.

I used Amul Cheese, I am sure mozzarella would have tasted even more delicious. There is really no recipe for this. You just do it as you go.

Pizza with leftover Chapati

Ingredients Needed:

Chapatis - 2
Navadhanya Sundal - 1 cup
Cheese - 2 cubes
Pizza sauce - 2 tsp
Tomato Ketchup - 1 tsp
Table butter - 1 tsp

How to make pizza with leftover chapatis.

Make the chapatis as you regularly make.

Make your navadhanya sundal.

For making the pizza, spread the chapatis, apply the butter on half of the chapatis., spread the pizza sauce then add grated cheese.

On this place the sundals. Sprinkle sauce. Add grated cheese again. Cover over this with the other half. Press well.

Microwave for a minute.

Cut and serve!

Sending this to Harini who is hosting Kid's Delight, themed on Dressing up Leftovers for Kids

Check out the Blogging Marathon page for the other Blogging Marathoners doing BM#9

Royal Idli ~ Leftover Idli delight | Step by Step Recipe

I didn't actually look into what the recipe called for when I decided I was going to make these Royal Idlis that I have been having in my files, filed under Dishes for Kids. When I saw the recipe, I was impressed as it called for adding a mix of dals to the cooked idlis. This is more like what you will do with leftover idlis. And it looked very much like how you might do with Paruppu Usli.

Since I normally don't make excess idlis, I had to make them fresh and do this version. I think these are called Royal Idlis because they are glorified into a new tasty dish. These are protein packed as I added two types of lentils to it and spicy too. As it was to be a kid's special, I made them with less spicy but then again added more when it became our breakfast too.

The measurement I have given is little mild, so increase the lentil if you prefer or your kid prefers and make it a bit spicy too.

This may not be a recipe that requires step by step, but since I had the luxury of having time on hand, I ended up making it so. It so happened that Amma ended up making noodles for the kids and naturally they were more interested in that.

Step by Step pictures to see how to dress up Idlis.

Steam the idlis as you regularly will do.

Have the ingredients required to do the seasoning ready.

Soak equal amount of Toor dal and Channa dal for 20 mins

Grind them to a coarse paste along with Red and Green Chilies. The green chilis were the tender ones and were so spicy.

Meanwhile have a non stick pan on flames, add oil and green chilis, curry leaves, red chilis, mustard, urad and channa dal for seasoning.

Add the finely chopped onions.

Add turmeric and saute till the onions are brown.

Now add the ground lentil paste. Mix well.
 

Cut the idles into small pieces like this.

Once the dals paste is cooked well, add the cut idli pieces.

Using a ladle firmly press them and mix well.

Royal Idli ~ How to make leftover Idlis pretty!

Idlies - 8

For the lentil paste

Toor dal, channa dal -  1 cup together
Red chilis - 1 long
Green Chilis - 2 long (* tender ones)
Salt to taste

For Seasoning:

Oil - 2 tsp
Onions - 2 medium
Urad dal  1/4 tsp
Bengal gram - 1/4 tsp
Mustard - 1/4
Curry leaves
Red Chilis - 1 long
Green chillies - 2
Cashew -  4 or 5
Salt t taste

Method to prepare:

Make Idlis the usual way. See how to make Idlis

To make the Lentil paste:

Soak both the dals in water for 2 hrs and drain it completely. Grind them with salt, chillies coarsely. Dals can be soaked for just 30 mins also, since the paste will be fried in oil.

To make the seasoning:

Heat oil in a pan, do seasoning and once it splutters, add finely chopped onions, curry leaves and saute well till onions brown. Then add the ground dal paste and cook till it becomes crumbly.

Meanwhile, cut idlis into small pieces.

Once the dal is cooked, add the cut idlis to the pan, mix well and cook for 5 mins with lid covered. Make sure you blend the idlis with the lentil mix well.

Finally fried cashews. This is of completely optional.

For adults you can sprinkle Podi over the idlis. For kids you can serve with ketchup.

Notes:

The Green chilis that I used were tender ones and weren't spicy at all. Please adjust to your variety.
The lentil amount I used wasn't really more in the end, so increase if you want.

This was really tasty when I sprinkled Amma's Podi over it and served.

Other dressed up Idli ideas

Masala Idli
Idli Upma