1 in 5 children struggles with hunger, What are we doing about it?

What would you do if you had $4 for food everyday? Would you be able to make a choice between eating healthy or getting a good deal for your money. Around 58 million Americans, have to make these choices everyday and around 16 million children live in families who struggle to put a meal on the table. It is astonishing that a country that produces so much food has to deal with problems like this. Sixteen million children will fill over 845 basketball arenas!!! ( Statistics from: nokidhungry.org).  That is a lot of children !

What can we do to help the situation ?? A Place at the table outlines, what the hunger problem in America is, It focuses on 4 real people affected by hunger and possible solutions. Here is a trailer for you to watch. The movie is available on youtube, you can watch it and invite your friends to watch it with you too.

Nicole Gullota, has started a movement , "Food Bloggers against Hunger". As a policy student, I am glad to be doing something to spread awareness on this issue. I have been fortunate to always have access to healthy food. When my sister and me where in school, every weekend before visiting the temple, my family used to hand out food packets to the homeless. It was a ritual we followed religiously for many years. 

For the whole of next week, my challenge will be to cook dinner with pantry staples and using ingredients with a budget of only $4 for 2 people. Why $4, you might ask. Americans who are on the SNAP (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program) program have a budget of around $4/meal, allocated to them. SNAP enables low-income individuals and families purchase food so that they can have a nutritious diet. 

I am sure if we all work together, we can create positive changes in the communities in which we live. I am going to end with this very empowering Henry Ford quote that says "One of the greatest discoveries a person makes, one of their greatest surprises, is to find they can do what they were afraid they couldn't do."

My mom's famous Methi Chai Puris

Every time I travel from home, my mom has to pack a box full of these chai puri's. Last time I didnt eat any on the trip, and saved them for later. I love these chai puris they have a nice spice and crunch to them and go well with your evening coffee/tea.

These puris are some effort, and are best made in large quantities so you dont need to keep making them over and over. The recipe I have will give you around 40-50 medium sized puris. But if you make them smaller, you ll get even more. This recipe is our favorite namkeen and is usually made during Diwali.

Tea, chai puris, a great book to relax 

Chai puris

Ingredients:

All purpose flour - 2 cups
Rava - 1 cup
Quick cooking Oats - 3/4 cup
Fresh Methi - 1 cup  / Kasuri methi  - 2 tbsp
Jeera
Salt - to taste
Crushed Pepper - to taste
Red chilli flakes ( optional)
Ghee - melted.
Oil for deep frying.

Make a stiff dough using all the above ingredients. Use as little water as possible to make the dough. Close it and keep it aside for half an hour.

Rolling out the puris

Close-up view 

Keep the oil to heat up in a frying pan. Roll into small puris, make sure it is thick and not very thin. Take a knife or a fork to make holes in the puris.

Once the oil is hot, fry the puris until they are a golden brown. Take them out and put them on a tissue paper for oil to drain.

Enjoy with hot tea or coffee. These puris are a health snack as they are made at home :) . Store the puris in an air tight container, so they stay fresh.

I hope you enjoy making these, let me know how yours turned out.

- Yanka

Yoghurt Parfait

The weather has been funny here in Portland. On one side there are dark heavy clouds and then on the other side there is the sun shining in all its glory. And when you have dary heavy clouds and a bright sun, there is a rainbow somewhere. In the past few days I have seen at least around 4 rainbows in a week ! They are indeed beautiful and exciting. Rainbows have the power to make you believe in the good and beautiful.

Well with the funny weather, comes my hunger pangs :). I get really hungry, when the clock strikes three and I go on a hunt into my refrigerator and pantry, and sometimes eat nothing or just wait till I feel really hungry. Yesterday I noticed I had some mangoes, Yoghurt and frozen blueberries and decided to make a Parfait ! It's so easy and oh so filling. And well , I assume everyone has some fruit, cereal and yoghurt lying around at home. It's an easy dish to make and comes together in a few minutes.

Yummy Yoghurt Parfait

I am sure you'll have fun making and eating it too.

* Yoghurt - 1/4 cup
* 2-3 tbps chopped fruit ( mangoes, strawberries, apples) fresh or frozen.
* Crushed cookies or sweetened cereal flakes.

Take a glass, add your chopped fruit. I had mangoes so i filled 1/4 of my cup with mangoes, Then on top of that goes the yoghurt again around 1/4 cup. I had some frozen wild blue berries, I add some of those on top of the yoghurt. For the final crunch you want to add either crushed cookies or some sweetened cereal that you might have at home !

Cereal Crunch, is awesome..

That's it now,  Sit , eat and ENJOY !!!

I am already hungry , looking at this pic .

All DONE !! :D

- Yanka

Caprese Salad

The other day , I was randomly browsing through the internet looking for Italian starters for a party I was organizing and came across this salad. Honestly, I am not sure if I have eaten it before but it look too appetizing and easy to ignore. So off I went to the grocery store picked up a few ingredients to make this delicious and oh so easy dish.

Fresh Mozzarella with balsamic vinegar reduction and basil.

Well I also looked online and learnt how to pronounce the way Italian's do ;) .. Its Ka-Pray-Say (kaprese)  see wasn that easy, Now we can all pretend we are connoisseurs of fine Italian Food.

Lets get on to the recipe.

Ingredients
3- Vine Ripened Tomatoes ( or just the fat huge tomatoes at the grocery store :D)
1 - large fresh Mozzarella cheese (you want to buy the whole big role)
1 bunch Basil leaves
Balsamic Vinegar
Salt & Pepper

* In a heavy bottomed pan take about 1-1 1/2 cups of balsamic vinegar and bring to a boil. Keep stirring while it boils , its easy to get it burned. It takes about 10 minutes for it to start getting thick & reduce.We are making a balsamic reduction here which will go over the salad. So once u have the reduction ready, take it off the pan and keep it ready.

*Wash & pat dry the tomatoes, You want to take off the stem, and cut them into thick slices.

*Take the mozzarella cheese and cut them into thick slices too, Hopefully you are not tempted to take a bite of the soft cheese like did and land up having less cheese and more tomatoes :).

* Now is the part I love, Take a long salad plate, place a slice of tomato, a slice of mozzarella, add basil leaves between the two slices and on top of the  mozzarella. Once you have done this with all the remaining slices, Drizzle balsamic vinegar , sprinkle with salt & pepper.

And don't forget to click pictures of your recipe and post them on Facebook on our webpage : CookwithAvial

Caprese Salad 

I hope to write very soon again.

- Yanka

Red Velvet Icecream with cream cheese swirl.

I must admit , I am not very good when it comes to blogging regularly, I love to write but I am just too lazy to edit pictures and upload them. Well, I will try to write at least every other week now, I have tons of recipes that I have tried and each one of them is unique. I have also been reading articles online on how to be a better blogger , every time I read an article I go from being yes yes yes that's how bad a blogger I am he he... So lets get on with our recipe for today.

Red Velvet ice cream with cream cheese swirl.

I love red velvet cupcakes, soft gooey and with cream cheese icing they are delicious :). I wish I had one with me right now. So, when it came to deciding what I wanted to make for Valentine's Day, I decided to try Red-Velvet Icecream. Oh, I havent told you yet about my ice-cream maker story. I got a great deal on a Cuisinart icecream maker and got one for my grand dad in India. But we used it in India with just a converter pin and not a step-up transformer and that burnt the entire coil. So I got it replaced ( lucky it came with a one year warranty), and now using it to make and try various ice-creams.
Coming back to red-velvet, I looked up online and found this amazing recipe for it, It came out so well, the texture, flavour and how it looked. You will need an ice cream maker for this recipe.

Here's what you'll need to make red velvet ice cream, adapted from Annie Eats:

Doesn't it look delicious :) !!!

* Red food coloring(liquid) - 1tbsp
* Cream - 1 1/2 cups
* Sugar - 3/4 cup, 3 tbsp
* cocoa powder - 1 1/2 tbsp
* Egg yolks - 6
* Buttermilk - 1 1/4 cups

In a saucepan combine the cocoa powder, sugar and heavy cream. Over medium heat whisk lightly until all three our combined and you have a chocolate cauce with no lumps and sugar has completely dissolved.

In a mixing bowl combine egg yolks and 3 tablespoon sugar. Whisk until smooth. Once the cream+chocolate+sugar mixture is ready, and cooled down add it to the eggs, whisk to combine everything together. Return this mixture to a saucepan and heat on medium high.

Keep stirring the mixture till you have a custard sauce consistency and the mixture is thick enough to coat the back of a spoon. Pour this mixture through a strainer to remove and lumps and then add the red food coloring and buttermilk. And refrigerate the mixture . This is the base for the red velvet ice cream.

Churning , to get the ice cream 

Once the mixture has been refrigerated for a few hours, use your ice cream maker to churn it, follow manufacturer's instructions.

For the cream cheese icing:

* Cream cheese - 4 oz (cold)
*Un-salted butter - 1 1/2 tbsp
*Cream - 1-2 tbsp
* Vanilla extract - 1tsp
* Sugar - 1 cup

You want to make this icing just when your ice cream is getting ready. It takes a few minutes only.

Whip the butter and cream cheese together until it has softened, add the vanilla extract and sugar and blend again. I used an electric hand mixer for this. The cream is added to loosen the icing a little. So add 1 - 2 tbsp of cream accordingly. You dont want a thin icing so be careful.

Now comes the most important part of the recipe, layering the ice cream and cream cheese swirl. I used an airtight container to do this. Using a rubber spatula I placed a layer of the ice cream and then layered it with cream cheese. By the time I go to layering the cream cheese the ice cream was already melting so I had to be quick or the two would blend together and I would not have a swirl. The original recipe suggests using a piping bag to pipe the icing on top of the ice cream. I did not have patience for this last final step, but you should try it. Follow this by adding more ice cream on top. Refrigerate for a few more hours till it has completely hardened. It took at least 4 hours for me.

Enjoy :)