Kai Holige

Wish you all a Very Happy Ugadi. Ugadi festival reminds me of childhood days. New clothes, lots of food and not to forget yummy ubatti. I still remember that song of our school days "Uga Ugadi Kaledaru"...what a lovely and meaningful lyrics. My cousin mentioned this festival is also called as "Ubbati Parab". Ubbati is a sweet dish prepared specially during Ugadi and Parab means festival in konkani.

My DH is not a big fan of chana dal. So I decided to replace ubbati with kai holige this time. He loved it ! My grandmother used to make this holige every year without fail right after Gauri festival. Because we celebrated Gauri puja at home, there used to be lots of coconut which is typically called as "vaina". It was her belief to make only sweet dishes out of vaina she used to make kai holige and distribute among her kids and their family.

Kai holige is made with coconut stuffing whereas ubbati with chana dal stuffing. We call this coconut stuffing as huran and the outside layer made with all purpose flour or maida as "kanik".This is my second attempt in preparing kai holige and this time the preparation was a bliss. Rolling after placing coconut dumpling came out perfect. This surely is a time consuming sweet dish and needs patience ! But the end result is something you can relish :)

Aamras/ Mango Pulp

Its mango season again :-) ! I just love mangoes. I used to avoid eating mangoes with a fear of gaining weight. Recently  I started reading about nutritional facts of mangoes and if it really causes weight gain the answer was "no". Wow what a relief to me ! I can have mangoes this season without any guilt !

I always buy mangoes for my DD from wholefoods. Those were so sweet and totally yum ! But I just love the ones we get from Indian grocery stores. The first mango I bought this year I could not stop myself from preparing aamras with poori. Yumilicious !

Kukka Bonda/Chinese Potato Bonda

I started this blog as a database for all the recipes I get from my family and friends. Recently one of my very good friend emailed me if I am still blogging about my collected, tested and tried recipes. Well, I completely have stopped blogging after Stuti is born. She keeps me so busy all day long ! I thought I should kick start it again. Atleast couple of recipes a week :-)

Chinese potato is nothing but kukka which we get in Mangalore. DH loves it and so does DD. When I was talking to my SIL she mentioned about this being available in US and I thought we should give it a try. Now chinese potato has been my go to "quick side dish" every time I run out of time. I make sure I always have a stock of these in the freezer.

When I mentioned about its availability to my aunt she said I must try bonda. Though I am striving to maintain a healthy non-fatty food diet, I could not resist trying this. All the ingredients and methods are exactly same as aloo bonda I posted long ago. Worth a try !