Rich Recipe of Bhetki

I must not say that I am a very good cook(er) but it is one of my hobbies to prepare different kind of foods at least twice a month. But it is your back luck that I am very irregular. Just kidding. Seriously I want to be here as much as I spend my times in bedroom.

Chennai is a metro city in India like Kolkata...but I am still not very familial with it and the main cause is nothing but its temperature. But you know, its already 11 weeks past, and the city becoming adorable to me. Oh, I became emotional!! :-D

May be you are thinking that why am I writing all these. I am writing this because my guardians from kolkata (at least no one is here to irritate us) continuously ask me to prepare oil free or less oily dishes. Why? Sam (my husband) had just put on some cholesterol. But you know doctors have already declared that this is under marginal level.

So, for those above mentioned reasons...I cook light dishes mostly. Daal, Sabji or sometimes kababs, and light fish/chicken curry (sometimes mutton/beef) exist in our daily routine. But it makes me happy, when Sam asks me for a dinner outing. And sometimes I/we also try to make new dishes...we are madly foodie.

So, for the recipe you will need

• Bhetki fish (Known in Thai language as pla kapong, it is very popular in Thai cuisine. It is known as koduva in the Tamil language, kalaanji in Malayalam language, pandugappa in the Telugu language in India) - 5/6 pieces 
• Onion- 2 large and a half
• Garlic- 6 cloves
• Ginger paste- 1 tsp
• Mustard paste- 3 tsp 
• Tomato- 1 medium
• Green chili- 4 (its spicy)
• Turmeric powder
• Bay leafs- 2
• Cumin seeds- 1 tsp
• Methi seeds- 1 tsp
• Dry chili- 1
• Salt- as taste
• Sugar- half teaspoon 

and that's all.

Now fry the fishes well and keep aside.

Make a paste of Onion, tomato, garlic and chili.

whole masala paste

mustard paste

Now take flat pan, pour mustard oil about 2/3 tbsp and allow it to heat. Then give all the forans i.e. bay leaves, cumin seeds, methi seeds and dry chili.

When you will find a good smell coming from it, pour all the whole masala paste in that pan and saute. Keep cooking until the masala starts to extract oil. (In the mean time put turmeric powder, salt and sugar) Pour the mustard paste. Saute again for 30 seconds.

Now put all the fishes their with 1 small cup of water, cover it, make the heat/flame low and cook for 4-5 minutes. You may keep the flaming more, you just need to make it somewhat dry.

And it's done...  
  

I wish, those who are spice lovers, will love this recipe... Trust me, it doesn't take much time to prepare and you can also serve it to guests...

Happy Cooking.....

Book review: Psycho 

I created this blog much before but lazy me have found no interest to push myself to write down something. You guys will find 3 to 4 posts in all. Today I thought to write another masterpiece ;-) . 

Last night I've started to read the suspense novel Psycho written by Robert Bloch and it was amazing. I have read a bengali translation of the book and it has only 123 pages, and I should complete it yesterday, but it is also obvious that a house wife like me has countless jobs and she can only read in a leisure time if she had. So I found it today after lunch hour when Samrat had started toward his office. 

Well, well, well, one of the most beautiful story is in my hand I can say. Its a bestseller and a worldwide accepted psychological thriller written on 1959. This is the story of Norman Bates, his old-mean-tempered mother, and two sisters Mary and Lila though other characters came inevitably. It is said that the story was based on a true incident occurred on 1957 called the case of Ed Gein. Bloch wrote two sequels, Psycho II (1982) and Psycho House (1990) but I don't have them right now. 

It was a bengali translation, but in relation with other translated books, this was much much better (surely you won't expect the real flavor of main script). The novel was adapted in 1960 into the feature film by director Alfred Hitchcock of the same name. Anish Das Apu is a good interpreter and did a good judgement with this book.