Shruthkirti attempts Rasgulla at home

The craze for Rasgulla started a few months back. Don't know where she came to know of the dish but she got obsessed with it. Went on youtube, selected a recipe. And much to our surprise selected a hindi version with English captions on it. Dutifully ( For a good 1 & 1/2 hrs) wrote the recipe by pausing at each and every line. This was during the phase of crazy writing where she was writing something or the other every day,mostly love letters to her mom & dad.
Since then she has been behind me to make Rasgullas at home and somehow in my head that seemed a frightening proposition. I have all sorts of conditioning in my head about what can be made at home and what can't..probably because I have always tasted these dishes only at marriages or parties or restaurants. Never seen anyone in my family cook some of this stuff at home. And now Chellu is slowly breaking this conditioning ..and is started with baking - cakes, muffins, BREAD!! and now the latest is Rasgulla.. I kept putting it off till a few days back she sat with me and patiently explained to me that it is not as hard as it looks . The look is her eyes finally broke my fear and laziness and I decided to make her wish come true.

Yesterday we kicked off the process. Bought some milk since that's one ingredient that's no longer available anymore in our house. We watched the recipe on youtube again and it seemed really easy. We set off to do it and Chellu was the one who did most of the tasks. I supervised and helped her a bit.The part I contributed the most was making the dough soft. She also took over the gas part of the cooking for most of the time. She would also go and check out the recipe video from time to time to ascertain that we were on the right track.  The Rasgullas came out fantastic and once again I'm all in admiration of this child who is so driven with her passion to cook. When she is cooking she is a diffn child. Her whole being glows in her enthusiasm. It is during such times that  I experience true learning with her. When body, mind and soul are in tune. I am always amazed at how she starts something out of her pure interest and covers all the ground in research to make it to happen.

Here are the pictures.

Squeezing lemons

Filtering the "chenna"

Squeezing out all the water to make the perfect chenna 

Washing the chenna with water to get rid of lemon's sourness

Kneading the chenna to make it soft

Preparation of sugar syrup

Making Rasgulla balls

Boiling the chenna balls in sugar syrup

Very happy !

Yummy Rasgullas ready to be refrigerated!

Experiments with atta or wheat dough : Banana Choco Mousse

Shruthkirti went through a phase of being obsessed with cooking with dough. She would try all sorts of combinations and put it in the microwave to see how it comes out.

Today we attempt Banana Choco cake:
1 cup wheat flour
1/2 cup gud
 1/2 cup butter
4 bananas
1/2 tsp cocoa powder
1/2 tsp baking soda

She proceeded to put it in the microwave. But it turned out to be a mousse instead of a cake. She was happy though with the results. Gave it a shape and decorates it with colored sugar crystals. 

Shruthkirti attempts her first gas cooked subji.

On this day's morning the first thing Chellu wanted to do was to make her own subji. She gets up and declares her agenda for the day - " I want to make my own subji!:"

She proceeded to chop the veggies: tomatoes, beans, red & white  pumpkin. And she carefully did the tadka  and cooked the veggies till they were done.

And then served it with some lemon pieces to up the tanginess.

Karadayaa Nombu cooking

Shruthkirti helps me with great care for the Kaaradayaa nombu cooking. Diligently made adais and decorates it with sugar balls! when I told her that she needs to have a hair bath to help me make the prasad she immediately agreed! Kutti madi maami!

Festivals are one of the best ways to include children in adult activities.And cooking always scores number one in that sense in our family. Making the prasadam together brings a great .sense of family togetherness and joy .After all isn't that why festivals are celebrated in the first place?

Chocolate sauce

Shruthkirti experiments with making chocolate sauce or drinking chocolate.
Mixed choco powder, vanilla essence and jaggery. And enjoyed it! :))

She seems to love to make sauces of all sorts. Probably quenches her need for implementation and is also very easy to make. No gas cooking or mommy's help needed. 

Chellu attempts her own version of gulab-jaumn for Diwali

Chellu had made her own version of gulab-jamuns this Diwali. She wanted to gift it to her building friends.  It was a mixture of rice-flour, brown sugar powder , honey with a stuffing of plums. She rolled into neat balls. I fried it for her. She also learned how to make sugar syrup.

Then Shreedhari helped with packing the jamuns into boxes. Chellu wrapped them up. The younger one then stacked them all into a neat row. 

Then off they went to gift it to their building friends!

A potential power struggle turns into a creativity burst

Yesterday night was one of those nights again. Its been happening for quite a few days now. A lot of power struggle with Chellu over food. " Yuck I don't like this , I don't like that"..And its strange coming from a child who has NEVER had a problem with any veggies. Well that's children! Nothing is predictable.

Yesterday by dinner time I was too tired. The menu was caulifower subji, roti & rice with yogurt. She was in rage over the choices she had and I just gave up. I told her that it was either the menu or nothing for her. She got really angry and declared " Alright then I'll make my own "..She opened the cabinets and the fridge and the masala dabba and surveyed what was available. And then after some pondering , started working on her food. The result: A chutney made of salt, haldi & some hing and a dessert: a grapes lollipop. She basically took out 2 straws, joined them and poked two grapes one after the other to resemble a lollipop.

I didn't taste either of them but Kunju was going gaga over both the inventions and declared that the chutney tasted much better with the rotis than with the subji.

One of the other evenings when the same situation arose, Chellu came up with chocolate cream. Take heavy cream , mix it with chocolate & vanilla !

Looks like the days of " no cooking by mom" are soon approaching!