Four entries to Pasta Party event

Jo from Panch pakwan is hosting a Pasta Party. Few recipes I posted in the past are ready to dive in to the event. Re-posting the links here. Thanks Jo for hosting such a wonderful event with a wonderful logo!

Pasta with roasted vegetables
http://manaliscravings.blogspot.com/2009/12/baked-pasta-with-roasted-vegetables.html




Asparagus Pesto pasta
http://manaliscravings.blogspot.com/2009/08/asparagus-pesto-pasta-with-sundried.html




Sun dried tomato pasta
http://manaliscravings.blogspot.com/2008/12/hhdd-24-pesto-another-entry-for-round.html




Simple yet tasty pasta
http://manaliscravings.blogspot.com/2008/08/really-simple-pasta.html

Steamed Spinach Diamonds

A quick healthy snack, a healthy version of traditional dhokla. Mixture of  soaked rice, soaked urad dal, cooked rice and fenugreek seeds steamed to perfection. Add the spinach before steaming. Enjoy with tomato ketchup or mint chutney/ tamarind chutney.

1 cup of rice
4tbsp urad dal
1/4th cup cooked rice
1 tsp fenugreek seeds

Soak the rice and the urad dal for about 6-7 hours. Mix the fenugreek seeds in to the dal before soaking. After 7 hours, grind the mixture and let it ferment for about15-16 hours. Less or more time is required  as per the weather. After the mixture gets fermented well, add the shredded spinach , salt to taste and pour the mixture in to the container and steam for about 15-20 minutes. You can also add jeera (cumin seeds) or ajwain before steaming the diamonds. Cut them in to diamond shapes and serve hot with any kind of chutney you like.

Baked Vegetable Spring Rolls

Now a days, I want everything baked. I love spring rolls, can't eat them often as they are always fried when you order them in any restaurant. I decided to try the baked version instead and loved it. It isn't as crisp as a fried version, still it satisfies my Craving for it.

Roadmap-:
Shreded cabbage, carrots, green beans, spring onions, and rice noodles. Saute everything in a sauce pan with corn flour mixed in a water and a dab of  soy sauce. Season it with a pinch of salt. Wrap the mixture in a egg roll, and roll to make spring rolls.

You will need:-

• Thinly sliced cabbage
• Thinly sliced  carrots
• Thinly sliced  green beans
• Thinly sliced green bell pepper (capsicum)
• Spring onions- cut in pieces
• Ginger thinly sliced
• rice noodle- soaked in water, ready to go in.
• Soy Sauce- 2-3 tbsp
• Corn Flour mixed in water
• Egg roll wraps ( you can also use spring roll wrappers)
• Some olive oil
• Canola oil 

For dipping sauce-

• Say sauce 
• tomato chilli sauce
• vinegar

Stuffing-:

• In a pan, heat some olive oil and add the ginger. Add thinly sliced veggies except spring onions to it and over the low to medium heat saute everything for a minute. 

NOTE-The key here is not to cook the veggies completely it should have a nice crunch to it. Also keep in mind that, these rolls are going to cook in the oven even further. So keep them on the stove top for not more than 4-5 minutes.

• Add the soy sauce and the cornflour mixed in  water to the veggies. mix everything well. Season it with some salt and black pepper. Keep in mind that the soy sauce also contains salt. 
• Add the spring onions that we kept aside.
• Take the mixture off the heat.

Putting everything together-:

• Before we start putting everything together, preheat the oven to 375 F.
• Place one of the egg roll wrapper on a plate. 
• Take a spoonful of stuffing and place it in the middle of the wrapper.

• Fold the lower corner, as shown in the picture.

• Fold the wrapper from both the sides, refer to the picture.

• Apply a dab of water on both the sides so that the edges will stick nicely preventing the stuffing from coming out. 
• Roll the spring roll from bottom to top. Put required pressure to seal the deal....:)
• Brush both the sides of the spring rolls with some canola oil. Prepare the rest of the spring rolls the same way.
• Spray the baking sheet with non-stick cooking  spray and place all the spring rolls on it. 

• Bake them for about 15 minutes and then turn them once. Bake for another 10 and they should be done.

•  They will be golden brown on outside due to the canola oil and the vegetables should have nice crunch inside.

For the dipping sauce-: I love mint chutney as dipping, but you can also mix some soy sauce tomato chilli sauce and very little vinegar as a dipping sauce. Just eyeball everything as per your taste.

Enjoy-: