Ground Chicken Pot Pie

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Assalamu alaikum and hello!

It’s been awhile since I completed a blog post… so much has been going on and keeping me busy, I’ll reveal a BIG surprise soon (stay tuned!)!! The weather is getting chilly- so today I decided to make some comfort food-ground chicken pot pie. First time making this and my stomach is rumbling from the delicious aroma that has taken over my home!

RECIPE

 Ingredients

1 package of butter puff pastry

1/2 onion, diced

3 tablespoons vegetable oil

1 lb ground beef or ground chicken

1 cup frozen vegetables [I used carrots, peas and green beans medley]

Salt and pepper to taste

Mozzarella cheese

1 egg, whipped

 Directions

**Take the butter puff pastry out of the freezer and allow it to thaw on the counter for 2 hours prior to beginning this recipe**

*Pre-heat oven to 450 degrees*

Add the oil to a pot set to medium heat.

Dice up the onions and add to the pot. Sauté until golden in colour.

Then add the frozen vegetables to the pot. I prefer small cuts of vegetables so I used diced carrots, green beans and peas.

Add salt and pepper to taste-I used about half a teaspoon salt and 1 teaspoon of black pepper.

Sauté the onions and vegetables together for 3 minutes.

Turn up the stove to a medium/high setting. Now add your ground beef or ground chicken. I clearly used ground chicken 🙂

Mix well and cook for 10 minutes, stirring every so often.  Once the meat is cooked, turn the stove to a lower setting allowing the excess liquid to evaporate. [I let mine simmer for another 10 minutes].

While the cooked meat was simmering-I prepared my ramekins:

Spray or brush each ramekin with oil.

There were two rolls of puff pastry in the package I used. Gently take out one of the puff pastries out of its packaging and roll it out in order to get the quantity of pieces you need. I rolled out the dough so that I could get 6 circles using a cookie cutter I had. In total, I cut out 12 circles (6 for the bottom of the ramekins, and 6 for the top of the pot pie)

In each ramekin-place a circle of the dough and press it along the sides of the dish.

When the meat is done, proceed to assembling the pot pie:

  1. Add a couple of tablespoons of the meat mixture to each ramekin, covering the puff pastry at the bottom.
  2. Take a handful of cheese and place on top of meat.
  3. Add some more of the meat mixture on top of the meat
  4. Place the second puff pastry circle on top and using your hands or a fork, press the dough into the sides of the dish.
  5. Poke a few holes with a fork in the puff pastry to allow steam to escape.
  6. Brush each top of puff pastry with the egg mixture to get a beautiful shine.
  7. Continue step 1-6 until all ramekins are done.

Place the ramekins on a large baking sheet and then on the lowest cooking rack, place in the oven.

Cook for about 15 minutes. Take a fork and test the top of the puff pastry, if it comes out clean, the pot pie is done. A golden crispy top is another way of knowing they are ready.

Allow the pot pies to sit for 5 minutes before serving.

Enjoy!!!!!!!!

 

 

 






Yogurt Parfait

 

RECIPE

 Ingredients

1/3 cup greek yogurt [I used coconut flavour]

1 kiwi, sliced

4-5 strawberries, sliced

1/2 banana, sliced

1/3 cup blueberries

1 tablespoon granola

 Directions

In a serving dish of your choice [I used a round glass but mason jars are great too!], place a tablespoon of the yogurt at the bottom of the glass

Next, add a layer of the kiwi followed by another layer of yogurt.

Continue alternating your fruit and yogurt layers until you reach the top of your serving dish.

Sprinkle with granola and serve right away 🙂

Enjoy!

 






Chaat Papri

What is chaat papri you ask? It is a popular Pakistani savoury snack filled with delicious fresh ingredients and flavours. I learnt how to make chaat papri out of necessity-here’s why: when we first got married my hubby kept insisting he knew of a place that served “the best chaat papri”, so we went to the most random desi shop in Mississauga (I don’t remember the name lol) and had it. I was not impressed, the spices were just too powerful and did not combine well with the ingredients and most importantly, it did not taste fresh! I think my hubby was a bit disappointed that I hadn’t liked it but I think having come from living with my parents and eating my mom’s amazing food (mashAllah!) for almost 24 years, I had high standards of what food should taste like! LOL 🙂 Anyways, the next day while hubby was at work, I went to the nearest Halal grocery shop, Apna Farm in Mississauga, and got the papri, yogurt, the spices and the other ingredients and made it my mission to make a delicious chaat papri for him! Alhumdullilah he loved it and we never went back to that random chaat selling shop ever again! *success*

RECIPE

Ingredients

Papri

3 medium potatoes, boiled, unpeeled and cubed (bite size)

2-3 medium tomatoes, cubed (bite size)

1 large onion, sliced thin then cubed (bite size)

1-3 green hot chilli peppers, chopped

1 medium sized can chickpeas, drained

1 container of natural yogurt

KFI brand: Hot & Spicy Tamarind Date Chutney Sauce

KFI brand: Spicy Mint Chutney Sauce

1/2 teaspoon salt

Laal mirch (red hot pepper) – *amount dependent on how spicy you like your food*

Chaat masala

Directions

Start off by boiling the potatoes ***kashmirifoodie quick tip: or you can cook them in the microwave-pierce the potatoes with a fork several times over the surface of the potatoes. This allows steam to escape from the potato*** Cook until tender then un-peel and cube into bite sized pieces

Chop, slice and cube the tomatoes and onion and green hot chilli pepper and set aside

In a serving bowl, you are now going to layer and build up the chaat papri:

1. Start off by putting down a layer of the papri at the bottom of the bowl

2. Drizzle some yogurt over the papri

3. Sprinkle some of the onions, tomatoes, potatoes and chickpeas over top

4. Take a 1/2 teaspoon of chaat masala and sprinkle it on top all over. Do the same with the laal mirch (red hot pepper), but only add as much or as little as you can handle because it will get spicy! I used 1/2 of a 1/2 teaspoon laal mirch (red hot pepper).

5. Take a pinch of salt and sprinkle that all over

6. Now take the mint chutney sauce and drizzle it evenly over top-as much or as little as you like, I tend to go easy on this one)

7. Then take the tamarind date chutney sauce and drizzle that on top-as much or as little as you like, I tend to put a lot of this as it brings a beautiful sweetness to the chaat)

8. Add a few green hot chilli peppers and sprinkle a few on top

Now repeat steps 1 to 7 all over again. Do these steps until your serving bowl is filled.

Once you have reached the top of you serving bowl, create a lovely artistic design with the tamarind date chutney sauce and the mint chutney sauce and garnish with coriander. Remember, we eat with our eyes first!

You are done! Pat yourself on the back and get ready to devour this chaat papri because it is like no other you have tried before!

Enjoy!

 

***Just some extra photos I pulled off google for you-I forgot to take my own photos:

This is the papri I used-it can be found in most Pakistani/Indian grocery stores:

 

 

 

 

 

This is the mint chutney sauce I used:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This is the tamarind date sauce I used:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 






Kashmiri Pakistani Kabobs

RECIPE

Ingredients

1 pound ground beef or ground chicken

1 medium onion

2-3 stalks green onion

1/2 tomato

4 green chilli peppers

1/2 cup fresh coriander

3 or 4 fresh mint leaves

1 teaspoon cumin seeds

1 teaspoon coriander seeds

3/4 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon laal mirch (red chilli pepper)

1/2 teaspoon garam masala OR chaat masala (both can be found in Halal grocery stores)

1 egg

 Directions

Using a mortar and pestle, crush the cumin seeds and coriander seeds gently [so like roughly and not a complete grind]

Set that aside

In a food processor, add the onion, green onions, tomato, green chilli peppers, coriander and mint leaves and mix this up roughly on medium speed

Add this mix to the meat in a metal mixing bowl along with all of the spices and mix everything together-use your hands for best results [you can wear disposable gloves if touching meat isn’t your thing]

Once everything is incorporated, add in the egg and mix it throughout

Wash your hands thoroughly or dispose of gloves 🙂

Make patties for burgers or oval kabobs as pictured above

Now you have two options for cooking:

1. Fry these baby’s up: Set stove to medium heat and in a pan add vegetable oil coating the entire bottom surface. Add a few kabobs to the pan at a time leaving space in between. Cook until browned evenly on all sides and inside. This is for the professionals. I personally do not use this method often but my mama does and they are yummmmmmy. I usually cut one kabob open to check to see it’s thoroughly cooked!

2. Bake the kabob’s in the oven. This is the safer choice-avoid oil splatters and cooks evenly throughout-this is the no worry method and my go to! Set oven to 450, and in a baking tray coated with vegetable oil, line the kabobs up leaving a bit of space between each piece. Place in oven and cook for about 30-45 minutes depending on your oven. Remember to rotate your kabobs in the pan halfway through to cook evenly.

Serve with biryani and raita {yoghurt with cucumbers and chaat masala} or make a kabob wrap and enjoy!!!!!!!!

 

**Stay tuned for recipes on raita, chaat papri and masoor ki daal!**

***E-mail me suggestions on other recipes you’d like to see!***






Crepes!

Ahh crepes! How I love thee. I was first introduced to crepes many many years ago when my younger sister had to make them for her high school french immersion food project (try saying that three times quickly-tongue twister!!) So naturally, my mom made them for her LOL. All I know is, my sister speaks french fluently (mashAllah) and I am thankful she had this project and my mom learnt to make these amazing crepes and passed the recipe down to me! It’s pretty easy once you get the hang of it. You have to work fast in rotating that pan to evenly coat the pan with the batter. And the best thing is, you can eat these any time of the day and change the filling/toppings up to fit the meal (but that’s another blog post 😉  )  Here ya’ll go:

RECIPE

Ingredients

1 cup all-purpose flour [or whole wheat/multigrain flour like I used!]

2 eggs

1/2 cup milk

1/2 cup water

1/4 cup sugar

1/4 teaspoon salt

2 tablespoons butter, melted

OPTIONAL TOPPINGS (can substitute with other goodies):

Oreos

Caramel sauce

Chocolate sauce

Cream cheese frosting

Vanilla Ice cream

Directions

In a large mixing bowl, whisk together the flour and the eggs. Gradually add in the milk and water, whisking to combine. Add the salt and melted butter; beat until smooth.

Heat a lightly oiled/buttered frying pan (non-stick preferably!) over medium high heat.

Pour or scoop the batter onto the centre of the pan/griddle, using approximately 1/4 cup for each crepe and tilt the pan in a circular motion so that the batter coats the pan surface evenly.

Cook the crepe for about 2 minutes, until the bottom is light brown.

Loosen with a spatula, flip and cook the other side.

Your crepe is now ready! I have spread my crepe (pictured above) with a Betty Crocker cream cheese frosting (mmm!), with mashed up Oreo’s topped with a single scoop of vanilla ice cream which was drizzled with caramel and chocolate sauce!! All sorts of topping combinations can be had on crepes: fresh fruit, different flavours of ice cream, brownies, etc-the possibilities are limitless (my mouth is watering as I type this out!!!!!)

**Note: remember to re-butter the pan lightly after each crepe is made to prevent sticking to the pan **

 






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