Category Archives: indian food

Fall riding and Indian food

Boy it has gotten cold outside now! It was in the 30s this morning when I got up. I have a feeling it is going to be a long, long winter coming up. Perfect morning for cream of wheat with pumpkin!

It was a busy day. Still really, really busy with work. Not screaming so much, but still uber busy. My little fingers are just typing away!!

I was able to get out for a bike ride today. It was cold, but there was sun and very little wind, so it was time to bundle up and ride!

We are past peak foliage here and now leaves are dropping.

Remember this?

It now looks like this:

The foliage season is too short! Got in another 8 miles today. 103 miles to go!!

I won the football picks this week after letting John have a turn. I am rolling this year. I am in the lead for the picks for the whole year among 4 of us 😀 (John’s sister and her partner play as well).

Anyway, it was time for Indian food! We started with naan, of course:

And I decided on something a little different.

This is an egg chana. Basically a chana masala with hard boiled egg on top. Chana means chickpeas, and this had lots of chickpeas in a tomato based sauce. Yummers!

Pink item in the day! Stop after dinner 😀

First football dinner!

Thanks for the well wishes. I am feeling better today. Tuesday and Wednesday were the worst days and now I feel like I am climbing back uphill now. Just in time for a busy weekend!

I haven’t done some daily eats in a while. Today was mostly typical, except for dinner. My oat bran brekkie:

Topped with my new love, which is cashew butter, and maple cream. Yum!

It was a busy, busy work week. That’s a good thing, though. I took a break to go for an easy 8 mile ride to get some exercise before it got hot again today. Boy it has been humid. Monster storm went through last night, too. Cool fall weather is on the way soon.

My lunch was pretty typical. Fage on top of my apple topping.

I have to show you this picture of Pixie. I never bought a kitty bed for her because I didn’t think she cared about that. She would often lay on a blanket we put out for her, but John’s soft-sided computer bag fell over and Pixie decided she would claim this as her own.

This is her new favorite spot to lay and I don’t have the heart to move the case. So, I decided that one of my projects this month is to make her a kitty bed using the other drawer that I haven’t re-purposed yet.

My afternoon snack of dried pineapple and an iced latte.

I had another half piece after my bike ride this morning.

So, the football season has begun and John and I are doing our usual dinner bets! I won the first week (the first of many weeks to come, too!!). My choice for dinner was a new place in Lake George called Tandoori Grill. They serve Indian and Pakistani food.

We got some aloo naan, which is indian bread stuff with potatoes and peas.

This was spicy, too. Not sure what else was in it.

My choice was the malai kofta, which is one of my favorite dishes. They are little vegetable dumplings in a creamy tomato based sauce.

Nom, nom, nom. I got a spice level of 5. You never know if it is an authentic spice level or americanized level. Well, this is the real deal because 5 had a good kick to it. 😀

Then we went off to Lowe’s and browsed kitchen stuff for ideas on our light remodel coming up this winter. Need to price out some different options and see what fits our budget (other than free).

And… I have now entered the realm of the smart phone.

This arrived today and I am trying to figure how the hell to get it set up because it doesn’t seem to be doing what it is supposed to. I think I am actually going to have to get Verizon on the phone. Eeek!

Recipe: Chana Masala (chickpeas)

My goal is 3 Indian dishes this month and first up is chana masala!

We have a Roku box on the TV upstairs (which I call the cuckoo box, for whatever reason) and there are wonderful channels that you can watch. ifood.tv is one of them and there is a channel devoted to Indian food, so I have been binge watching it at bedtime. My recipe is based mostly on this one with subs that work for me and my kitchen.

A lot of recipes call for tamarind paste, so I went ahead and picked some up the last time I shopped on Amazon. Tamarind is a very sour fruit and you can sub lemon juice for this, although it’s not quite as potent.

Did you know you can get a lot of gourmet foods and spices on Amazon? Not to mention free shipping with Prime! Anyway, I digress…

Ingredients:

1 can chickpeas (15 ounce), drained and rinsed
2 tbsp oil
1/2 medium onion, chopped fine
1 tsp Garam masala
1 tsp ground turmeric
2 tsp ground coriander
1/2 tsp cayenne pepper
1/2 tsp cumin seeds
1/2 tsp ground cumin (yes, both whole and ground seeds)
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp of brown sugar
1 to 2 cloves minced garlic
1 tablespoon grated fresh ginger
1/2 tsp of tamarind paste (or the juice of half a lemon)
1 1/2 tbsp of tomato paste
3/4 cup of canned diced tomatoes
2 green chilies, minced

Good use for all those spices in your cupboard! Anyway, little prep makes this dish easy to make. First, put all the dry spices and brown sugar in a small bowl:

Then put the ginger and garlic in another small bowl. I keep some ginger in the freezer and then take it out and use a microplane grater. I just use a veggie peeler to remove some of the peel and then grate:

This way your ginger won’t go bad and you will always have it on hand.

Then chop the other veggies and you are ready to cook.

In a pan, heat the oil over medium to medium-high heat and add the onions. Saute for 4 to 5 minutes until they get some caramelized color. Please note that I puree my onions. I like the flavor of onions, but hate the texture of the chunks, so I puree. Totally not necessary for people who are not weird.

Then add the bowl of dried spices and cook for 1 minute.

It looks dry, but that is okay. You are really making a curry paste here.

Add the tomato paste, tamarind paste, garlic and ginger and cook for 1 more minute.

Then carefully add the tomatoes.

Steamy!!

Turn the heat down to medium and cook for 4 minutes. Now add the chickpeas and diced green chilies.

John seeded the chilies for a little less heat. I can take it, but he is not as fond of the heat as I am.

Stir this up, cover and simmer on medium-low for 7 minutes.

After 7 minutes, uncover and add 1/2 cup of water.

Looking good! You can see where some rice spilled on the stove while making some of that on the side… and some tamarind paste. Just keeping it real around here! 😳

Cover and simmer for another 7 minutes and you are ready to serve!

I just had mine straight up, but John had his over rice.

This has lots of flavor. It was savory with some slight sour and a hint of sweet. And not too hot. I definitely would make this again. It was pretty easy and came together in about half an hour, which is good for a first time recipe for me!

I’ll get the nutrition stats for this soon. This makes about 3 good size servings, I would say. At least normal portion servings as a main meal. Ballpark guestimate right now is approximately 250-300 calories per serving.

Summer riding!

Saturday = Long Ride Day! A hot and sweaty ride, too.

John had a late poker night, so while he was sleeping, I went for a short ride in the morning around the neighborhoods before it got hot – a warmup ride, so to speak 😀

Since it was so hot, we nixed Saratoga in favor of path riding that would be more shaded. I lathered up with 70 SPF sunscreen. There has to be some overkill with that, right? How do you test 70 when there aren’t enough daylight hours to test that?

Anyway, we headed up to Lake George. Of course, we have to do street riding to get to the path. And sometimes we just choose street riding. Waiting at an intersection for the light to change.

I was sweating in a hurry. Thank goodness there was a fair amount of cloud cover because it was very humid and hot. The sun would have been roasting (like Sunday was, actually).

Hill climbing.

At the peak, this bridge overlooks the road going to the outlet malls. Look at the line of cars waiting to turn at the light.

And it’s not even Christmas!

It was surprisingly uncrowded at the lake, but then I remembered it was graduation weekend for the high schools, so many people were at ceremonies and parties.

Did I mention how hot and humid it was?

John wanted lunch in Lake George and we had a BOGO coupon for Taste of India. Apparently Taste of India is now also a hookah bar.

No hookah-smoking caterpillar, though. Who… are… you?

We started with some Naan bread.

Then I had some Shahi Paneer. Paneer is an Indian cheese. It is very mild in flavor like ricotta or cottage cheese, but has a texture similar to tofu. It’s really good. Mine was in a spicy yogurt/nut/tomato sauce.

Very good! I like Little India in Saratoga better food wise and price wise. But, when you eat in a tourist town, you have to expect that.

We walked to Shepard Park and saw a craft fair going on!

That was fun! We walked around and actually bought something. It was one of those cloth towels with a crocheted loop handle. Our towels are always falling off the oven door, so we have been looking for more towels like this. And at $3? I’ll take it!

Then it was riding for some ice cream! We headed off to Martha’s:

I was soooooo hot!! Even my forearms were sweating.

TMI, sorry. I did not get sunburned – that is reflection off of my pink shirt.

I had pumpkin ice cream with wet walnuts.

This was so good. So good! However, I was unable to finish it. Sad, but true.

We headed on home, stopping by the marsh.

Lots of people fish from this bridge, although no one was on this day.

Remember last week I posted a picture of that building that was being torn down? It’s all gone except the door:

That is one cool door, too. Wonder if they would notice if I went back and got it?

Ride stats for the day:

Total miles: 41.3

Top speed: 28.7 mph

Average speed: 12.3 mph (lazy morning ride)

Saddle time: 3 hours 35 minutes

Calories burned: 1339

My legs are feeling really good now. They should – I have almost 900 miles on the bike this season. Doing good towards that goal of 2500 for the year.

Hope all of you had a great weekend as well!

Biking season wrap up

Another super nice weekend! There are those times when life is just really good, you know? This is one of those times 😀

I did, however, have to pay for John’s football meal from week 11. He decided on Indian food, so we headed down on Saturday to Saratoga to hit up Little India:

I like this place, so I wasn’t complaining all that much!

The happy winner:

We split an order of Pashwari naan, which had coconut, raisins and ground nuts inside.

Here is the inside. So good!

My entree was paneer makhni, which is cheese cubes (paneer) in a sort of tomato sauce, but it isn’t really a tomato sauce like Italian tomato sauce. I know that doesn’t make sense if you haven’t eaten Indian food, but it is sooooo good.

John chose a vegetable korma. Loads of different veggies with potato and paneer in a korma sauce, which is like a ground nut sauce.

We also had a bowl of basmati rice to share. This meal was delicious! I wish there were Indian places closer to us, but maybe that is a good thing.

I love how they serve candied fennel seeds to aid digestion:

They are kind of like crunchy Good N Plenties!

Sunday was the day for biking and working outside. It was in the upper 50s and likely the last ride of the season! (boooo…..). I was happy to get out. I got the garden ready for winter:

I leave some stuff up for winter interest.

Then it was biking time!

We headed to South Glens Falls for the holiday parade:

This is a really long parade. Bagpipers:

Dancers:

Our next car:

The kazoo band:

Various marching bands:

We didn’t stay for the whole parade because it is really long. We then headed over to Chocolate Mill for a coffee and a snack!

This was a vanilla malt cookie and a walnut sandy (shortbread).

We headed out home on the bike path. A little wistful thinking the season is coming to an end.

This is how many miles I put on the bike since we got them outside this spring:

😯 😯 2245 miles!! That is a lot of riding. Happy riding, other than the million flat tires we had this year. 2011 season was the year of the flat tire. I need to try to figure out how many flats we had. We are in the double digits.

Anyway, good season!

Temps are now in the 40s, so that probably was the last ride.

31 miles round trip to India

Saturday is bike day! I was up pretty early, so I had a piece of toast and pear/cranberry jam.

I don’t want to say that I was waiting for John to wake up because he noted that I seem to write that a lot on my blog. So, we will just say I was up early, okay? 😉

After a couple hours, it was time for breakfast! Suzie had also sent me some samples of Cacao Bliss. I have seen this stuff on the internets, but it is not in the stores here in small town USA.

I made banana custard oats and put half of this packet on there.

Can I say that this tastes *exactly* like a melted Mounds bar? I wish I didn’t know that. I wonder if I can recreate this at home… Time fer some ‘sperimentin!

We lounged for quite a while today, as a shorter ride was planned. Instead of going south towards cupcakes, we headed north for Indian food! Last week it was to Ireland 😀

It was pretty windy today, but that just adds a nice challenge to a ride. We got to the lake after 15 miles. The fall colors are just starting to peep.

There was also a speed boat show going on. They are noisy 👿

There is always something going on at Lake George.

Not a speed boat:

Do we look hungry here?

Yes – it was time for lunch.

A Taste of India. We had a 20% off coupon (I loves me a bargain). John had the tikka kabobs (which arrived totally sizzling and drool worthy).

I had the aloo matter – which is a potato and pea dish with other veggies in a tomato based sauce, which seemed a bit creamy.

With rice – and yes, I ate a lot more than this 😀

Delicious! We were talking to our server and he seemed really amazed that we would bike 30 miles in a day. It’s funny when you become an endurance athlete (yes, I am going to go ahead and call myself that!), the idea of far distance gets really skewed. I was standing up when I was talking to the server and he sort of gave me an up and down look a couple times. The old me inside assumed he was thinking “Really? *You* can ride 30 miles?” Of course, I really have no idea what he was thinking at all and it isn’t my business what he thinks of me. Funny how old hurts and feelings just never really go away.

There was also a little craft show going on here.

A booth was selling fudge, which had a big line. And those blasted sugared nuts! Those are like kryptonite to me, and then John says they were really priced reasonably. However, I did not partake in any. Hooray for me!

That’s cause I knew I was getting something later. We headed on down to our next stop, which was 10 miles later at the library!

Like I need any more books out. I had 7, now I have 8. 😳

Then we walked over to the Chocolate Mill. Lots of lovely desserts in the case.

I ended up choosing a carrot cake cookie because it was on the smaller side. After all, we were only slated for 30 miles today LOL!

Tasty! With a cup of coffee on the side.

Then it was to home.

Ride stats:

30.5 miles

Top speed 22.9 mph

Avg speed: 12.7 mph

Calories burned: 949

It felt really good to ride today. I wasn’t even tired when we got home. There are only a couple months left of biking weather, if that. I think I am going to buy one of those indoor trainers to put my bike on for the winter time.

Stay tuned on Monday morning for a review and giveaway!

Biking and chilaxin’

Woke up to the most gorgeous morning, although it was very chilly. We hit an overnight low of 43 – can you believe that? 😯

I wanted something warm and toasty, so I made protein waffles and topped with an apple cranberry topping.

It was good enough that I am going to write down the recipe and post it next week!

I was cold waiting for coffee to brew. See my short hairs?

Very short! Now I might start growing it out again….

Even though the low was 43, the day was about as picture perfect as it could be, so we decided to bike up to the lake. We went a different route.

First up is a little bike maintenance:

Some nice scenery on this road:

Date snack!

I had 2. Isn’t this a pretty little church?

This route had some seriously hard hills! After 23 miles, we arrived at the village and were ready for lunch!

As we love to do at Lake George, we stopped at Taste of India. I think they have another location, but this one is right on the edge of the Lake and is sort of the casual beach type place. We had a coupon for buy one/get one, too! John ordered a Mango shake to try:

It was really interesting. Not like a lassi, because there was no yogurt in it. I swear there was condensed milk or coconut milk in it. Good, but quite sweet!

My choice was aloo gobi. Aloo means potato. This dish is a potato caulifower dish that is yummy! Maybe gobi means cauliflower?

It is a drier type of Indian dish and not fatty, which is a good thing 😀

John had paneer palak, which is cheese and spinach dish:

Paneer is sort of a cheese curd/cottage cheese type thing. It does not have a strong flavor and it is firm and does not melt. It’s quite good.

Served with rice and some puri – which was basically fried!

Think we will stick with naan or roti bread.

After lunch, we strolled around town. Gotta love the wax museum:

I wondered where Frankenstein was, but then I saw him!

Wandering around the street. Guess that is what monsters do around here.

We headed over to Shepards Park to have a sit and enjoy the beautiful weather. Relaxing in an Adirondack chair:

The lake was a bit chilly for swimming, but there were some people in the water. Lots of sunbathers, though.

It was so wonderful to sit and enjoy. It almost seemed like a September day, not the end of July! Mid 70s and perfect. I really do appreciate living around here.

It was time to head home, but we decided to take the regular bike path back home. The trip there was nice, but the shoulder wasn’t really wide enough for comfort.

You all know what is on the way home, right?

Honey almond yogurt with marshmallow topping. Yum! I was feeling very strong on the ride home. Funny how it takes me 20 miles to really get going. I don’t know what is up with that, but it is kind of funny. Just when John starts to get tired, I get moving.

Finished up the last 7 miles to home:

Ride stats:

Mileage: 39.3 miles

Average speed: 12.7 mph

Top speed: 28.1 mph (hills – wheeee!!!!)

Calories burned: 1208 (sweet).

What a wonderful day! I feel a little tired right now. Pixie is laying in my lap as I am writing this post. She is in full cooler weather lap mode! We have more chair sitting and relaxing in store tonight. 😀

Hope you are all having an awesome weekend as well!

Palak Chole (Chickpeas and Spinach)

Palak Chole or Chickpeas and Spinach. This is a very easy recipe to whip up. Do yourself a favor and use low sodium canned items. The ingredient list is mostly spices, so don’t let it scare you. It happens to be vegan, too. Can someone tell me if this is gluten free? I think it is.

Serves 2-3
Ingredients:

1 can of low sodium chickpeas, drained and rinsed (15 oz)
2 cups of frozen spinach leaves, chopped (or 3 cups of fresh)
1 can of sodium free diced tomatoes, drained
1 green chile, chopped
1/2 inch chunk of fresh ginger
1 tablespoon of coconut oil
1 teaspoon of cumin seeds
1 tablespoon of ground coriander
1/2 teaspoon of chili powder
1/4 tsp onion or garlic powder (not salt)
1/2 tsp of turmeric
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp of black pepper
1/2 cup of water
1/4 tsp of garam masala

Blend together the tomatoes, ginger, and green chile to make a puree. Set aside.

In a sauce pan over medium heat, add the coconut oil. Put in a cumin seed to see if it pops. If it does, the oil is hot enough. Add the rest of the cumin seeds and stir for 30 seconds. They will all pop. Slowly add in the tomato puree, being careful of splattering.

Then add the coriander, turmeric, salt, pepper, and chili powder. Cook this mixture over medium heat for 5 to 6 minutes, stirring occasionally. It will reduce by about half.

Add the spinach, cover and cook for 5 minutes. Then add the chickpeas.

If the mixture is a little dry, add some of the water. It will be drier if you use fresh spinach. Cover and cook for 10 minutes, checking periodically to make sure there is enough water to make a sauce. I used about 1/2 cup for mine.

If you like, you can mash some of the chick peas to make it thicker. Add in the garam masala and serve!

This is great with naan bread, or brown rice. Yum! It even got a thumbs up from John 😀

The whole batch is about 610 calories. Isn’t that awesome! Split into 3 portions for a light meal or side dish, or divide it in 2 for a main dish.

Substitution notes:

– Fresh or frozen spinach will do. I used frozen spinach leaves, not cooked spinach. Water content will vary depending on what you use. I did not thaw my spinach before adding.

– You could use 2 whole fresh tomatoes instead of canned if you’ve got them.

– You could use any oil if you don’t have coconut.

Enjoy!

Quiet day and a much better ride.

Sunday and back to work again. The weather has quieted down. Since my chain was not working well and we had to go grocery shopping, we just drove to breakfast. Back to Panera Bread for bagels! We need more than 2 bagel places around here within an 8-mile radius.

Blueberry with reduced fat cream cheese

and 3 cups of coffee 😀

We then got all nicely stocked up on groceries. Lots of fruit. Strawberries, kiwis, bananas, dates, blueberries, apples, pears. I we eat a lot of fruit during the week.

Work was slow today, so I ended getting more things done than anticipated. I scrubbed my bike off and degreased and regreased the chain, and did general cleaning around the house.

Lunch break was chicken with laughing cow and some pan sauteed sweet potato slices. Good that way.

Plus yummy blueberries! I need to call the local farm and see if it is picking time yet….

With still no work available, I went out for a leisurely bike ride for 1.5 hours.

Much, much better ride than the craptacularness that was yesterday. See how happy I am after arriving at the yogurt place?

I had some lemon yogurt with raspberry topping.

This combo was good, but I was expecting a more tart lemon, like sorbet.

See all the choices of flavors to choose from? It’s almost too much.

Nice ride today. 14 miles round trip. Active recovery day for me!

Still no work in the late afternoon. We have to keep checking in every couple of hours when there are no files, just to make sure any stat reports get finished. So, that is annoying because I don’t earn any money….

I decided to take that time and make an Indian dish for dinner called Palak Chole. It is a spinach, tomato, and chick pea dish that was really easy to make, healthy and turns out to be vegan as well. I will put a recipe page up with that hopefully tomorrow.

Yum! I had mine with 1/2 of a Lavash bread. Nothing like combining cuisines, right? If someone had said to me 4 years ago that I would be eating a dish that combined chick peas, spinach, and tomatoes and liking it, I would have said “Ick, no way!!”. Oh what I have missed.

Got more weeding done tonight. Doing good on controlling them this year so far. Tonight’s snack:

Kashi!

And:

Summertime = berry time! Yay!

Lifting, squats, and Indian food.

Slept pretty good last night and got up at about 6:50, which is pretty good sleeping in for me 😀 I had a protein drink and biked to the gym in gorgeous weather!

Did the iron – trying to do less weight and more reps.

Exercise	Set/rep/weight	Muscle worked
Barbell Squats	3 sets of 8 at 45#!!!	Lower body
Chin ups	1 set of 2, 4 sets of 1	Upper back
Dumbbell Pullover	3 sets of 10 with 25# DB	Back
Barbell press	3 sets of 12 with 45# bar	Chest
Plank	3 sets of 1 minute holds	Abs
Good mornings	3 sets of 10 with 30# bar	Hammies and low back
Face Pull	3 sets of 15 at 20#	Shoulders
Nosebreakers	3 sets of 12 at 25#	Triceps

Good news – I was finally able to get back under the barbell! Just an empty bar, but I could do the squat fairly balanced. Yay! I was feeling so good about that I hopped on the treadmill and busted out a mile jogging. Really slow, but I did the whole mile. About a 14-minute mile, but jogging nonetheless. Maybe I will get over the injury after all

Came home and made some custard oats with cocoa powder.

Topped with almonds and some fluff. Then I relaxed and read blogs and caught up on emails. Pretty soon, it was time for a visit here:

Dentist! I have a chipped filling, which is going to be replaced next week. They are also going to fill a cavity and build up between these 2 teeth. I have a large space between those teeth and food gets caught there a lot. I have to floss it after every meal (annoying). It will be nice to get that fixed. I have to say that I really love my dentist. He really seems to care about the patients. I also found out I am an agressive brusher! I have some exposing of my roots on one side because of that. So, I have to make sure I keep the brush angled and to only hold it with 3 fingers to keep the pressure light.

After a good cleaning, you know I had to go spoil that with eating!

Isn’t this fun? It’s a blue potato topped with laughing cow, some quinoa and broccoli. Tasty, but I did put some hot sauce on it after taking a pic 😀 Plus a yummy pear. Working in carbs today in preparation for tomorrow.

Spent time working in the garden. Nothing new blooming, so no pics today. I made lattes.

Looks a little green? Don’t tell anyone.

Maybe it is because there was some of this in there:

Hey, it’s the weekend! With this on the side:

John got cooking dinner. He made a recipe link provided by Karen for Mujadara – a lentil and rice dish.

Caramelizing onions:

I cooked up lentils while John did the rice. Mixed all together with cumin, cinnamon, salt and pepper:

We cooked up some chicken, too, because we need more protein.

Easy and tasty! Although it did take a while to cook those onions. Who knew the onions would be so yummy. This from a girl who picked out every single onion out of things growing up. (I know, Mom, can you believe it??).

I also made a batch of date protein ball/squares today:

Made this batch with almonds. And I snacked on some. I hope to have a recipe up this weekend for these. These are to take along tomorrow. We are shooting for a 60-mile ride! I am a little nervous, but looking forward to it. We will be leaving early as it will be at least 5 hours of riding.

Have a super night!

Finding Radiance

Trying to live a fit life loving food, cycling, gardening and everything in between!