Kali Chana Pulao

 Today I will share one of our family Ramadan special recipes “Kali Chana Pilao”. Both my moms (mom and mother in law) make this pulao at least once for ifter during the holy month of Ramadan. 
This pulao is usually made with small basmati rice (Gobindo bogh rice in bengali) but you may replace it with normal basmati rice. Kali chana pulao is a complete dish, you can serve it as it is or with some raita or achar. I hope your family will like it.

Ingredients:
1. Small basmati rice – 500gm (2 cups)
2. Black Pea (Kali chana) – 250gm
3. Onion – 1 large , thinly sliced
4. Green Chili – 5
5. Refined oil – 2tbs
6. Ghee – 1tsb
7. Salt – to taste
8. Water – 4 cups (double of rice)
9. Garam masala – 1/2tsb
10. Whole cumin seeds – a pinch
11. Whole green cardamom – 2
12. Cloves – 2
13. Ginger Garlic paste – 1 tsb
Procedure:

Step 1: Wash and soak the black pea overnight or for 8 to 9 hours in water. Dain them and add to the pressure cooker with 3 to 3.5 cups water. Pressure cook for 6 to 7 whistles or more, till the black peas are tender and cooked well. Drain the cooked black peas and keep aside.
Step 2:  Wash the rice nicely in water then soak the rice in enough water for 30 mins. Strain and keep aside.
Step 3: In a nonstick pan add the refined oil and the ghee. Once the oil and ghee is hot add the whole spices – cumin seeds, green chilies cardamoms and cloves.
Step 4: Add the sliced onions and sauté them until they are translucent in color, add the ginger garlic paste mix well.
Step 5 :Add the soaked rice and boiled black peas to the pan. Mix all together and cook fry everything for 5~6mins while stirring continuously so that all the rice grain are fried properly.

Step 6: Add the water, salt to taste, garam masala mix well and cover the pan with an air tied lid. Cook in medium heat for around 12mins. Check after 12mins, check the rice, if it is cooked more than 90% turn of the heat cover the lead for another 10 mins and you kali chana pulao is ready to serve. Gently fluff the rice and serve. Enjoy

Bibimbap(비빔밥 Korean Rice Mix)

Today we will learn about one of the most popular Korean dish Bibimbap (비빔밥). 'Bibim(비빔)' means 'mix' and 'Bap(밥)' means rice, so Bibimbap is a bowl of rice topped with a array of individually cooked/boiled vegetables, meat(optional) and seasoned with a special sauce prepared with Korean hot pepper paste(gochujang). As, 'gochujang' or Korean red pepper paste is not available everywhere, I tried to make a substitute, which tastes quite similar.

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FYI, you may use any vegetables of your choice, traditionally in Korea they use- soybean sprouts, spinach, zucchini, carrots, fernbrake, dried seaweeds, Shiitake Mushrooms and egg.

This recipe may look little long, as we have to cook all the vegetables separately but the procedure is very simple. I hope you like this Bibimbap recipe :) .

For this recipe I used the following ingredients for 1 serving,

1. Short Grain rice - 1/4 cup,

2. Button mushrooms- 1/2 cup sliced

3. Carrots- 1/3 julienned,

4. Zucchini -1/3 julienned,

5. Spinach- 1/2 cup cleaned and chopped,

6. Egg- 1 fried, sunny side up,

7. Dried Seaweed- 1 julienned,

8. Onions -1/3 sliced, In Korea they generally use white onions,

9. Oil to Sautee the vegetables(Sesame oil if possible)

10. Chopped Coriander leaves - I added this, as I like it but Koreans will never ever use Coriander leafs they just hate the smell,

11. Black pepper powder

For Bibimbap Sauce- Combine all the following ingredients mix well and keep aside

1. Hot chili ketchup - 2 tsb,

2. Hot chili powder - 1/4 tsb,

3. Vinegar - 1/4 tsb

4. Sugar- 1/2 tsb

5. Roasted sesame seeds - 1tsb

Procedure:

Step 1(cooking rice): Cook the rice and keep it aside, we will use it during assembling the dish.

Step 2(Sautéing vegetables): Now we have to cook all the Vegetables(one by one) according to their tenderness. We should not cook the vegetables very soft, it should be little crunchy. We will use the same pan to sauté all the vegetables

~Carrots: Heat some oil in a pan, add the julienned carrots, salt to taste and a pinch of black pepper powder, cook in high heat for around 3~4mins. Carrots takes little longer time than the other vegetables. Takeout the carrots and keep aside.

~ Zucchini: Add very little oil, julienned zucchini, salt to taste, pinch of black pepper and cook for 1 min in high heat.

~Onions: Sauté the onions similarly for 1~2mins.

~Mushrooms: I generally cook the mushrooms at the end, as it may leave some water in the cooking pan . Sauté it similarly for 1~2mins.

~Spinach: boil 1 cups water in a pan or microwave. add pinch of salt to the hot water and stir. then add the spinach leaves in the hot water. close with a lid and let the spinach leaves sit in the water for 1~2 mins. strain the spinach leaves and immediately add to a bowl of ice cold water, it will help to preserve the nice green color. after few mins drain the water.

We are done with sautéing all the vegetables now we need to assemble rice and vegetables in a bowl

Step3(Assembling): Place the rice in a big bowl as base. Nicely arrange a small amount of each prepared vegetable, the julienned seeweeds over the rice. Drizzle a little sesame oil over. Top with the fried sunny-side up egg and serve with the red 'Bibimbap Sauce'(1 or 2 tsb according to your taste) we prepared.

How to eat~ Combine rice, all vegetables, egg and the special sauce together, mix it very well with a spoon. The rice should become red :) , enjoy your Bimimbap..