I cooked!!!!!!!!!! – chicken do pyaza

I cooked!!!!!!!!!!

hate cooking. Why?? Because i am a very lazy person; i hate the cutting and chopping and mixing

required before the actual cooking; i hate the cleaning up after the cooking; and i don’t have

patience to check every few minutes whether the food is being cooked properly. So, now you know

why it’s a big achievement for me to have cooked chicken do pyaaza. And before I tell you my

experiences of cooking this dish, let me tell you about a silly notion I had about the dish name. I

always thought the “do pyaaza” referred to 2 uncut onions added to the dish after it is cooked!!!

For the uninitiated, you will know very soon what “do pyaza” signifies – definitely 2 onions, but

not like I imagined!!!

I looked up the recipe on ndtv goodtimes site – the recipe by Marut Sikka and made a few

variations to it based on the availablity of ingredients at home.

Take a kg or 1.3 kg of chicken and wash it properly in lukewarm. You must remove all blood stains

from the chicken. (Why lukewarm water? – The water in the tank was quite hot by the time I

started cooking.)

Marinate the chicken with a tbs (tablespoon) each of garlic paste, ginger paste, red chilli powder,

and salt. Leave it for sometime.

Cut 2 onions – chop one onion very finely and cut the other onion into large pieces. (hence do

pyaza!!) Make puree out of 4 tomatoes.

Now, heat oil in your cooking pan (I used Saffola) and add 2 tbs of garlic paste and 1 tbs of

ginger paste to it. Cook till it looks brown. Add the finely chopped onion to it and cook till it’s

golden brown.

Add the tomato puree and salt to taste. While this is getting cooked, take half a cup of yoghurt,

add 1 tbs each of red chilli powder and turmeric powder to it and mix well.

Add this mixture to your onion and tomato puree in the cooking pan and cook for sometime.

Then, add 1 tbs each of coriander powder and cummin powder, the other onion (whihc you cut into

large pieces), the marinated chicken, some water, and garam masala. Now, let it cook for 30-40

minutes till the chicken is tender. See how my do-pyaaza looked.

Now, garnish it with 1/2 tbs of kasoori methi, 4 finely chopped green chillies, and some dhaniya

(coriander) leaves. Cover the pan with the lid and leave it for sometime so that the aroma of the

garnishings get mixed with the aroma of the rest of the ingredients. This is how the final dish

looked.

Believe me the aroma and the taste was Divine (as Marut Sikka says)!!!!

My friends always told me cooking is a great hobby. I never wanted to believe them. But, I must

admit I enjoyed cooking this dish. For all those who hate cooking, do try it out. It’ll take about 90

minutes for a beginner, and while you cook you are relieved of all your stress. And, the end result

makes you feel like a winner – on top of the world!!

Happy cooking!!!

Significance of the 10 exclamation marks in the blog title – People who know me know how much I hate cooking. Why?? Because i am a very lazy person; i hate the cutting and chopping and mixing required before the actual cooking; i hate the cleaning up after the cooking; and i don’t have patience to check every few minutes whether the food is being cooked properly. So, now you know why it’s a big achievement for me to have cooked chicken do pyaza.

Before I embark on telling you about my cooking adventure, let me tell you about a silly notion I had about this dish name. I always thought the “do pyaaza” referred to 2 uncut onions added to the dish after it is cooked!!!

For the uninitiated, you will know very soon what “do pyaza” signifies – definitely 2 onions, but not like I imagined!!!

I looked up the recipe on ndtv goodtimes site – the recipe by Marut Sikka, and made a few variations to it based on the availablity of ingredients at home. So, this is how I cooked it.

Take a kg or 1.3 kg (i cooked that much!!) of chicken and wash it properly in lukewarm water. You must remove all blood stains from the chicken. (Why lukewarm water? – The water in the tank was quite hot by the time I started cooking.)

Marinate the chicken with a tbs (tablespoon) each of garlic paste, ginger paste, red chilli powder, and salt. Leave it for sometime.

Cut 2 onions – chop one onion very finely and cut the other onion into large pieces. (hence do pyaza!!) Make puree out of 4 tomatoes.

Now, heat oil in your cooking pan (I used Saffola) and add 2 tbs of garlic paste and 1 tbs of ginger paste to it. Cook till it looks brown. Add the finely chopped onion to it and cook till it’s golden brown.

Add the tomato puree and salt to taste. While this is getting cooked, take half a cup of yoghurt, add 1 tbs each of red chilli powder and turmeric powder to it and mix well.  Add this mixture to your onion and tomato puree in the cooking pan and cook for sometime.

Then, add 1 tbs each of coriander powder and cummin powder, the other onion (whihc you cut into large pieces), the marinated chicken, some water, and garam masala. Now, let it cook for 30-40 minutes till the chicken is tender. See how my do-pyaaza looked.

Now, garnish it with 1/2 tbs of kasoori methi, 4 finely chopped green chillies, and some dhaniya (coriander) leaves. Cover the pan with the lid and leave it for sometime so that the aroma of the garnishings get mixed with the aroma of the rest of the ingredients. This is how the final dish looked.

 

Believe me the aroma and the taste is Divine (as Marut Sikka says)!!!!

My friends always told me cooking is a great hobby. I never wanted to believe them (I still don’t buy that!!) . But, I must admit I enjoyed cooking this dish. (Now, I neeed not worry about dinner for 2 days!! )

For all those who hate cooking, do try it out. It’ll take about 90 - 100 minutes for a beginner, and while you cook you are relieved of all your stress. And, the end result makes you feel like a winner – on top of the world!!

Happy cooking!!!

enjoyed the struggle

enjoyed the struggle

Waking up at 4:45 AM and driving to the gym by 5:30 AM and then going through a one and half

hours of strenuous ordeal – running and cycling and pedalling (the CT) and lifting all sorts of

weights and stretching to the extremes, not to mention the ever so difficult crunches.

And after doing 10 stretches or pulls or crunches, my trainer Naveen would force me to do

another 5. His excuse: “Come out of your comfort zone or else you will never lose those flabs.”

And, when I am done with 15, he smiles sweetly and says : “how about 5 more? You could do 15 so

easily.” My sides still hurt from doing those crunches.

He is alive only because I don’t hurt people; believe me, I had half a mind of hitting his head with

the 10-15 kg dumbbells.

Well, that was how I survived my first week of exercise.

That was the struggle part. Now the fun part – this last week has been one of the most

rejuvenating week I have ever spent. This is the first time I have been to a gym. I am just too lazy

to go to one even for a billion dollars!! (Why I started gyming is another story – an encouragement

I got thatz worth much more than a billion dollars – in fact, priceless.)

And this one week has given me a lot – confidence that I had lost over the last few months, I got

rid of my shyness (to some extent), I am a little less self-conscious these days – I walked a good

1.5 kms to the gym in gym clothes Sunday morning (something I would never do even in my wildest

imagination). And, yes it definitely feels great to do something for yourself.

They have group activities, which help you be less conscious of yourself, specially when you see

the rest of the group doing the same mistakes.

I also learnt suryanamaskar – I always thought we just had to stand straight in namaskar position

looking up at the sun. I was in for a BIG surprise!! Whoever knows what suryanamaskar is must be

laughing at me right now!! And those of you who don’t know what it is, do try it once.

All said and done, exercising is a great experience. The first week is the toughest, but if you can

survive that, you are on a roll. Try to enjoy the exercises … after all, it’s something you are doing

for yourself. Along with a great fit body, you will get an active positive confident mind (an added

bonus). So all you who have never tried it – just go for it!! Take it a day at a time, and before you

realize it, you will be the super confident dude or dudette.

As for the diet, I have started reading this book by Rujuta Divekar … more about this in my next

post.

Do leave comments or mail me about your exercising experiences!!

Waking up at 4:45 AM, driving to the gym by 5:30 AM, and then going through a one and half hours of strenuous ordeal – running and cycling and pedalling (the CT) and lifting all sorts of weights and stretching to the extremes, not to mention the ever so difficult crunches.

And after doing 10 stretches or pulls or crunches, my trainer Naveen would force me to do another 5. His excuse: “Come out of your comfort zone or else you will never lose those flabs.”

And, when I am done with 15, he would smile sweetly and say : “how about 5 more? You could do 15 so easily.” (He is alive only because I don’t hurt people; believe me, I had half a mind of hitting his head with the 10-15 kg dumbbells.) My sides still hurt from doing those crunches.

Well, thatz how I survived my first week of exercise.

That was the struggle part. Now the fun part – this last week has been one of the most rejuvenating week I have ever spent. This is the first time I have been to a gym. I am just too lazy to go to one even for a billion dollars!! (Why I started gyming is another story – an encouragement I got thatz worth much more than a billion dollars – in fact, priceless.)

And this one week has given me a lot – confidence that I had lost over the last few months, I got rid of my shyness (to some extent), I am a little less self-conscious these days – I walked a good 1.5 kms to the gym in gym clothes Sunday morning at 10 (something I would never do even in my wildest imagination). And, yes it definitely feels great to do something for yourself.

This gym has group activities, which help you be less conscious of yourself, specially when you see the rest of the group doing the same mistakes.

I also learnt suryanamaskar – I always thought we just had to stand straight in namaskar position looking up at the sun. I was in for a BIG surprise!! Whoever knows what suryanamaskar is must be laughing at me right now!! And those of you who don’t know what it is, do try it once.

All said and done, exercising is a great experience. The first week is the toughest, but if you can survive that, you are on a roll. Try to enjoy the exercises … after all, it’s something you are doing for yourself. Along with a great fit body, you will get an active positive confident mind (an added bonus). So all you who have never tried it – just go for it!! Take it a day at a time, and before you even realize it, you will be the super confident dude or dudette.

As for the diet, I have started reading this book by Rujuta Divekar … more about this in my next post.

Do leave comments or mail me about your exercising experiences!!