Spicy SweetPotato Fry, Awards and MEME

Alright, yet another post without my garrulous and chatty talks. This time I have a long list of awards and MEME's to share. Sorry friends, you all have been so nice in sharing these awards with me, but I know I'm just too late in posting them. I got hooked up in posting the recipes than posting my awards and before I postpone it any further I have to do it today. So, I just want to quickly post a simple yet a flavorful recipe that I made today and move on to my awards and MEMEs.

The first time I read this sweet potato recipe in a magazine, I was a little hesitant to make this as I'd never made any dish with sweet-potatoes by that time. Just out of curiosity I made it and it turned out wonderful! I absolutely loved the blend of sweet flavor mixed with vibrant spice flavours. After a few more trials it has now taken a permanant place in my cookbook. Its light, its flavorful and its simple.

Ingredients:

Sweet Potatoes - 2 cups (cooked, peeled and chopped into cubes)
Mustard seeds - 1 tsp
Urad dal/Ulundham paruppu - 1 tsp
Asafoetida - a pinch
Turmeric powder - 1/2 tsp

For the powder: (feel free to adjust the spice level according to your taste)

Corriander seeds - 1 tbsp
Chana dal/kadalai paruppu- 1/2 tbsp
Urad dal/Ulundham paruppu - 1/2 tbsp
Red Chillies - 4 to 5

Procedure:

• In a pan, fry the ingredients mentioned for the powder with 1/2 tsp of oil and powder them finely.
• Heat more oil in the same pan and season with mustard seeds, urad dal.
• Once the mustard seeds pop, add turmeric and asafoetida. Fry for 10 secs.
• Add the cooked & cubed sweet potaotes, salt and fry for 2 - 3 mins in medium heat.
• Now add the spice powder and mix well. Cover for 2 mins in medium heat and fry for 3 more mins.
• Remove from heat.

We enjoy this with dal/rice.

MEME: Its Meme time! Deesha had tagged me with this 7 facts about myself and here they are Deesha!

Since I've been already talking a lot about my food likings and opinions in my posts regularly, I will stay away from my food facts in this MEME :)

1. I am a late night person and my brain works the best only late evenings. All my blogging and any serious planning activities happen only when I'm done with my regular duties and the house is super quiet like a haunted house.

2. I am not a big fan of reading books and mostly stay away from big novels, although I like to quickly glance on some of my favorite magazines.

3. I love to be alone once in a while and engross in the world of my own. I think solitude is my best companion many times.

4. I am fond of music, mostly melodies, and have a huge collection of MP3 songs. I enjoy the song lyrics as much as I enjoy the music in the song and surprisingly, I happen to know the lyrics for the majority of these songs! I learned classical music during my childhood, and after several years, my forgotten passion is back and I'm now learning classical music again from a professional teacher...

5. I'm a shopping freak, especially with apparels. My closet is always full with latest tops, pants, salwars etc. While writing this I am realizing that last two months I haven't been shopping much.. Hmmm, need to catch up!

6. I am not that good in waiting for things to happen on its own. I quickly run out of patience and need things to happen right away. I am working on it, but I also have to say that my tendency of impatience helps me in winding down things faster without postponing..

7. I'm addicted to Sudoku and have finished almost 3 books (over 300 puzzles) in just 1 month. Don't know how long this addiction will last..

Alright, now awards time!
Bhawana, Kitchen Flavours and JZ have passed me the Brilliante Weblog Award:
Vani and Srilekha passed me the "Beautiful Site Award":

Kitchen Flavours has passed me this "Friendship Blend Award":

Suma and Madhavi have passed me this "Good Job Award".

And last but not least - Vani, Purva, Raaji and Gita have passed me this "Butterfly Award".


Thank you soooo much to each one of you for thinking about me and sharing your award with me. With so many good friends around me in my blogging world, its hard for me to pick only a few people to pass these awards. I'm sure all of you have already recieved it. If you have not received it, feel free to grab them from here.. :)