Tomato Rice | Easy lunchbox recipes

For the third week in this Blogging Marathon, I have chosen to blog about lunch box dishes for kids. I have heard from many mothers that packing lunch boxes for children is a very big challenge. Kids these days love variety and they want to feel surprised when they open their lunch boxes.

The biggest challenge in packing lunch boxes is that the recipe should be something the kid likes. And the next one is that it should be easy to make during the morning rush hour. In this post I have posted photos of how I packed tomato rice for the lunch box. Generally kids hate tomatoes. I have seen this in a lot of kids. But they enjoy the taste. So I grind tomatoes and onions to make this rice. 

I packed the tomato rice with gobi manchurian, papads and curd. I also added a boiled egg to make the lunch more interesting. The other option would be to pack this rice with lots of fryums and fried potatoes.

The recipe of gobi manchurian is given here.

Ingredients:

Jeera rice - 2 cups (200 grams)

Tomato - 150 grams

Onions - 100 grams

Ginger - 5 grams

Garlic - 5 grams

Green chillies - 2 nos (small)

Salt - to taste

Garam masala powder - 1/2 tsp

Turmeric powder - 1/2 tsp
Oil - 2 tbsp
Coriander powder - 1 tsp
Chilly powder - 1/2 tsp
Coriander leaves - few

Method:

• Wash the rice and keep aside.
• Grind the onions, tomatoes, green chillies, ginger, garlic into a coarse paste.
• In a pressure cooker, add the oil. Add the ground paste and fry until the water is completely evaporated and the ground mixture becomes a thick paste.
• Add the washed rice and throw in all the powders including salt.
• Fry for another one or two minutes.
• Add the required amount of water (1:2 ratio).
• Mix well. Check for salt. Close the pressure cooker.
• Cook for one pressure. Then bring doen the heat to minimum. Cook for another minute and switch off the stove.
• Open the pressure cooker as soon as the pressure is released and transfer the contents to a wide mouthed bowl.
• Garnish with coriander leaves.

Notes:

• The tomato rice will be more flavorful if made with basmati rice.
• To make it more attractive to kids, garnish it with fried cashewnuts.

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Paal Arisi Kanji | Dessert

Paal Arisi Kanji - This is one dessert which I make very often. This is very easy to make. This recipe comes in hand when we have unannounced guests at home.

I say this to be an easy recipe because all the ingredients - milk, cooked rice and sugar are always available at home. This tastes little different to pal payasam since the rice is not cooked in milk. And with little less sugar this recipe would be a very good appetizer.

Ingredients:

Milk - 1 litre

Cooked rice - 1 cup

Sugar - 3/4 cup

Cardamom powder - 1/2 tsp

Saffron - few strands

Ghee - 1 tbsp

Method:

• In a wide mouthed vessel, boil the milk.
• Once the milk starts boiling, lower the flame and add the cooked rice and sugar.
• Stir well and boil the milk for another 10 minutes. 
• Keep stirring so that the milk doesn't burn at the bottom of the vessel.
• After 10-12 minutes, add the cardamom powder, ghee and saffron strands.
• Mix well, switch off stove.

Dhideer payasam ready!!

Notes:

• This sweet can also be garnished with cashew nuts, raisins and other nuts.

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Layered Custard

The second recipe in line for "No bake recipes" is this layered custard. Custard preparation these days is no big deal. We get ready-made custard powder packets. We just have to boil milk with this custard powder and in minutes custard is ready. This would be a very good dessert for kids and also can be made quickly. I just made a little twist to this by adding some coloring agent and layering it.

Ingredients:

Custard powder ( Vanilla flavor) - 100 grams

Milk - 1 litre

Sugar - 350 grams

Coloring agent - Green, red

Decorative sugar crystals - few

Method:

• Mix the custard powder in about one glass of milk and keep it aside.
• Boil the remaining milk in a thick bottomed vessel.
• Once the milk starts to raise in the vessel, lower the flame. Add sugar and mix well.
• Now add the custard mixture and mix well. Keep stirring till the mixture thickens for about 5 minutes and then switch off the stove.
• Divide the custard into 3 portions. In one portion add a little green color and in another portion add a bit of red color.
• Now in glass cups, layer this custard and refrigerate it for about an hour.
• Decorate it with sugar crystals just before serving.

Check out the Blogging Marathon page for the other Blogging Marathoners doing this BM#78