Fresh fruit cheese cake - With yogurt

" Here's a perfect recipe for all cheesecake lovers.It's healthy, with easily available ingredients and no raw egg's. Have been making this one for over 20 years, made almost 6 of them for a special family occasion.They are light, flavorful and as guilt free as cheese cakes can be..."

Servings - 8- 10

Ingredients:

 Base

• 200 gms digestive biscuit
• 50 gms melted butter
• 1 tsp rind of lemon/lime

 Filling

• 400 gms yogurt regular ( or 1 cup thick yogurt)
• 200 gms low fat or single cream
• 3/4 cup powdered sugar
• 200 gms strawberries(mangoes or any other fresh fruit you may want to use)
• 1 tsp vanilla (pod/paste/essence)
• 1 tbsp gelatin
• 4 tbsp water
• 1 tsp lime /lemon juice

Method:

Base

1. Butter a spring-foam pan or a pie dish which has a diameter of 10 inches
2. Crush biscuits coarsely
3. Mix with melted butter and rind
4. Layer the dish with biscuits at the bottom and the sides, pressing firmly (use a flat bottom glass or bowl to help press down as firmly as possible)
5. Refrigerate biscuit base for 1/2 hour

  Filling

1.  Hang regular yogurt in a muslin cloth for 2 hours to remove excess water, balance thick yogurt should amount to 1 cup OR use 1 cup of thick yogurt
2. Soak the gelatin in warm water for 15 minutes, and warm over simmering water till translucent (gelatin bowl should not be touching the water. OR prepare the gelatin as per box instructions
3. Puree the strawberries, leaving 3 whole for decorating purposes
4. In a bowl mix all the filling ingredients - yogurt, cream,strawberry puree, sugar, vanilla, lime,gelatin and beat till smooth
5. Pour the mixture over the biscuit base, wrap with clingfilm and chill overnight
6. Decorate with sliced strawberries and ENJOY

Note:

• Any fresh fruit can be used instead of the strawberries, mangoes work just great
• For a plain lemon cheesecake, remove the fruit adding the juice of one full lime
• Each serving has only 1 tsp butter + 1 tbsp cream as the guilty ingredients 

Spicy Fried Fish

"This is an authentic  Konkan style ( Sea-side belt of Maharashtra/ Goa in India)  fried fish recipe, which while it sounds spicy, it uses chilies more for color than spice, and you could use as much of the spice paste as you think you can handle. My kids just love this one ..."

Serves : 4

Ingredients:

• Spice paste
• 50 grams dried red chilly(kashmiri or any other chili - high on color-low on spice)
• 20 grams (1 1/2 tbsp) ginger and garlic paste
• 2 tbsp white vinegar
• 2 tsp cumin seeds
• 1 tsp salt (or to taste)
• 4 palm size pomfret fish (around 200 grams each - whole with shallow cuts on both sides ) 
• 6 tbsp semolina
• 1 lime

Method:

Spice paste

1. Soak the dried red chilies for 10 minutes in 4 tbsp of water
2. Make a paste of all the 5 spice paste ingredients along with the chilly water (add more water if needed to make a thick paste)
3. Use 1 heaped tbsp of spice paste to marinate each pomfret fish, making sure the paste is rubbed in well into all the shallow cuts
4. Coat the fish in semolina, and leave for at least 10 minutes outside or upto 2 hours in the refrigerator.
5. Shallow fry till golden and crisp and eat immediately after sprinkling some lime juice 

Tip:

• The spice paste ingredients make enough to fill a 200 ml bottle and can be refrigerated against further use
• 1 tbsp of spice paste can be used to marinate between 100 and 200 grams of fish as per taste
• Instead of whole pomfret fish, you could use any other firm white fish - whole or fillets

Cottage Cheese pie

"This is a simple vegetarian  variation on the Shepard's pie, which my mom and aunt came up with and is a much loved family  favorite for the last 40 years. Plan it as a hearty vegetarian side dish or a vegetarian main course served with a fresh salad and crusty bread "

Serves 4 people 

Ingredients:

Cottage cheese mixture

• 250 grams cottage cheese ( chopped in 1/2 inch cubes)
• 3 cloves garlic (diced finely)
• 2 medium onions (diced finely)
• 3 tomatoes (chopped finely)
• 1 capsicum(chopped finely)
• 2 tbsp tomato ketchup
• 1/2 tsp garam masala 
• Salt to taste

Mashed potato mix

• 300 grams potato 
• 1 tbsp butter
• 3 - 5 tbsp milk
• salt and pepper to taste

Method:

1. In 1 tbsp oil stir fry garlic and onions till just translucent
2. Add capsicum and stir fry for 1 minute, then add the chopped tomatoes, the ketchup and salt,cook them for a couple of minutes till tomatoes are softened
3. Add the cottage cheese, the garam masala and cook it for 2 minutes till it is all incorporated
4. Layer the cottage cheese mixture in the bottom of a baking dish ( square  7 inch)
5. Make mashed potatoes with all the ingredients
6. Layer the mashed potato mix on top of the cottage cheese mix, such that there should be 2/3rd of cottage cheese topped with 1/3rd of mashed potato mix
7. Bake in pre-heated oven (180 deg C) for half an hour till you get a nice brown crust

Tip:

• The pie can be pre-prepared till step no 6 and covered with cling film and refrigerated till bake time
• All vegetables should be stir-fried rather quickly so they retain a bite