Spicy Potatoes and Methi Malai Matar: Treats From Other Blogs

I run almost every day into recipes on other blogs that I want to make, and one day this week I found two that sounded delicious and healthy and, luckily, I had on hand all the ingredients I needed to make them.

The great thing was, although I bookmarked them from two separate blogs, they sounded like they'd make a perfect meal together.

So Latha's Spicy Potatoes and Supriya's Methi Malai Matar it was for dinner, and they were both as delicious as they sound.

I made very few changes to the recipes-- in fact, I didn't make any to the potatoes except to add a coriander garnish in the end-- I love the lemony freshness of coriander with any spicy potato dish. Latha had used fingerling potatoes but I just went with russet potatoes which I had on hand.

In case of the methi curry I did need to come up with a substitute for cream, although it was an easy choice-- cashew paste. I soaked 2 tbsp of cashew nuts with 1/2 cup of water for about an hour, and then blended it to a smooth paste and added it in place of the cream in Supriya's recipe. I'd say you can go with coconut milk too, if you'd rather, and it'd be delicious.

We scooped up all this goodness with some fluffy phulkas.

Thanks, ladies, for a lovely dinner!

***
If you read this blog, you know I love the Mahatma. A few weeks back, when I put up this cynical post, many of you wrote in to me to say that Gandhi's ideas are not dead and that there are many around the world who are striving, against all odds, to keep them alive.

One reader, Deb, sent me a page of Gandhi's quotations. Now I love inspiring quotes and I have read most of Gandhi's, and looking over the ones Deb had sent I thought maybe it wouldn't be such a bad idea to share some of those as well as other favorites with all of you.

A lot of what Gandhi said remains so topical and so current, including his thoughts about the treatment of animals. His words offer a powerful lesson: learn from your mistakes, think about the consequences of your actions before you act, and believe in yourself when you know you are on the right path, even if the rest of the world seems to not agree with you. Eventually, they will.

So here they are, as inspiring and brilliant as they were the day he said them.

Enjoy!

"Freedom is not worth having if it does not include the freedom to make mistakes."

"The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated."

"I object to violence because when it appears to do good, the good is only temporary; the evil it does is permanent."

"Even if you are a minority of one, the truth is the truth."

and my favorite:

"We must be the change we wish to see in the world."
**
And, finally, a weekend treat: pictures of my delicious Opie. As the last of the snow melts down in our area, Opie-- who adores the snow-- is clinging to every last bit that dots our yard and the neighbors'. Literally.

Each day, when we walk him, he will race toward any bit of snow he sees and plonk himself right over it. And then he'll refuse to budge for the next 15 minutes at least. He doesn't just sit there either. He rolls over on his side, slides on it, and does some really silly stuff that's just wonderful to watch.

Funny guy.