Vegetable Medley In Sour Cream Sauce

Most of us Indians have a tendency to cook vegetables to the n^th degree and add plenty of masala in everything! And us Southies, in addition to the above two propensities, love adding fiery heat to the food - red chillies, green chillies, dry or fresh - you name it, we use it! While I do enjoy food prepared this way, I also like veggies cooked just till they have a little bite left in them. On occasion I also leave out the masalas, keep a light hand on the spices and let the the flavor of the vegetables do all the talking.

While such dishes are too bland to suit DH's tastes, my little one loves them. As far as my kid is concerned, just blanch, flash steam or saute vegetables till they are tender, sprinkle some salt and pepper and serve - he loves it! I used to initially think of it as "बीमारों का खाना " - sick bed food! But over a period of time, I have come to like such stuff.

Today's recipe is one such and for once, DH did not complain! Initially I thought of just mashing a couple of cloves of garlic and adding it to the veggies, but then I would have had to fish it out later as I did not want any chunky piece of garlic in my mouth. So I used my micro-plane grater to directly grate the garlic into the pan. In addition to this, I used just a bare minimum of spices for the flavors. This helps bring out the flavor of the vegetables beautifully, while the sour cream helps enhance the taste.

Preparation & Cooking: 15 minutes        Serves:3-4

Ingredients:
Onion - 1, sliced
Carrots - ¼ cup, sliced
Beans - ¼ cup, halved
Cauliflower - ¼ cup, broken into florets
Peas - ¼ cup
Garlic - 1 tablespoon, minced/grated
Pepper - to taste, freshly cracked
Nutmeg - a pinch
Crushed Red Pepper Flakes - to taste
Sour Cream - 1 tablespoon
Salt - to taste
Olive Oil - 2 tablespoons

Method:

1. Heat olive oil in a pan, add the minced garlic to it and give it a stir,
2. Add the vegetables (except peas) and saute till they are tender but still retain a bit of bite.



3. Mix in the peas, freshly cracked pepper, nutmeg, crushed red pepper flakes and salt to taste.



4. Finally add the sour cream and take it off the flame.


Serve hot with rice or rotis.