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My Mother In Law (MIL) who is the Mahalakshmi of my home, Smt. Parimala Rayasam. My Father In Law, who is the Maharaja of our hearts, Sri. Ramalingam Rayasam. Most of the recipes in the Rayasam Cook Book are contributed by my MIL. My in-laws mean a world to us, their wisdom, their courage, and [...]

Diwali synonyms sweetness … brightness… silence….   sweetness gives brightness and that is blissful silence..   happy diwali and hearty thanks to radha cookery …. thank U friend ~Poet VairaBarathi~ Jalebis are crispy, fried sweets that are like thin flutes filled with syrup inside. Many Bollywood movies have devoted a few scenes in the praise [...]

“Mary has invited us to spend the day at their place, right in the heart of the hill country on their beautiful 3 acres,” said my husband. The boys got all excited. All they wanted to do was get into the thick woods and start their wild adventures. I did not mind, Texas hill country [...]

Hari Nayak is a celebrity chef based in New York who has a degree in Hotel & Hospitality Management from Manipal, India. He graduated as an honor student from the Culinary Institute of America in 1998. He apprenticed under the famed Chef Daniel and Chef Alain Ducasse. He has been a consulting chef for world [...]

What can be more enticing than different varieties of spiced rice to a South Indian like me? The picture of this rice dish caught my eye as I was flipping through Hari Nayaks’s cook book “My Indian Kitchen.” I love black-eyed peas and the recipe seemed very quick and simple. I used frozen black-eyed peas [...]

Cauliflower has always been one of my favorite vegetables! I love to eat the florets raw, or stuffed inside a hot and spicy paratha, or with potatoes. I love the texture and delicate taste of the vegetable. It absorbs flavors of spices very well indeed. Ginger is known for its health benefits. It aids in [...]

I love Raita. It is a refreshing yogurt dip I generally make with diced onions, tomatoes, cucumbers, and boiled potatoes. I was intrigued by the Avocado Raita that I found in Chef Hari Nayak’s book. I called him to talk to him about the unusual combination of Avocado and Yogurt. It’s really delicious, he claimed. [...]

My husband really enjoys Bengali cuisine a lot. His mom is an expert but somehow I never really had much interest in learning that cuisine. While in an Indian grocery store, I saw a ready-made packet of Panch Phoran on the shelf. I was curious and bought it. I thought one was supposed to eat [...]

The image of Chaatambades or dal vadas on Page 60 of Chef Hari Nayak’s book My Indian Kitchen had me apply my brakes and freeze on the spot. Going back into the flash back, I remembered the good old days of my childhood where I would ask our maid servant to buy me some of [...]

My husband was born in Calcutta and he has fond memories of the language and food there. He remembers his neighbors and friends with affection. My MIL makes a variety of Bengali dishes; I’ve tasted several of those but never took the time to experiment in my kitchen. While I was looking through Hari Nayak’s [...]

Curry leaves always remind me of this couple next door who I thought were supremely funny. I was about 10 years old then, and this couple who were our neighbors would pluck out some fresh curry leaves right off their tree and start chewing it first thing in the morning. They reminded me of two [...]