Recipe Collections

With a long weekend at hand, it's the best time to plan a family picnic! Pack a snack and food basket with these goodies that are delicious, easy to make and very convenient to pack for travel. There's no better way to enjoy an extended weekend than a drive out with family and friends. The picnic menu covers refreshing drinks, wraps and sandwiches with an assortment of fillings, one dish meals that can be out together easily and enjoyed by large groups, and of course picnic-friendly dessert!

Kicking off the festivities for the new year is the auspicious occasion of Pongal, Sankranti or Makar-Sankranti. Essentially a harvest festival, it's celebrated in regions across the length and breadth of the country, as the day of the passing of winter and welcoming the spring season. It is celebrated with varying customs and traditions and known by different names across the country. Makara Sankranti in Karnataka, Pongal in Tamil Nadu, Bhogi in Maharashtra, Uttarayan in Gujarat and Lohri in many parts of the North, this festival celebrates providence, abundance and invokes prosperity for the coming year and season that lies ahead.

With vacations done and the festive spirit fading away faster than we'd have liked it to, you're probably still grappling with getting back to your routine. Juggling the many aspects of your life, providing healthy, balanced meals for your family, though a priority tends to be stressful and difficult to manage every single day. When you're pinched for time, it is tempting to reach for that packet of instant noodles or dial the closest restaurant for a take-out meal. This collection of delicious and wholesome meal ideas are excellent for such days because they combine the best of most of all requirements - essential nutrition, high on taste, and most of all they're complete meals by themselves. 

Here's a flavourful round up of some of the best Indian Vegetarian Recipes from the last year alone. Spanning all the requisite essentials -- appetisers, main course including curries, dals, vegetables, breads, rice, festive sweets and mithai, breakfast, street food and evening snacks - this list is a great place to bookmark your favourites, or catch up on the delicious updates you may have missed out on.

There's no better way to bid 2015 farewell than to revisit some of the most loved World Vegetarian Recipes from the last year. From snacky appetisers, wholesome main course options including pastas, pizzas and one dish meals from around the globe, sweet and savoury breakfasts to tea time and snack box treats - this list is a great place to revisit your favourites, or catch up on the delicious recipes you may have missed out on.

The most talked-about day for dinner parties is finally upon us, and whether you've made plans to entertain a house full of guests yourself, or go to a potluck dinner party - you're likely to have party people to feed! This Vegetarian New Years Eve Party Menu has some of the best selections from Archana's Kitchen - featuring a good variety of cuisines and flavours. A balance of fun, finger foods and appetisers to a more comforting Indian-themed main course selection. Give this menu a try and zest up your NYE dinner plans.

It's the season of gifting, celebration and getting together with friends and family. And the season is incomplete without an adequate touch of sugar and spice, and everything nice. Desserts add a very welcome dose of extra festivity to every gathering. They're great to distribute amongst guests, hand out as party favours, pack in children's snack boxes and store away for even after the holiday season is over. 

If you've already made your Boozy Christmas Party Cake, here are 12 more great ideas for Christmas treats to share with your guests. They're celebratory, festive, fun and eggless to boot!

If you're having an annual Christmas dinner party to celebrate the festival of cheer and togetherness, this menu might interest you. Whether you have a few vegetarians to cater to or want to challenge yourself and prepare a whole vegetarian feast, you'll find some inspiring ideas here. Right from starters and appetisers to hearty mains and dessert too - this vegetarian menu will delight you and your guests.

Maharashtrian cuisine is hearty, spicy,yet comforting with lots of homegrown flavours. Quintessential homemade spice mixes, masalas from granny's pantry and heirloom recipes are quite the trademark. With a diverse range of preparations spanning vegetarian and non vegetarian recipes, this cuisine is a minefield for a true lover of Indian food. So this weekend meal features just a small sampling of Maharashtrian and Konkan inspired cuisine, to whet your appetite for more.

The Winter is here to stay for a few weeks more. Temperatures have dipped considerably and it calls for warm food all round. Take comfort in hot soups, heart one pot meals that exude warmth in spice, flavour and textures. There's no better way that to get in the mood for winter than with hearty food that beats the dipping temperatures. This weekend meal will inspire you to fire up your stove and get the soup pot out from exile! Whisk up your favourite soups from this selection. Serve it with a baked dish or two of your choice, lay out some Garlic Bread and bring out your repertoire of warm desserts. You're going to need it!

With the Indian Super League Games in full swing, and building up to an exciting finale, its only fair that you get your game night fix in time for the weekend. Gather together with friends and family over sport and this game night menu will have you sorted for a great Saturday Night party.

World cuisine or world food is increasingly becoming common with the boundaries on the culinary map of the world fast getting blurry, and east to cross. While fusion food is another genre altogether - and focuses on an amalgamation of diverse cuisines, world food is more about sampling many different classic dishes from different stretches of the world. With access to a wider range of exotic ingredients, recipes from around the globe and influences being shared easily through food blogs, gorgeous pictures and cookbooks, putting together a meal that gleans from all over the world is not difficult to do. Indeed, given how multi-cultural the food map of the world is getting, it often feels like the world is a quite literally a melting pot inviting you to dig in!

 Indian street foods are always a hit when added to a party menu! When made at home they're fresh, zesty and bring in all the essential flavours that make it perfect for a party indulgence. From tangy to sweet, spicy to sour, crunchy to soft, and deep fried to fresh and raw - Chaat Favourites from the nooks and corners of India have a wide range of flavours and tastes across so many different preparations. This weekend's family meal features 9 such Indian street food favourites that you can very easily make at home and wow your guests with.

It’s the weekend and we're taking a break from the typical lunch and dinner menus we have been curating so far. Festivities have probably also had us all overfed and we are looking to break the monotony with something different, refreshing and a spread that you can decide how much you want to indulge in. Brunch is a wonderful option for days like this. Falling right in the twilight zone between a lazy breakfast and a leisurely weekend lunch, it allows for enough space to either nibble on a bunch of things or indulge on your favourites. The best part? Space is out and spread it over a few hours and you can skip lunch all together, freeing up time to catch up on your reading, spend time with friends, take a long nap or even just veg out in front of the television. That's what weekends are about, right? This weekend menu will put you in the mood for brunch!

It's time to give thanks for the abundance in our lives. Gratitude for family, friends, togetherness, success, prosperity and everything that you have had the good fortune of experiencing this year. And what better way than to get together with your near and dear ones over a hearty meal. If you're battling rain and chilly weather where you are, this meal will hit all the right notes. It's a vegetarian take on the traditional Thanksgiving Meal - but captures the essence of all the main elements. So fire up that oven and get baking. This is a meal you will want to make and share with those around you as you give thanks for all that you have received, pay it forward and welcome the new year with a open mind and heart.

Although it originated in the countries and cultures surrounding the Mediterranean Sea, Mediterranean Cuisine has fast become popular in restaurants across the world. It is not uncommon to find a pretty authentic Mezze Platter on many menus in restaurants we frequent, but few go beyond just the basics that we know. However the cuisine is rich, diverse and very hearty, gleaning from multiple countries such as Lebanon, Morocco, Turkey, Spain, Portugal, Egyptian and Greek cuisines too. Often called Lebanese food, or food from the Middle East too, a Mediterranean menu usually is hearty, featuring the staples like good quality Olive Oil, wholesome legumes and some kind of flatbread. With a little preparation, this is an easy and delicious cuisine to cook in your own home. We will show you how.

Get into the festive spirit with a traditional South Indian thali. As we welcome the festival of lights, your home is probably already abuzz with activity and your kitchen, a scene of hectic preparations. While you get your annual dose of Festive Sweet And Savoury Favourites and plan that Cocktail Menu for your Diwali Party - here is a traditional home-cooked South Indian meal menu to bring back some comfort to all your planning.

It’s hard to resist the temptation to celebrate Diwali when there is a party with a lot of good food and drink, hearty conversation and cheer included. Whether you are really religious, understand the traditional significance or even celebrate the festival annually, here's a party menu that is going to get you in the spirit of the festival. If you haven’t been invited to a Diwali bash as yet this year, how about you host it yourself?

With the festival of lights around the corner, your kitchen must be buzzing with activity. Knowing you must be at your busiest best we thought we'd share some ideas on the sweets and savouries that can be prepared for this festival. The shared recipes also make great favours that you could take for your friends as gifts to add a personal touch.

A delicious Punjabi dinner is a perfect excuse to have a party at home with friends and family. In this section we are ticking off all the classic Punjabi recipes, from Pindi Chole to Achari Paneer Tikka and Stuffed Kulcha and Gajar Ka Halwa to top it off. So get into your kitchen and whip this meal up for your loved ones. It's the perfect way to get into the festive spirit! 

There is something incredibly romantic about the festival of Karva Chauth and for me, this romance was created long before Shahrukh and Kajol made the festival popular with DDLJ. Every year I would see my parents showing love and affection publicly, something that was typically not a common thing in our household. 

Today, we bring to you must have recipes from across the country that are most popular on Archana’s Kitchen. It's an experience in itself to look at the kind of diversity we have in our country on the food front. And we have it all right here, just for you. So go right ahead and feast your eyes and your tummies to the most delightful spread we have for you here.

It’s the weekend and with festivities in full swing, this week’s dinner calls for some extra celebrations. Dining options that are away from the ordinary. Something zesty, that will bring the whole family and your closest friends together. So we have for you a selection of mouth-watering chaats – spicy, tangy, sweet, cool, crunchy – this list covers it all. Making a medley of flavours that of some of the most loved chaats from across the country. There’s no better way that a festival to celebrate with a party that centres around food!

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