My paneer kebabs are a delicious snack as well as breakfast/brunch recipe, made with the goodness of homemade paneer and lots of veggies
A few days back, when we were about to make our chai in the morning, as is our ritual, we realised that the milk had curdled. This meant that we would have to make do with milk powder for our tea, until we got some fresh milk. That we did, and also, I didn’t discard the milk because, I just knew what I wanted to do with it – make paneer out of it! This is an age old, zero waste technique that my grandmothers used and mom still does, when milk goes bad. And because paneer itself is made by curdling milk, this is a great idea. While my homemade paneer came out perfect, it wasn’t much in quantity (we’d already used up more than half of the milk). Therefore, instead of making a curry with it, I added some more veggies and made these very yummy paneer kebab with vegetables.
Not only did these, very easy to make, kebabs taste amazing, they were quite filling and wholesome, too. We had some, sandwiched between breads and some we had with our evening chai. And we loved both the ways. Hence, my paneer kebabs are a delicious snack as well as breakfast/brunch recipe. You could serve these with some coriander mint chutney and even some ketchup. Kids, especially, love it with ketchup and you could pack these even for their school lunch boxes. These kebabs are indeed a delicious, healthy and filling, lunch box recipe. And a great way to sneak in veggies in your kids meals. 🙂
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Wholesome paneer kebabs
My paneer kebab with vegetables are shallow fried and pretty healthy, too. After all, it’s got the goodness of crumbled paneer and a host of vegetables. I have added sweet corns, onions, carrots, peas etc but you could choose to add in any vegetables of your choice. Also there isn’t any crumb coating that I’ve done for these, so the cooking process is also quick. And because they don’t have a crumb coating, these kebabs have a lovely, soft texture. They are melt-in-the-mouth yummy. Moreover, they make for a much appreciated evening snack and even party appetizers. You could also add in some grated mozzarella to make it even more appealing, especially for kids.
Now, if you are wondering about the binding agent here, I have used corn flour. I, deliberately, didn’t want to add boiled potatoes for binding since, I wanted to keep these kebabs light, for snacking. But if you want to make a more filling meal of these delicious paneer kebabs you could add potatoes and leave the cornflour out. Additionally, if you like your kebabs to be crunchy you could also crumb coat them and shallow fry.
I have flavoured these lip smacking beauties with garam masala and chaat masala. While I have used both, fresh chilis and chili flakes, for my kebabs, you could choose which to add or omit. When making for kids, you could totally leave them out.
Share it!
If you have liked my recipe and are planning to make it too, I’d love to hear from you. You could share your paneer kebab pictures with me on Instagram or can drop me a line with your feedback below. It would really mean a lot to me!
Eat hearty!
Paneer kebab with vegetables
Equipment
- Shallow cooking pot
Ingredients
To make the paneer
- 500 ml semi skimmed/whole milk
- 2-3 tbsp lemon juice
To make the kebabs
- 1 cup mixed vegetables finely chopped
- 1 small onion finely chopped
- 1 tbsp ginger-garlic paste
- 2 fresh chilis finely chopped
- 2-3 tbsp coriander leaves finely chopped
- 1 tbsp chili flakes
- ¼ tsp turmeric powder
- 1½ tsp garam masala
- 1½ tsp chaat masala
- 1 tbsp lemon juice
- 2 tbsp corn flour
- 4-5 tbsp oil
- salt to taste
Instructions
To make paneer at home
- Set the milk to boil, when it comes to a full boil, add the lemon juice and turn the flame off
- Keep stirring, with a spatula, until the whey separates. Drain this over a tea cloth lined colander and tie it up tight
- Let it sit for about an hour so that all the whey drains out and you are left with moist homemade paneer* (about 180g). You can place a bowl below your colander to collect the water to use it in your curries, dals, dough etc
To make the paneer kebabs
- Heat a tablespoon oil in your cooking pot and temper the cumin seeds. When aromatic, add the onions and chilis (if using) and saute´until the onions soften
- Then add the ginger garlic pastes and fry for couple more minutes. When they don't smell raw anymore, put your veggies in with the salt, turmeric powder and cook for 5-7 minutes. Then remove from heat and this mixture cool down
- Then, in a mixing bowl, mix together the paneer, the vegetables mixture, lemon juice, chili flakes, garam masala, chaat masala, coriander leaves and cornflour
- Mix to form a homogeneous dough (do not knead) and pinch out 7 equal sized portions from it. Make roundels and then flatten them out, as in the pic
- Reheat your cooking pot with the remaining oil and shallow fry the kebabs over medium heat until golden brown from both sides. Drain and remove on kitchen towels
- Serve these yummy paneer kebabs with vegetables as an evening snack with ketchup and/or green chutney. Enjoy!
Notes
- *You can use this paneer to make curries, sweets, snacks etc. This is also called chaena in Bengali, the ones used to make rasgullas from
- In the vegetables, I have used a mix of sweet corn, green peas, carrots, red bell peppers and broccoli florets
- I got about 180g of paneer from the milk I used
- g - grams
- tsp - teaspoon
- tbsp - tablespoon
- 1 cup = 250 millilitres
Mouth watering preparation and presentation
Thank you so much Maa! Loads of love x