Mahanandi

Ridge gourd, potato and carrot – this is a veggie match, made in an Indian kitchen. Their flavors compliment each other and when combined with some onion, green chillies, coconut, they make a fresh, satisfying side dish.

This is the kind of veg-medley I love to make when I’m short on time. A pleasing, sweet-spicy taste that pairs well with rice and dal or with chapatis and corn tortillas. Tasty and flexible, lot of curry in less time – what more one could want in a recipe?

Recipe:

2 fresh looking ridge gourds (turai, beera kaya): First peel/or scrape the ridges on outside, wash the veggie, then cut it into bite sized pieces.
1 medium sized potato and carrot – peeled, then cut into bite sized cubes
1 onion – finely chopped
5 green chillies and 1 tbs of coconut powder – made into smooth paste
Salt to taste and pinch of turmeric
1 fistful of fresh or dried peas – I used dried peas (soaked overnight in water)
Popu ingredients – 1 tsp each of mustard seeds, cumin, minced garlic and curry leaves

It’s just like regular curry preparation, only thing you have to keep in mind is – first cook potatoes and carrots, add ridge gourd later, as it cooks faster, compared to potatoes and carrots.

Heat one teaspoon of peanut oil in a big pan. Add popu ingredients. When they start to splutter, add onions, saute for few minutes. Stir in peas, potatoes and carrots. Cover and cook them in their own moisture, for about 10 minutes on medium heat.

When they are little bit softened, stir in ridge gourd pieces, salt, turmeric and green chilli-coconut paste. Cover again and cook them, stirring in-between, till they reach the texture/softness you desire.

Serve hot with chapati/paratha or with rice and dal combination.

Ridge gourd curry and paratha ~ Our lunch.

I bought a quite few amlas (usiri kayalu, Indian Gooseberry) at Toronto and I couldn’t resist making a small batch of pickle with them, following a recipe from Malathi Chandur’s cookbook – “Vantalu-Pindi Vantalu“. The pickle turned out to be hot, spicy good.

Recipe:
For 15 amlas

15 clean, fresh looking, blemish free amlas (usiri kayalu)
½ cup peanut oil
¼ cup of salt and red chilli powder
¼ cup of mustard seeds – roasted & finely powdered (aava pindi)
½ tsp of asafoetida (inguva)

Preparation:

First wash the amlas and dry them using clean cloth, without any sign of moisture.

Heat up 1 tablespoon of oil in a skillet and add the amlas and sauté them till they turn light brown. Remove and let them cool down to room temperature.

Heat the remaining oil in another pan to a smoking point. Remove it from heat, let it cool down to room temperature.

Add salt, red chilli powder, mustard powder and asafoetida to the roasted amlas. Mix them all with a clean, dry spoon. Pour and stir in the heated (now at room temperature) oil. Mix them all together, again with a clean dry spoon. Cover tightly and let it stew at least for two weeks. The more you wait, the tasty the pickle becomes and the normal waiting period is one month. I couldn’t wait that long.:)

Just before serving, do the popu or tadka. Heat 1 tsp of oil in a pan, fry red chilies, cumin and mustard seeds until they splutter, then add garlic flakes and remove from the heat. Add it to the pickle, mix thoroughly and serve with rice and dal.

Amla Pickle (Usiri kaya Uragaya) – spicy and sour like mango pickle and quite tasty in this cold winter weather.

Recipe Source: Malathi Chandur’s Cookbook “Vantalu-Pindi Vantalu“

Ridge gourd is often compared to zucchini, the squash. But the comparison is like saying potato and sweet potato are the same. Except for where they come from, there is no comparison at all taste wise, between those two.

Ridge gourd has a firmer, less watery texture than zucchini, and the flavor is much more intense and sweet, where as Zucchini seems to be full of water and nothing else when cooked and too bland to taste. Given a choice, ridge gourd clearly comes out as the winner, taste wise. Though I dislike character less personalities in life, I do like the bland zucchini. It took some time but it won me over. In case of ridge gourd, I may have made complaining noises about other veggies but never about ridge gourd or ‘beerakaya’ we call it in Telugu. Be as curry or chutney or in dal, I relish ridge gourd in all forms. I even tried growing it here, when we were in Houston albeit unsuccessfully, not good seeds.

Here is a recipe of ridge gourd in tomato sauce, Vijay’s favorite and My Mother-in-law’s recipe:

Recipe:

2 young looking, fresh ridge gourds
Scrape the skin and ridges, wash, then cut into bite size pieces
4 ripe juicy tomatoes – finely chopped
1 onion – finely chopped
4 green chillies
—————-
1 tablespoon of coconut powder
½ tsp of dhania(coriander) powder & turmeric
¼ tsp of salt – or to your taste
Popu ingredients – 1tsp each of mustard seeds, cumin, curry leaves & minced garlic

Preparation:
You know the drill. Heat peanut oil, do the popu, sauté onions, tomatoes and green chillies. Add chopped ridge gourd and all the seasoning. Stir to mix and cook, covered. Tomato juice and water that comes from cooked ridge gourd pieces is going to be enough to make the curry a stew/kurma type. So don’t add any extra water, unless you want a watery, thin version. Cook till ridge gourd pieces are tender and the sauce thickens. Serve it warm.

Though I have to say my favorite is always the dry curry recipe, that I posted a while back, I also make this sauced version sometimes, because Vijay likes it. Either as a sauce for pasta/with chapati/ or with rice, this curry tastes good. Sometimes, we do the dunking thing with toasted garlic bread. Good eat, any way you prefer.

Cooking ridge gourd (beerakaya, turai) in tomato sauce.

Recipe source: Attamma(MIL)

Another recipe with tindora (ivy gourd, dondakaya, Kovakku), this time with a sauce. Sauce is prepared from roasted sesame seeds, fresh coconut and dried chillies, sweetened with little bit of jaggery. Usually sesame sauce calls for the addition of tamarind, but in this case, slightly sour taste of tindora cancels the need for tamarind.

A different recipe, sweet and sour – because of jaggery and tindoras, nutty and nourishing due to sesame-coconut combination. A must try, for those of you who are interested in cooking up something new with tindoras.

Recipe:

20 fresh tindoras – each, cut crosswise into rounds (3 to 5),
1 medium sized onion – finely chopped
½ cup sesame seeds
¼ cup powdered coconut – I used fresh coconut-oven dried
4 to 6 dried red chillies
1 tablespoon powdered jaggery (or to your taste)
½ teaspoon salt and turmeric
Popu or tadka ingredients

Preparation:

In an iron skillet, lightly toast sesame seeds, powdered coconut and dried red chillies. Cool and take them in a blender or food processor and make a smooth paste.

In a pan, heat one teaspoon of peanut oil, do the popu or tadka i.e. toasting one teaspoon each of mustard seeds, cumin, minced garlic and curry leaves

Add onion, saute a little bit, and then add round slices of tindora. Mix them once, cover and cook, stirring in between for 10 to 15 minutes on medium heat. Allow cooking tindora in its own moisture, sort of steam-saute.

When they are tender and giving off wonderful smell, add the sesame-coconut paste, jaggery, salt and turmeric. Add half glass of water. Stir to mix and cook them covered, until the sauce thickens. Serve warm with rice or chapati.

I have to say this curry tastes great with chapati/roti than with rice.

Tindora Curry with chapatis ~ Our lunch today.

Okra (Bendakaya in Telugu and Bendi in Hindi)

As a whole, okra looks handsome and wholesome.

Cut it open, you realise that you are dealing with one needy veggie. Like a toddler who hangs on to mother’s saree, okra clings to everything that is in sight. To the cutting board, to the knife, to the pot and it slips in your mouth too. No wonder it elicits strong reaction from people. I like okra and I don’t mind its clinginess because I know how to deal with it. I have few tricks and tips to make it less sticky. Keep in mind, I am talking about the fresh okra and not the frozen kind, which are hopeless to reform.

Recipe and some tips:
(For two, for one serving)

20 to 25 fresh, whole okra – washed thoroughly, then rubbed in a clean cloth, to remove all the moisture. This small step alone reduces the clinginess by 50%. After making sure they are clean and dry, slice each one, crosswise into half centimeter thick pieces. By now you may notice, touch of knife brings out the thick, viscous substance in okra. So in between cutting, periodically, wipe the cutting board and knife with a paper towel to remove the sticky stuff that’s accumulated.

1 medium sized onion – finely chopped
6 green chillies and 1 tbs of coconut – made into smooth paste
Turmeric and salt to your taste
And the usual ingredients of popu or tadka

Preparation:

In a wide pan or in a well-seasoned iron skillet, heat one teaspoon of peanut oil. Do the popu or tadka (toasting 1 tsp of each, mustard seeds, cumin, curry leaves and chopped garlic).

Add and saute onions till soft and brown. Then add the cut okra slices. Sprinkle in turmeric, salt, and fine paste of greenchilli-coconut. Mix them all once, allow them to cook for 5 minutes, covered on medium heat.

After 5 minutes, remove the cover and stir them once. Reduce the heat to medium-low and let them saute or cook openly. This is the time to show restraint. Do not stir and mix at all, at this stage. The more you stir and the more okra breaksdown and oozes clingy stuff. So don’t stir. Let it cook undisturbed for 15 minutes. As a result, round okra slices will be intact in shape and tender, lightly browned in the bottom and crunchy – perfection. Serve hot.

Tastes good with rice-dal combination and also with chapatis/rotis.

Okra curry and rice ~ Our Meal Today

A perfect side snack, karela chips are crunchy, slightly bitter and spicy. A very different taste compared to potato chips but equally irresistible as an accompaniment to the regular meal of rice and dal.

I usually make them, slowly sauteing in a big pan for half an hour like that, until they turn crispy. Back in Nandyala, deep-frying the thinly sliced rounds of karela is the norm. Thanks to Kay and her recipe, I found a very easy way to make the karela chips without compromising the taste. Baking and broiling. Method is easy and the taste is superb.

Recipe:

I followed kay’s recipe.
Washed 3 bitter gourds (Karela – Indian variety). Using a mandoline, sliced thin rounds. That’s easy. chuk..chuk.chuk.. Plateful of karela rounds. Tossed them in two teaspoons of peanut oil and sprinkled red chilli-garlic powder, salt, turmeric to my taste (1/2 tsp each). More tossing. Kept them for 15 minutes like that so that karela rounds can absorb the seasonings.
Arranged them neatly in rows, on a foil covered baking tray. Then baked them in a pre heated oven at 375° F for about 10 minutes, another 5 minutes under broil setting to make them extra crispy. I had to watch them closely during the broiling. They turn from crispy to black very fast, I didn’t want that. Total 15 minutes in the oven – the result was crunchy karela chips.

Thanks Kay for this wonderful recipe. Fabulous results without much sweat – Vijay and I both liked them very much.

Bitter gourd (Karela) Chips.

Karela chips with okra sambhar & rice

I remember the mock fights with my sisters using this lengthy, stout vegetable, when we were children. This vegetable was our makeshift club in our funny fights. There are other stories that I still could remember to this day related to this vegetable. My mother used to plant this vegetable every year in our backyard and the crop was surplus to our family… in those days I dreamt of making a lot of money by selling surplus produce, which never materialized. After some time we were tired of eating this vegetable and I tried to convince my mother not to plant this vegetable in vain. One year we had a crop of more than 200 of these and needless to say, if you were our neighbor during that time, you would have received some of these from us for free, you might have begged us not to sent any more too.:)

Sorakaya in Telugu and bottle gourd, lauki, dudhi or lau in different Indian languages, here is one of my mother’s recipe with bottle gourd. Not a lot of ingredients, very simple and basic – tastes good only with chapatis and jowar roti.

Recipe:

Bottle gourd – medium sized – outer skin peeled, then cut into cubes.
1 cup of dalia(pappulu, pottu kadalai) – finely powdered
Dalia or Pappulu is a type of dal made by roasting the chana dal or bengal gram
1 teaspoon of red chilli powder
1/2 teaspoon each of salt and turmeric
Jaggery, one tablespoon or to your liking

Heat one teaspoon of peanut oil in a big saucepan, toast mustard seeds, cumin and curry leaves. Add the bottle gourd cubes. Cover and cook them in their own moisture. When they are little bit softened, add the finely powdered dalia (pappulu), red chilli powder, salt, turmeric and jaggery. Add half glass of water and mix them all thoroughly, without any lumps. Cover and cook for about 10 minutes until the sauce thickens and bottle gourd pieces turn soft.

Serve hot with chapatis or with jowar(Sorghum) roti.

Bottle gourd curry and chapatis
After two days of silence in our kitchen (because of newyear celebrations at friends house), Vijay and I prepared this simple meal today.

Recipe source: Amma
Note to the reader: The sauce to this curry is mainly made of dalia powder. If you think, there is not enough sauce, powder some more dalia and add it to the curry and adjust the seasoning like salt and jaggery to your taste.

Do you remember my post about stuffed brinjal curry with peanuts and sesame seeds? In that post, I also mentioned different kinds of stuffing that I know. Here is another type of stuffed brinjal curry, I am calling it by Hindi name – ‘Bagara Baingan’ – This time with purple brinjals, stuffing made with dals and fresh coconut and cooked in a pan. The stuffing doesn’t taste very good when pressure-cooked. So for this kind, I make it in a pan, like how they do it back home.

Recipe:

Small, fresh, young, blemish free brinjals – 8 to 12

Roasting for stuffing and gravy:

Chana dal and urad dal – quarter cup each
Black peppercorns and cloves – 4 to 6 each
Dried red chillies – 6 to 8
Cumin, coriander seeds & methi seeds – 1 teaspoon each
Roast them in an iron skillet till golden. Mix them with
Fresh or dried coconut – 1/2 cup
Tamarind juice and powdered jaggery – 1 tablespoon each
Salt – 1/2 teaspoon
My addition: One fistful of roasted cashews
Ginger garlic paste and roasted red onions can be added to this mix.

Make a smooth paste of all the above ingredients without adding any water. Divide it into two portions. One for stuffing the brinjals and the other portion is for making the gravy.

Stuffing:

1. Wash to clean up the wax coating on brinjals. Neatly cut and remove the stem of each brinjal.
2. Starting at opposite side of stem, make a plus (+) shaped cut towards the stem side, but not all the way through. (See the photo above, to get an idea)
3. Gently separating the brinjal petals, fill the narrow gap with the prepared paste.

Cooking:

1. In a big, wide, flat pan – heat one tablespoon of peanut oil, do the popu or tadka (toasting one teaspoon each of mustard seeds, cumin, curry leaves and minced garlic).
2. Arrange the brinjals – stuffing side up, neatly in rows. Cover and cook them in their own moisture for about 15 to 20 minutes on medium heat or until they soften. The younger the brinjals, the faster they cook.
3. Once you are sure that brinjals are tender and cooked, remove them carefully without disturbing shape onto a serving dish.
4. Pour the remaining paste that was kept aside to the pan. Mix it with half glass of water. Sprinkle in turmeric and adjust the salt, spice (red chilli), sour (tamarind) and sugar to your taste. Cook for another 10 to 15 minutes on low medium heat, until the gravy thickens.
5. Now put the brinjals back into the thickened gravy. Cook for another couple of minutes.

With rice or roti, this curry is a party favorite and a crowd pleaser.

Bagara Baingan with Rice ~ Our dinner today.

Until I was married to Vijay, I never tried the donda kaya (Tindora in Hindi). My mother never cooked this vegetable, I don’t know why; lack of availability is not a reason, that’s for sure. One seed, it spreads like wild fire, climbing and occupying every inch of the garden and produces the fruits like there’s no tomorrow. Almost in all seasons, tindora is there to buy. Common and cheap, that’s how we regarded it, back in Nandyala, I never saw anyone get excited or salivated over tindora back then.

They look cute though. This small greenish vegetable with white lines is so pretty, when freshly picked, you just want to bite it. But don’t do that, raw food item it isn’t. It has a very thick skin and insides are white flesh filled with small seeds. Red flesh means it is overripe and not fit for consumption. I heard hearsay of people going brain-dead who ate over-ripe tindoras.:) Well I never tried the over-ripe ones, so I am not sure of its veracity.:) When comes to cooking, some people cook it to the death, but I prefer little bit of crunch, so most often I make a shallow fry of the vegetable.

Recipe:

If you have regular Indian cooking stuff in your pantry, then making the curry is as easy as saying 1, 2 and 3.

1. Cut each tindora into half lengthwise, then make another lengthwise cut in each half – you will end up with 4 long thin pieces. To make curry for two, for one decent serving, you have to cut at least 15 to 20 tindoras.

2. In a pan, heat one teaspoon of peanut oil, do the popu or tadka (toasting mustard seeds, cumin, minced garlic and curry leaves).

3. Add the cut tindoras, sprinkle turmeric, salt and red pepper flakes to your taste. (Sometimes I also add dry coconut powder.) Mix them once, cover and cook for about 5 minutes. Remove the lid, then sauté openly for another 5 minutes or until the veggie reaches the crunchy consistency you desire.

Serve hot with chapatis or with rice and dal.

Tindora fry and fenugreek dal mixed with rice on the background.
Dondakaya kura mariyu menthi kura pappannam muddalu.

Tindora is available fresh or frozen in almost all of Indian grocery shops here in US. Fresh ones are most preferable.

First thing one notices about fresh fenugreek is how beautiful and delicate the leaves are. Then the smell, aromatherapy in truest sense, when pressure cooked with toor dal or sautéed with potatoes, any other vegetable, the leaves release wonderful fragrance. ‘Johnson and Johnson-A family company’, who makes money by beguiling the families with air fresheners and scented oils, if they get the whiff of fresh fenugreek, you bet, you’d see an ayurvedic or eastern themed fenugreek scented oil on shop shelves for sure.

Fenugreek is one of those green leafy veggies, looks innocently innocuous but when cooked, dazzles & grabs your attention by its wonderful aroma and makes you try and like it. For a dal-rice addict like me, nothing beats the taste of rice and dal made of fresh fenugreek leaves. Very tasty and nutrititous, it’s one of my favorite foods. Fenugreek and toor dal combination is a true and tested recipe, very popular in our Raayala seema region of Andhra, again one of those I learned from my mother.

Recipe:

One bunch of fresh fenugreek – washed and leaves plucked
4 fistfuls of Toor dal
1 medium sized onion and tomato – chopped
1o green chillies – finely chopped
Small lime sized tamarind
1/4 tsp of turmeric
Salt to taste

For popu or tadka :

1 tsp each of oil or ghee, mustard seeds, cumin and urad dal
1 garlic clove – finely chopped
Few curry leaves and few pieces of dry red chillies

Preparation:
Cook dal: In a pressure cooker, take toor dal, fenugreek leaves, onion, tomato, green chillies, tamarind and turmeric – add one glass of water and pressure cook them till 3 whistles. When the valve pressure is all released, remove the lid, add half teaspoon of salt and mash the dal using a wood masher to smooth paste.

Do the popu: In a deep bottomed vessel, heat one teaspoon of oil, add the remaining popu or tadka ingredients. Saute till the seeds start crackling, garlic turns red. Pour the cooked and mashed dal, stir well and cover. Tastes great with rice and chapati.

Fenugreek dal (Methi Dal or Menthi Kura Pappu) and rice with ghee.

Recipe Source: amma
Fenugreek is available both fresh and frozen in most of Indian grocery shops here in US

The first snow of the season has arrived this morning. The rain turned to snow for few minutes, giving us a brief glimpse of coming season. It was cold enough, so to warm the house and the stomach, I cranked up the oven to 400° F and baked cornbread with okra toppings. This is my first attempt at cornbread and it was a success, thanks to the detailed recipe written by Barbara of Tigers and Strawberries. I changed the recipe to my liking and also added crisply fried okra as cornbread topping.

Recipe:

Okra topping :
1 cup thinly sliced okra rounds, one onion, three green chillies and two garlic cloves all finely chopped. Saute them in oil, until they turn crisp and crunchy, like you normally do for a dry curry.

Cornbread Batter :
• Mix together 1 cup yellow cornmeal, 1/2 cup whole-wheat flour, 1 tsp each- baking powder and soda, 1/2 tsp salt.
• In another bowl, mix – 2 eggs (I removed yellows), 1 cup buttermilk, 4 tablespoons of molasses/sugar and 4 tablespoons of peanut oil.
• Combine the dry and wet ingredients.
• I also added half cup watermelon seeds that I brought from Nandyala to this mixture for some nutty crunch and nutritional value..

Baking:

Preheat the oven to 400 ° F. When you are ready with cornbread batter and sautéed okra, place the empty iron skillet in oven and heat it up (Barbara’s tip). Remove the hot skillet from the oven. First place the okra in the skillet, then pour the cornbread batter over it. Spread the batter neat and even with a spatula. Place the iron skillet in oven, bake at 400° F, for about 20 to 30 minutes or until the top is lightly browned.

Because this is for our lunch, I also baked some cauliflower florets and some baby lima beans along with cornbread. Just tossed the baby limas and cauliflower florets in some oil, salt and pepper. Spread them on a baking sheet and baked until they turn crisp.

We both liked cornbread with okra very much. Thanks Barbara for the wonderful cornbread recipe.

Baked lima beans are good too, but cauliflower florets…oy!. Not that good. I won’t be baking cauliflower again, ever!

Skillet Cornbread with okra toppings, baked baby lima beans and baked cauliflower florets & Ragi malt ~ our meal today.

Fresh Cilantro (Coriander, Dhania, Kottimera):

Indispensable to my cooking, I can’t imagine preparing food without this herb. More about Cilantro – here and here.

For this Weekend Herb Blogging, it’s Curly Parsley at Kalyn’s Kitchen and Keerai(Amaranth) at My Dhaba.

Bitter gourds, true to their name, are bitter and just like any bitter, sour things, they are an acquired taste. My mother’s recipe pairs the bitter gourd with jaggery and red chilli powder; the result is a sweet and sour, lip smacking good, bitter gourd curry. She made it impossible for us kids to hate this vegetable, really, who can resist a sweet and sour combination paired with hot, hot rice and ghee. Clever woman, she is.

Recipe:
4 to 6 fresh, good looking Indian variety bitter gourds (karela, kakara kaya)
( This recipe works only with karela, not good with chinese bittergourds. To know the difference, check the link)
½ to 1 cup powdered jaggery
½ tsp of red chilli powder
½ tsp of salt
A pinch or ¼ tsp of turmeric
For popu or tadka
½ tsp of mustard seeds, cumin and few curry leaves

Wash the bitter gourds (karela) and peel the outer rugged skin of each one. Cut into half. If you see white, kind of dried out seeds, they are good for consumption, proceed and cut them into bite sized pieces, including the seeds (They taste nutty and crunchy, add them as whole or cut them into pieces). If you see red colored seeds, the gourd is very mature and tastes impossibly bitter, so it is better to throw the whole thing away.

In a pan, heat one teaspoon of oil, splutter the mustard seeds, cumin and curry leaves. Add the cut bitter gourd pieces. Cover and cook them in their own moisture for about 5 to 8 minutes or until they are tender to touch. When you are sure that the pieces are tender, then only add the powdered jaggery, salt, turmeric, red chilli powder and one tablespoon of water. (Jaggery prevents further cooking of vegetable, so make sure the pieces are tender before adding jaggery.)

Mix them up thoroughly, cover and let them cook for about another 10 to 15 minutes on medium-low heat. In between sprinkle some water, taste and adjust the seasoning, add more jaggery if you think it’s needed. Jaggery melts and coats the bitter gourd pieces and ten minutes of simmering turns the melted jaggery into a gooey, thick, brown caramel like sauce.

Serve this gold colored, sweetly bitter, delicious curry with hot rice and some ghee.

Bitter Gourd (karela, Kaakara kaaya) Curry.

Recipe Source: Amma

You can also find different and more recipes with bitter gourd (karela) by other fabulous Indian food bloggers –Manisha and Gini.

Young, fresh cluster beans (Gawar, Matti kayalu) have a narrow and long body with tiny pods. They are very popular vegetable in Andhra. What I gathered from the Internet about cluster beans is that they are native to India and are widely grown, not only in Andhra but also in other parts of country (dry, warm and arid regions). Young ones are harvested for vegetable use. The mature pods – the seeds are harvested to be dried and powdered to flour known as guar gum. Guar gum is used as thickening agent in commercial food preparations like ice creams etc. I also came to know that cluster beans are not only low in calories but are also very effective in lowering the blood sugar and cholesterol levels. I didn’t know about that till now.

These cluster beans (gawar) are available in Indian grocery shops, both fresh and frozen here in US. They are eaten whole and have a delicate flavor, providing they are not overcooked. Even the young, fresh cluster beans need to be topped and tailed and may also need stringing. Just pluck the end of a cluster bean with your hand, and then pull downward; if a thick thread comes away, the bean need stringing, so do the same on the other side. The beans can then be sliced either using a sharp knife or with your hands. Cut or pluck them to pieces of one-inch length.

Recipe:

2 cups of cut cluster beans
1 onion, finely chopped
3 to 4 green chillies and 3 tablespoons of grated fresh coconut, blend to smooth
¼ teaspoon each- salt and turmeric or to taste

Add the cut cluster beans to boiling, salted water and cook until just tender or al dente and drain. Usually one or two minutes is sufficient. When overcooked, beans turn to flabby, flavorless things. So keep an eye on them and do not overcook.

While beans are cooking, in a wide skillet, heat one teaspoon of oil and toast mustard seeds, cumin, curry leaves and 2 sliced garlic cloves. Add and fry the onion pieces for 2 to 3 minutes until golden. Add the blanched cluster beans, green chilli-coconut paste, turmeric and salt. Turning occasionally, cook them for about 5 minutes.

Tastes great with rice or chapati.

Cluster Bean Curry with Rice, Gongura Dal and Sago Papad ~ Our Meal Today

Velvety texture of young, fresh green eggplant is a pure luxury, especially when paired with potatoes and tomatoes. The purple brinjals does not have the same delicate flavor but makes a good substitute here. The combination that I like most is brinjal-potato curry with sorghum roti. I have the sorghum flour, I know how to make the roti and I wanted to make them for this curry, but I was short on time so instead I made rice, the quick and easy alternative.

Recipe:

6 to8 green brinjals
1 or 2 medium sized potatoes – peeled and cubed
4 to 6 large, plump, ripe tomatoes – diced finely
1 onion – sliced thinly lengthwise
1 tablespoon of dry coconut powder
1 tablespoon of poppy seeds (gasa gasaalu) – powdered
1 teaspoon of ginger-garlic-cilantro paste
1 teaspoon of red chilli powder and salt
1/2 teaspoon of turmeric

Preparation:

Take tap water in a pot and add one teaspoon of salt. Cut brinjals into medium size quarters and add them to salt water. This will prevent the discoloration of cut brinjals. (An old trick, I think that all home cooks know in India.)
In a big pan, heat one teaspoon of oil and do the popu or tadka(frying 1 tsp mustard seeds and cumin), add the onions, sauté them till golden. Next add tomatoes, cook them on high heat, covered for few minutes until they soften and turn into mush.
Then, add the brinjal, potato, salt, turmeric, red chilli powder, coconut, poppy seed powder and ginger-garlic paste. Add half to one glass of water, mix them thoroughly and cook them covered on medium heat for about 15 to 20 minutes or until the potatoes are tender.

Our meal – Brinjal & Potato curry with rice and boiled egg