KhuraasNichi Chutney

The Black seeds are the KhuraasNi seeds (Botanical name: Veronina Anthelmintica). 

Slender black and nutritious, antihelmintic.

As kids growing up in Mumbai you would not expect us to know about KhuraasNi. On our visits to Gondavale we would be served this black chutney at the top of the Taat. Wondering as we licked what it was? My Mother as ignorant as me having grown up in the konkan, had never heard of KhuraasNi. She guessed, may be sunflower seeds! But they are not.

Till I grew to be older I was clueless even though we would enjoy it from packets bought from small shops in the ghats. 

One day my friend Sangita's Mom made the chutney and she gave it to me to taste. Hers was with peanuts, yummy nevertheless. I was enlightened then about KhuraasNi.

This recipe is from a random source, I don't remember who gave it to me but this is how I make it.

Ingredients

1 cup KhuraasNi

1/2 cup sesame seeds / Til

1/2 dry coconut

1 teaspoon coriander seeds

1 teaspoon cumin

1 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon red chili powder

Toast the KhuraasNi and sesame seeds for a minute in the microwave.  Keep aside.

Chip the dry coconut into slices and toast in the MW for 1.5 mins, tossing once for even browing.

Now toast the cumin and coriander seeds for 30 secs.

Cool to room temp all the ingredients. Mix and put in the grinder jar. Dry grind to coarseness with red chili powder and salt.

It can be served with the traditional Taat or even with dosas and idlis for a change. A drizzle of oil will make it a good lick and you won't cough up from the spice going up your nose.

Enjoy it more by storing in an airtight container to last you long at room temp and stretch the shelf life to months by storing in the fridge.

 

Jardaloo Chhole With Vegetable Pulao And Rose Milk

Jardaloo Chhole With Vegetable Pulao, Nuts from Jardaloo, 

Microwaved Potato Mirgund and Rose Milk

Today, 1st May 2013, was one of the days I did nothing and actually enjoyed doing nothing!

The Nothing is giving me something, Peace of mind!

It is the heat and dust that is causing trouble but harsh summers make the anticipation of the monsoon showers worth the wait! That's life too!

In this unbearable summer time I have been making simple meals and lots of coolers for the afternoons. So far the meals went something like this Chilled Kelyacha Shikaran and Poli, Bean cultlets with salad, Greens stir fry and Phulkas, Tomato Omlette etc. 

Today I felt like making a combo meal complete with dessert. It should get ready in under 30 mins being the criteria. Having started cooking only at 12.30 pm I ensured the hungry Dad got his sharp 12 noon fill of a plate of cut papaya. The papaya was tasteless so gave it a honey bath.  

That done I could focus on preparing the meal. I had cooked and frozen chickpeas that turned out to be of great use today, I pulled them out and set them on the counter to defrost. On the side I was soaking Jardaloo for the things I wanted to do inspired by ET, I also promised her that I will experiment with them in a curry.  

Now the cuisines that I know which use Jardaloo or Apricots in their cooking are the Parsi and Middle Eastern. So I froze on the simple veg pulao which is on the lines of Brown rice that goes with Dhansak. To round off the meal on a sweet note I thought Rose milk fit the theme perfectly.

So presenting to you a Parsi inspired combo-meal.

Jardaloo Chhole

Ingredients

5-7 Jardaloo/ Apricots soaked in hot water for atleast 2 hours.

2 cups cooked Chickpeas/ chhole

 (Incase cooked are not available, soak overnight and pressure cook until completely cooked about 4-5 whistles)

2 medium onions chopped lengthwise

3 tomatoes diced

1 teaspoon Koli masala

1/4 teaspoon red chili powder

1/4 teaspoon turmeric powder

1 teaspoon jeera

1 teaspoon coriander powder

1 teaspoon sugar

2 tablespoons oil

Chopped Cilantro for garnish

Masala paste

2 green chilies

7-8 cloves garlic

1/2 inch piece of ginger

1 teaspoon salt

In a mortar and pestle, grind the green chilies, garlic, ginger and salt to a coarse paste.

In a small pressure cooker heat oil. Fry the masala paste till caramelized slightly. Add the chopped onions and fry till transparent and pale pink. Add the tomatoes and the spices, jeera, coriander powder, turmeric powder, red chili powder, Koli masala and fry on high heat till the tomatoes form a paste. Add the sugar. Now tip in the cooked chhole.

Add the soaked Jardaloo. Remove the stone from the Jardaloo before adding or if you don't mind them while eating you can just remove it at the table. If you have strong teeth crack the stone and eat the nut inside!

Close the lid and allow 3 whistles. Put off heat, allow to cool completely. Open the lid and mash the chickpeas a bit with the back of the spoon against the cooker wall to get a thick gravy.

To serve ladel out the chhole into a bowl, top up with a cooked jardaloo from the gravy and garnish with chopped fresh cilantro.

Vegetable Pulao

(Parsi Brown rice inspired)

This is a very simple pulao and goes well with this curry. I would not recommend it as a pulao for consumption on its own but may be the western palate may still find it good as a stand alone. 

Ingredients

1  cup Basmati rice

6 Fresh beans, I used black eyed beans from the Green Balcony

1/2 cup florets of cauliflower

1/2 green peas

2 onions chopped lengthwise

1 Tej patta

5-6 cloves

10-12 pepercorns

2 cardamoms

3 tablespoons Oil 

1/2 teaspoon of sugar
Salt to taste

Wash and soak basmati rice in water for 30 mins. Drain the water and keep aside.

Heat oil in a wok. Fry the onions with half teaspoon of sugar. They will brown evenly and quicker. Add the vegetables to it  and fry. Add the drained rice and mix to coat the rice well with oil. Cook for 10 mins.

Meanwhile boil 3 cups water with salt.

Pour the boiled water into the rice.

Cook another 15 mins covered. Till all water it absorbed. Fluff the grains of rice.

To serve mould it in a cup and turn it out on the plate. Top with a red cherry.

On the side serve some jardaloo nuts. When you deseed the jardaloo before adding to the curry, keep the seeds aside. Smash these seed open to get the nut, it tastes like almond. No part of Jardaloo is wasted.

Rose Milk

Ingredients

3 tablespoon rose syrup (I used Kalverts) 

400 ml chilled milk

few ice cubes

sugar to taste

Mix everything in a shaker and serve in elegant glasses.

Enjoy this Parsi inspired combo-meal. Put together the plate with a small portion of the vegetable pulao, a bowl of Jardaloo chhole. The curry as well as the pulao has sweet notes from the Jardaloo and the sugar. It makes it a balanced taste. Add the microwaved potato mirgunds for some crunch. Sip on the perfect summer cooler of Rose milk and end your meal on a sweet note.

Life is about living the best way you know inspite of the harsh summers and the heat and dust!

Choco-Vanilla Marble Cake

Sometimes you turn the world upside down for a good recipe and then you just experiment with something on hand and you hit upon a perfect recipe. It is so good that you want to use it every time you bake a cake but then you warn yourself this is a rich cake not your usual cake, yes even on its own!

I used this cake as the base for my nephew's BD, The Chocolate Volcano! Cake.

I am not a big fan of richly decorated cakes that are laden with butter cream or fresh cream, exception is the mascarpone. The celebration cake was something that got made for my nephew and later again just the bundt without all that ganache for Dad and me to have along with our tea. It is a perfect cake with tea or coffee. The bad thing about Bundts is that the slices are small. 

Ingredients

100 g butter , softened
1/4 cup oil
225g caster sugar
4 tablespoons curd
225g all purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon soda bicarbonate
3 tbsp milk
1/2 cup Amul fresh cream
1 tsp vanilla extract
2 tbsp cocoa powder

Soften the butter by cutting it up and whisking along with the oil, sugar and curd.

Mix all the dry ingredients, flour, baking powder and soda bicarbonate. Fold into the smooth liquid. 

Add the vanilla extract, fresh cream, milk and adjust the consistency.

Divide the batter into 2 equal parts and add cocoa powder into 1 part and mix well to get the chocolate batter.

Prepare a 10 inch bundt pan by greasing and dusting with flour. Pour the two batters in blotches. Alternate with chocolate and white batter. Then pass a knife randomly to draw swirls in the batter. This will give the marbled effect.

Bake at 180 deg for 25 mins using the convection mode in the oven.

Let it cool completely in the tin before you turn it out on to a plate. This cake is soft and has tender crumb. Slice it for a high tea or decorate it into the The Chocolate Volcano! Cake.

Kokum Sarbat

It is summer time and more than the last year I am feeling the heat more this year. Last year when I came back to Mumbai I was fearing being hit by the heat but the summers just passed away. This year I am deliberate in attempting to make lots of cold drinks for us to sip on especially in the afternoon instead of tea.

Here is a post by my dear blogger buddy Saee, on how Kokum juice concentrate is made just the way it is made traditionally in the villages of the Konkan region of Maharashtra.

I haven't gone to Thal in a while and no fresh Kokum for me yet. So I use the Kokum juice that comes in a plastic can to make this thirst quencher.

Ingredients

300 ml Kokum juice concentrate

700 ml chilled water

1/2 a lime

1/4 teaspoon pink salt

few sprigs of fresh mint

Ice cubes

In a glass jar measure out the kokum juice concentrate. It is all natural fruit preserved in sugar. Since this concentrate is made in sugar you won't need extra sugar to make the sarbat. 

Squeeze into it half a lime. The lime should be thin skinned and juicy to lend a nice citrus twist to it. 

Add pink salt, this sets off the sweetness a hint and lends a balance.

Crush the mint between your palm and add to the jar.

Top up with the water to get 1 litre of sarbat.

Add ice cubes into the glasses and fill them to the brim as you hand out the sarbat to a parched soul as the person steps into your home. 

In summers in the Kokan this Kokum sarbat is the welcome juice of choice due to the abundance of this fruit. It is called  Ratambe (plural) in the local dialect. Funny that we love our Hapoos and Payari so much yet this completely different fruit with it cooling properties and antacid effect is called Ratamba (singular) or mango of the night. It must be simply because we love both the mangoes and the night mangoes equally!

Look for Kokum sarbat in any Marathi locality in Mumbai or tell your Mango supplier, I am sure he will get you a drum of Kokum sarbat concentrate.

Make a glass won't you! 

Growing Green Garlic

In my home garlic is not something that we depend on to enhance the flavor in our food but there are certain things unarguably that taste better with garlic. Like the garlic chutney which is a signature Koli style.

Well but garlic cloves taste quite different than Garlic greens. The greens are milder and impart and beautiful mellow taste. 

Growing it is as easy as sticking the garlic cloves from your pantry into some mud, watering it and waiting for it to sprout and waiting to let it grow into 10-15 inches tall grass like greens.

Here is what I did

1. Take planter plate. 
2. Fill with planting soil upto 1 inch below the brim.
3. Create holes in the soil at the top.
4. Take a whole garlic, separate out the cloves. Stick each clove into the holes created and cover with soil.
5. Sprinkle water to moisten the soil. Do this every day.
6. Ensure enough sunlight, but not direct. You can keep it under a larger plant for some shade.
7. End of a week or two you will see beautiful greens. Let them grow till 10-15 inches tall.

Harvest : 

Pluck the greens when still tender for use as a herb. You can keep them fresh by keeping it standing in water for a few days.

Some uses:

• Use for garnishing.
• In preparations like pasta, undhiyu or Bhoplyachi Khichadi 
• Pull Apart Garlic Rolls with green garlic would be just awesome, what say?

Lime In Salt and Sugar

Fresh and yet to be aged

This is a preserved lime recipe my Mother would make for me as a kid. She would make small quantities and we had a special glass bowl with a lid for it. Simple yet wonderful especially for a kid that suffered nausea and acidity all through growing up years. If there was this lime my Aai brought out on my plate, I would eat my varan bhaat without complaints.

It's simple to make and not much of a recipe. Just preserving the lime in lots of sugar and salt.

Ingredients

20 Indian lime

1/2 kg sugar

4 teaspoons salt

Wash the lime and drain. Pat dry with a napkin and cut each lime into 8 pieces. 

In a glass jar put all these pieces and cover up with sugar and salt. Shake the jar and keep it in the sun to cook for a week.

After 3 months this pickle will get paler yet juicier as the lime juices thicken with the sugar and salt.

In my home it is called Mooravlela limbu in Marathi or preserved lime.

Aged preserved lime after 3 months, yum!

Bhoplyachi Khichadi With Green Garlic

The green garlic used in this recipe was homegrown

Yesterday was my best friend Sangita's birthday. I had invited her family over for dinner and one of the things I made was a variation of this Khichadi. Yesterday it wasn't Khichadi but took the avatar of risotto with cheese and a bit of cream in it. This one is surely an Indian khichadi. It is a simple wholesome dish with the garlic and pumpkin making it delectable. 

The flavor profile is clean and uncomplex. The creaminess makes is so very comforting that a warm bowl guarantees that you will make it on those days when its cold and you would like to meditate over it, almost!

So get going if you are tempted to cook right away.

Ingredients

1/4 kg pumpkin / bhopla

1/2 cup small grained rice.

4 cups water.

1 tablespoon ghee

1 small bunch of green garlic, about 10 cloves with greens 

salt to taste

In a pressure cooker measure out the rice. Wash and drain. Peel the pumpkin and chop into large chunks. Add salt to taste. Top up with water and close the lid. Allow 4-5 whistles to get mushy cook rice.

Cool the cooker and then open the lid. Mash the rice and pumpkin with a ladle to gooey consistency. 

In a tadka bowl heat ghee and add chopped green garlic to it and tip off into the mushy rice and pumpkin khichadi. Mix well. 

Enjoy the pumpkin khichadi with some crunchy munchies. It tastes awesome.

Stuffed Chilli Pickle

This is an irresistible pickle! 

That said, I must say you need guts of steel to enjoy this one. There is something very glamorous about pickling these pretty red hot~~ chilies.

On one of those visits to APMC market I spotted this guy selling these beauties. I fell for the sheer charm and bought a whole kg. On counting they were 45 or more!

I took on the challenge of washing, drying and slitting them open to remove the seeds. They were going to be my best pickle I knew already. I am not kidding each of my 4 sisters, my 3 bros, my atyas and uncles all got a share of this pickle. They all loved it!

Well it was Sia's Monsoon Spice pictures that got me into risking scorching my hands and she in turn refers to the original recipe by Rajani of Eat write think.

I kept the same ratios but made a huge batch of the masala thinking the quantities specified by both the ladies are small compared to the no. of chilies. They had made smaller batches while mine was more than double. I had too much masala in the end but you will see in the upcoming post what I did with the extra masala. Anyways what I give here is halved quantities of the masala I actually made and used for this pickle.

Ingredients

1/4 cup Fennel Seeds

1/4 cup Cumin Seeds

1/4 cup Fenugreek Seeds
1/4 cup Mustard Seeds

2 tablespoons Nigella Seeds

3 tablespoons Turmeric Powder

1/8 cup Amchur Powder/Dry Mango Powder 

1 tablespoon asafoetida
1/4 cup salt

1/2 cup Mustard Oil

300 ml Mustard Oil  to immerse the chilies

In the microwave toast all the seeds for 30 secs. Let them cool to room temperature.

Put all of it into the mixer jar, add the turmeric, asafoetida and amchur and give it a whiz. Stop at coarse grind. 

Remove to a thali the coarse grounds and mix in salt and mustard oil.

Preparing the chillies is the biggest challenge. I would recommend handling the chilies with gloves on. Wash and pat dry. Then slit the chilies and remove the central pith and seeds. I at the time thought I did not think I needed gloves and assumed the the chilies would not be that hot. I was wrong. My hands were scorched. Until...

I made this pickle over the day long chores in the house so I was applying ice all through the day on my hands till I sat down to stuff up the slit chillies. It was an amazing feeling how the prepared spice paste cooled my hands. It assured me that the heat in the chilies will be toned down as they aged. Yet again I was to be proved wrong.

After stuffing all the chilies I lined them into a clean and dry glass jar. Pour 300 ml Mustard oil over the stuffed chilies.

Keep the jar in the sun for a week.

Then move it to store in a cool dry place.

To serve I usually remove 1 chilli at a time from the oil using a tong and divide it into bits for individual serves.

Do you need suggestion to eat this pickle? We eat it with everything Indian! It's the best pickle now in my repertoire may I say :)

Thank you Rajani and Sia, I am now the designated stuffed chilli pickle maker in my family and friend circle.

Spicy Lime In Jaggery

Suncooked for a week and aged for 3 months, ready to be licked up!

This is a very very traditional Maharashtrian pickle, sweet, citrusy and spicy all in one! It is a must to have this pickle at home. It went with almost all desserts to set off the sweetness and clean the palate or much like ketchup with the savory snacks, like thalipith, tikat puris etc. I was under the impression that red chili powder is not permitted for Upvas for the longest time but this pickle has always been part of the fasting food in Gondavale.

We fell in love with this pickle in Gondavale and my expert pickle maker Aunt Devaki made it every year in winter when the limes came cheap. Bought from the markets in Byculla, in scores by her husband PJK. We would sit down around the huge tub of limes washing, cleaning and pat drying them before quartering. Our hands went sore with the lime juice. It was an activity that we loved doing as a group of kids in our sit out in the back of our little cottage in Tata colony. So much happened then!

Ingredients

40 nos. medium sized limes, quartered

1 kg Jaggery

1/4 cup red chilli powder

1/8 cup salt

Mix all the ingredients in a large tub. Pack it into a clean dry jar and leave it for cooking in the sun.

Fresh after a week of suncooking

Pack the jar only 3/4th as the jaggery melts and bubbles up, it needs space. Else you will have lava flowing out. I did cause it, as I filled the jar to the brim and on the second day had to remove a lot of the pickle into another jar.

If you do not like jaggery use the same amount of sugar. Sugar ferments lesser than jaggery so it lasts longer too but we don't mind the fermentation as we love jaggery, well and as a family of teetotalers wee bit of alcohol is Ok we think in the food, kidding ;)

This pickles stores well at room temp. As long as it is juicy and not smelly you can use it, ours lasts a year easily.

Whole Awala In Brine

 Lets begin this series with the easiest of the pickles, Whole Awala In Brine.

Ingredients

1 kg Awala

1/2 cup salt

2 pinches of lime / chuna

1/4 cup julienned ginger

handful of whole green chilies

Wash and pat dry the whole Awala / Amla / Gooseberries.

Then prick the Awala from all sides with a fork to make salt absorption and adsorption possible. 

In a large bowl mix the pricked Awala, ginger, whole green chillies, salt and lime. Toss with a salad tong. The lime is added to avoid oxidation and precipitation. Else the brine becomes milky. The 2 pinches of lime keeps the brine clear.

Once mixed well, pack into a glass jar. Keep out for sunning for atleast a week till all the salt melts to give a brine.

Store in a cool dry place and shake well to mix once every fortnight to avoid fungus formation.

Uses:

As medicine for nausea or as souring agent in your curries and chutneys. Awala has that special flavor that lifts a mundane curry or chutney to a different level.

Wish you good health with this vitamin C packed pickle.

Pickles 2013

 

These are some of the pickles I made at the start of the year. Before I get to pickling the Rajapuri mangoes like last year posting these here. Those who follow the FB page would have already seen these. The recipe for each of these and some more to follow...

Growing Chavali

Chavali or Black eyed beans, is one of my favorite beans. I love tender beans as a stir fry and the mature seeds soaked overnight and cooked into a spicy curry with a gravy. On one such day I soaked the Chavali for the curry and decided to plant one and see how it grows. I had read somewhere it grows easily. It did and I am happy with it.

I grew Chavali in three stages

Soaking:  

12 Jan 2013

Add the seeds in a jar and cover with 4-5 inches of water above the seeds. Soak them in water overnight.

Sprouting: 

Drain the soaked seeds and let them sprout in the soil       

Planting: 

• I used a plastic tray with growing media.
• Fill up to the brim.
• Ensure there is a small hole in the bottom of the planter for draining excess water.
• Sprinkle water to moisten the soil. Do this every day.
• Cover thinly with dry leaves/ saw dust or a wet muslin cloth to protect from birds picking the sprouts.
• Ensure enough sunlight, but not direct till the bean stalk proliferates quite a bit.
• In a week I got 5 inch tall bean stalk.
• Replant into a bigger pot with growing media, a mix of soil and twigs. Fill up with planting soil up to 10 inches.
• Start supporting the bean stalk on the grill or a cage.
• It flowers into white blossoms and bears fruit in the form or green beans.

Harvest:
Pluck the beans once they are about 15 inches to use when tender or leave them on stalk to mature if you want to wait for the seeds.

24 Mar 2013

Cleaning for Use:
Remove the crown and destring, if you must, break into small pieces or chop up fine.

Some uses:
Till now I have harvested only 4-5 beans at a time so they went as sprinkles on uttapams or into a sambar.

While we are talking about growing Chavali here, there is something else happening on the other side of the world with red chavali and my Koli masala which traveled across with ET. Mints, thank you for posting, you made my day!

 Fresh beans harvested for the mature seeds. 11th April 2013

Finding peace...

My Green balcony

And 

My father's soulful singing

  Maze Maharaj

Sadguru Maza

Tricolored Chili Paneer

In a vegetarian family serving starters always means making fried stuff or sandwiches, most times. Chili Paneer is a favorite and how much that my nieces and nephews choose it over chocolate cake. The last time we had a function is our home I was serving this tricolored Chili paneer to my uncle MJ, the kids saw it. It was not yet their dinner time and they were playing video games, on spotting it they immediately dumped their play and instead demanded that I serve them the chili paneer. I offered chocolate cake but they chose this lovely colorful chili paneer!

So here is the recipe

Ingredients

1 block of paneer about 400gms
2 tablespoons corn flour
1 red bell pepper
1 green bell pepper
1 yellow bell pepper
1 tablespoon dark soya sauce
2 tablespoon chopped garlic
2-3 onions chopped into squares
3-4 spring onions chopped fine
1/2 cup baby corn sliced
slit green chilies (as much as you can handle)
2 tablespoon oil
salt to taste
sugar to taste

Keep a pot of boiling hot water ready to dunk paneer after frying to make it super soft.

To begin lets fry the paneer first. Make a thin batter of corn flour water and salt. It should coat the paneer chunks thinly. Cube the paneer to finger sized pieces. Dip each piece in the batter and fry in hot oil. Remove once golden and dunk in the hot water. Once all the paneer pieces are fried and dunked in hot water to soften. Drain them on a sieve. Separate out each piece if they are sticking together.

Heat oil in a wok. First fry the garlic then add the chopped onions and fry till translucent. Chop all the three colored bell peppers into long fingers. Add them to the saute. Cook for 5 mins. Add the white parts of the spring onions and cook for another 5 mins. Follow in with the slit green chilies and baby corn slices. Add the soya sauce, lastly add the paneer and stir well and fast on high heat just to caramelize a bit. Salt it and add sugar as per taste.

Remove from heat and serve immediately with sprinkles of the spring onion greens.

Gongura Pappu

Is my most favorite spicy dal. Especially if my ex-neighbor Rani has made it. The dal is cooked to creaminess with the gongura leaves in it and the single way to enjoy it is drizzle ghee and mix it with the fingers. I have seen thinner version of gongura pappu but this is how Rani makes it, thick and creaminess characteristic of gongura.

The thick dal mixed with rice and made into a mudda is how Rani would love to enjoy but since we always teased her she would go to the kitchen and eat her muddas but never in front of us. We would tease Anu, my pilloo that she would have eaten rice balls on the day gongura dal was made and she would go, "Noooo". Such precious memories!

Then life does a 360 on you. Today if I have to thoroughly enjoy gongura pappu I must make muddas with rice!

Two years ago when I did my Andhra Pradesh Road Trip I was in search of a good gongura pappu but found none. Which only means that this recipe is priceless and good recipes are the ones that are made at home. My belief is strengthened.

So here I am sharing with you.

Ingredients

1 large bunch of gongura 

2 cups tur dal

1/2 teaspoon turmeric

1 teaspoon red chilli powder 

For more authentic taste use the red chili and mashed garlic masala that Andhraites make in bulk. The garlic lends a very slight fermented taste to the masala and a beautiful flavor to the Andhra specialties.

Pluck the leaves of gongura. Wash and clean. Chop them fine. Wash tur dal. In a pressure cooker add the dal and the gongura. Add the spices. Top up with 6 cups water. Cook for 20 mins with whistle or for 3 long whistles. Open the cooker. The dal should be crumbled completely on cooking. Mash it and keep aside.

For the poppu/ tadka

1 teaspoon mustard seeds

2 tablespoons oil

asafeotida

as many Garlic cloves as you like, peeled

curry leaves (I was out of stock)

Heat oil till smoking point. Splutter the mustard seeds add asafoetida, curry leaves and finally garlic cloves. Fry till golden. Pour the poppu over the cooked dal and bring to a rolling boil. Serve hot and enjoy.

P.S: In the picture I have used a red Pochampalli cloth done in Ikat style of dyeing which is unique to Andhra Pradesh. I love ethnic fabrics and these weavers need encouragement.

Kache Popaya Chi Chana Dal Ghalun Bhaaji

Raw papaya (Koli: Popaya) and chana dal in green coconut masala.

Traditionally this gets made in two ways, one with chana dal and the other with sode (peeled and dried prawns) but in our home its the veg version ofcourse. It would sound scandalous now if I say it, since I am a  vegetarian for the last 25yrs but this tastes the best with sode. This a very much Koli Style bhaaji, what we call esavana chi bhaaji which means bhaaji with essence of non veg, mostly dried fish.

Yesterday, I visited Thal to see my youngest Mama/ Maternal Uncle who suffered a paralytic stroke. I realized one thing that we are becoming people who show apathy to even the most grim circumstances that affect our life. In the village if a person falls ill, he is immediately considered useless and left to die. It is a lot to do with not having money and no humanity! Fortunately Shankar Mama has people who love him around him and I am praying he recovers well.

In Thal popaya is considered "bhutacha khana". To ward off evil many a times the popaya is waved around the body of a person and then discarded on the seashore faraway from the residents and their commonly used areas. See even the ghosts are fed in our culture!

I was touched by my cousin sisters in Thal. I saw a terracotta handi filled with water lying out in the backyard. I told them I wanted another one like it. Nirmal Tai immediately wanted to give the same handi to me but then explained that it was kept for the birds and animals. In my city home for decades we have stopped doing this. Why?

Few things I can think of is nesting problems, messy window sill. Are these problems so big that we must let our birds and animals die? 

Join me in celebrating World sparrow day on March 20th and add a feeder to your window sill to keep celebrating everyday. 

 

Here is what Mohammed Dilawar is doing for the sparrows.

Last weekend when I stayed over at my friend Gauri's home she shared with me this bouquet of dried paddy she had brought back from Kolkata. It is a symbol of fertility and prosperity in Bengali homes and is hung in the doorway. Yes the doorway was open to birds and animals in the villages but in our modern vertical growth concrete jungle the doorway is mostly a maze thru which humans, themselves hate to make passage. So I chose to hang that bouquet of paddy in my window.

I had taken the day off on Friday, I spent the entire morning watching the sparrows feed on the paddy. It was such a calming experience for my nerves that had been wrecked by some unnecessary burden I had invited. Yeah I am like that some times, 'Kunachya khandya var kunache oze' must have been written for me ;P.

Oh lets get back to the recipe.

Ingredients

1 kg raw papaya/ kacha popaya
1/2 cup chana dal
1 tablespoon oil 
salt to taste

For the masala

1/8 piece of a fresh coconut 
1 teaspoon cumin seeds
3 green chilies
1/2 cup chopped coriander leaves
1/2 teaspoon turmeric powder
1 teaspoon Koli masala or garam masala

First grind the masala. Keep aside.

Peel the raw papaya and chop into bits. Wash the chana dal and keep aside Heat oil in a wok. Add the raw papaya and the washed chana dal to it. Top up with water about a litre and cook till chana dal starts crumbling just a bit. Salt it to taste.

Add the ground coconut masala. Add more water to get a nice gravy but not too thin.

Note: If you are using peeled and dried prawns, you need to soak them in water for 30 mins to plump them up. Use them instead of the chana dal.

Enjoy the Kache popaya chi bhaaji with chapati or Chavlachi roti.

 I'll leave you to listen to this beautiful Abhang by Tukaram and sung by Lata Mangeshkar which is what this post is about.