Beerakaya Tholu Pachadi – Ridge Gourd Peel Chutney

 

Give me a traditional south indian thali meal, and I will surely overdose on steaming hot rice with ghee and pachadi or/and chutney podi…..this is a given. I once took a visiting friend and my mother to a famous typical Andhra style restaurant in hyderabad, amma sat open mouthed as I heaped rice with ghee and gongura pachadi onto my banana leaf, not once or twice, but three times…..i obviously had a tough time reconciling with how much I ate for the next few weeks!! But my mother always recalls that incident whenever we swap stories of excesses….she’s never going to let me forget!!

A short walk away from my last work place, there was a modest Mess that served up terrific Andhra style meals…..we’d look forward to our monthly visits there and dread the amount of food we’d collectively eat….again for me, the pachadi would decide how miserable I felt for the rest of the day. We obviously quickly learnt to indulge in this on a day when our group had a relatively lesser workload, because it was humanly impossible not to feel like a beached whale once we were done eating.

Though chutneys and pachadis or a vegetable based relish of some kind is a must at most indian traditional meals, I haven’t been very inquisitive with them. Somewhere stuck in my head is the feeling that these are extremely difficult to make items. You need to be able to get the right blend of all the spices and delicately balance all the flavours. While I take my baby steps in pachadi making, this feeling is reinforced…that you need to balance everything…although I am now somewhat beginning to discover that they aren’t very difficult if you learn to use your tastebuds as a guide!!

Beerakaya  tholu pachadi is made by using the peels of the ridge gourd. Said to be rich in iron content, it’s a good way of using a part of the vegetable that would otherwise get binned. We eat ridge gourd quite a lot when its available (I wonder why I haven’t posted about it here yet!!) and each time I peeled the skin off I wondered when I would get down to grinding it to a chutney….while chatting with Srivalli one day she sent me a link to the one she had on her blog and a few days later, I made my version of it. while I try my best to follow a recipe, I cant but help make modifications. Sometimes because I don’t have the same ingredients, but more likely because I cant recall the exact recipe (I try and write them down in my big black book!!)and then resort to improvise .

This pachadi is great with steaming hot rice with ghee (clarified butter), dosas, idlies and even as a sandwich spread. The flavours are subtle and makes it very difficult to stop licking it off your fingers!!

Sesame & Groundnut Chutney Powder

 

I am increasingly getting addicted to podis…in the last 4 months I have never made the same podi twice. I simply cannot stick to the same proportions even if I manage the same ingredients….and this in a way is a good thing…..considering the convenience of having a podi on hand to spice up idlies, dosas, buttered toast or steaming hot rice…….….

I am not a “little by little” person…I am more of a “clean sweep” kind of gal…so when I decide I am going to stand over the kitchen stove to dry roast and powder something, I do it so it lasts atleast 6 weeks…..this works for me cos I can’t see myself repeating the same activity too soon …..so stand and dry roast I will…..but my way….. Most podis will stay fresh for atleast a month…..initially I got half yearly supplies from my MIL and it stayed fresh and fine for several months……anything oily will turn stale…so refrigerate any podi which contains dry coconut, sesame seeds, groundnuts etc if storing for more than 3-4 weeks……

A few months ago I received a lovely package with some fabulous sesame chutney powder from Nandita…we polished it off in record time but I saved the little container it came in for the sticker that had the ingredients printed on it. It was in Marathi, which is similar to hindi I was able to make out what they were (more or less) and I tried to make something similar.

This is my entry to Roma’s Long Live the Shelf event….. hop over to see some time and nerve savers!!

Jamming around……….Star Anise Jams with Peaches and Plums

so this is part three of the posts on jams that have made their way into my kitchen……….all within a span of a few weeks…but have taken me a long time to post…..

Aunty E who you all read about here was operated upon for at cataract and I went to see her…she is doing well and recovering and the doctor was delighted that she cooperated so well…..she lives quite far from where I do, and so it was quite a trek…but so worth it!!

On my way back home, I picked up some peaches and cherries…I had no idea what I would do with them….because most fruit is eaten as it is at my place, and very little is done with the fruit….we demolished the whole box of cherries in a couple of days and k didn’t quite know how to handle the peaches……amma used to poach them in a sugar syrup mildly spiced with cinnamon and cloves and I pondered over that….but we as kids had it with fresh cream or custard…..now that is an indulgence I cannot afford……also, it was obvious that the peaches made a long and arduous journey to actually get to me, so while some of them were seriously in need of some life support, a few others were still a bit unripe….and so I decided to make an easy jam / preserve of the peaches……..

I’d read a column/ book by Karen Anand book some time ago where she advises that cut fruit sprinkled with sugar and left overnight in the fridge gave better flavour to the jam / preserve…..since I had a lot on my hands the day I skinned and chopped the peaches, this suited me just fine…..only I left it in the fridge for two days amidst bouts of panic that they would perish!! I added 1 cup of chopped plums to the 4 cups of peaches and made this entirely in the microwave….though it took longer than the time it was supposed to take, it was totally fuss free and the only aberration was that some of the syrup fell onto the plate inside the microwave oven, which had to be washed clean…….the jam is pretty awesome……even if i say so myself!! With the small chunks of fruit still intact….the colour is glorious and I am so happy to be eating a non commercial variety of jam…… btw, k and I aren’t really hot on jam…so I have no idea what I am going to do with a bottle full of this stuff…..maybe try some as a dessert topping or in baking etc……

this is my entry to sunitha’s Think spice event which turns one….no guessing that Star Anise is my absolutely favourite spice!!

Jamming around…..Plum Jam

Jam for me is a trip down memory lane……my mother’s annual plum jam was a much awaited event….she’d spend a total of three days each year…sourcing the best plums, washing and drying them, sorting, slicing and finally cooking them to the ribbon stage….. bottling it up and then presenting a bottle to anyone who evinced interest….

at least that’s how I think it started…..because for as long as I remember, there was always a pretty long recipients list…….I am not a very jam friendly person…..and as a totally confused kid, thought it was way better to eat store bought jam…..I couldn’t understand why amma couldn’t make hers as smooth or sweet as what kissan made…..neither could I understand why she insisted on keeping some of it pulpy…..I remember mostly reacting to amma’s jam with a “yuck”…….funny….. because now I can give an arm and a leg for it……life has a way of reminding you how silly you were…..but mostly I am grateful for it!! I still am not big on jams…..I prefer it with pancakes, on desserts or simply mixed into some yogurt to satiate the sweet tooth…..

This was a labour of love that my mother indulged in once a year…..and regardless of how much people praised her and the result, and asked her to go commercial, she would say that all she wanted to do was make her signature plum jam once a year for her kids and she was satisfied…..for the last few years, due to various reasons the jam wasn’t being made, and tho I am not huge on jams and preserves, I was missing amma’s jam….so this year I decided to make some of it for myself….and between several panic stricken phone calls and extreme “I am missing you mommy”, I managed to make the jam….

Plums come from the prune family and infact dried plums are prunes…they are high in antioxidants and their sweet juicy flesh is used traditionally to make jams, juices, wine making and brandy……to read more on this, go here…..

I realized that jam making is a game of patience….firstly was the quest to buy jam worthy plums….. after searching in a couple of places….(my mother always went to the wholesale fruit market….. I took the easier / closer way out) I went to the neighborhood fruit shop and asked the “chacha” there to get me 5 kgs of jam worthy fruit…..why did I want 5 kgs? I don’t know…my mother always made it with that much…..plus we ate into it anyways………i told him why I wanted it and specified that I wanted ones that are firm and even in colour…..

the plums arrived a couple of days later and I washed them in a plastic bucket, with salt in three changes of water….laid them out to “air dry” on a thick towel on the kitchen counter for about 3-4 hours……all this while, k and I ate about 1-1½ kgs of it…..plums are sweet and tart at the same time….and the juicy insides do not allow you to stop at a few…..most of them have a whitish waxy coat and after they were dry I wiped them with a clean soft cloth…..they can be stored without refrigeration for a couple of days, but ensure they are a little under ripe if you plan to do this….

next comes the slicing of the fruit, removal and collection of the seeds and the cooking……….and however strongly you feel about hastening the cooking process, do resist it…..i didn’t have a vessel large enough for all the fruit to fit in the microwave, and it wouldn’t be authentic amma style….so I stuck to her stove top method…..4 hours of cooking on a low flame, and I am rewarded with the most beautiful dark ruby wine like coloured jam……..

 

the whole time, i went up and down the roller coaster, of emotions, panic and happiness at the end product ( I told you I love melodrama)……amma is delighted that I chose to attempt this one…and tho in the future I won’t be making such large quantities……i just hope I will continue to make jam….it was like meditation for me this one!!

this is my second entry to WYF: colour in food, mine is ruby red…what’s yours??

this is also off to Roma’s Long live the shelf event

Jamming Around – Quick Mango Jam

This was intended to be the last part of a three part jam making story….but a bad case of the flu and an even worse case of laziness meant that i have to post this today to make it to MBP – Fruit Fare, hosted by Aparna of the very Diverse Kitchen…..MBP is the ideation of coffee, the hostess of the Spice Cafe

this is also my entry to WYF: Colour in food hosted by Easy Crafts of Simple Indian Food

I made this jam many weeks ago when mangoes were still available, but i reckon it can be made with any other fruit as well……the whole process is so quick that all those stories about cooking the jam for hours and hours whilst stirring continuously will seem like folklore…..

I made this from nandita’s recipe for instant Mango jam….and followed the recipe to the T but doubled the quantity, makes for a lovely dessert topping as well….the colors arent as intense as her jam pics, but that’s possibly because i used benishan (banaganapalli) mangoes………..since this has no preservative of any kind, it will need to be refrigerated and consumed within 3-4 days

Recycle Rani’s heir apparent and WBB#15 : Starring Pesarattu and Coconut Chutney

As children, my brother and I had nicknamed amma “recycle rani” ……….of course we didn’t appreciate the fact that she became a staunch practitioner of recycling everything much before it became fashionable and environmentally necessary….all this owing to the fact that she grew up at a time when everything from clothes to food wasn’t in such abundant supply and it was a government controlled market and hardly the consumerist society that it is today….she’d save mithai boxes to pack food for when we traveled by train…each one had their own meal packed in a box, complete with a paper napkin and cut fruit…….packing paper to reuse either for gift-wrapping or to line cupboard shelves, scraps of fabric for making baby clothes, market bags and other stuff, infact I still have a cover for the mixer –grinder made from such scraps of fabric…..and food…..she put the refrigerator to good use since she was a working woman, with portioned precooked food, boiled dal, gravies etc would be stocked in the freezer, and food was never thrown away if she could help it……if there was vegetable upma for breakfast, I could be pretty sure it was leftovers from the previous night’s dinner…..excess food cooked for festivals or other occasions would be frozen, given a makeover and one wouldn’t be the wiser as to its origins!!

So imagine my happiness when I realized that I hadn’t yet missed the deadline for Nandita’s event?? It’s a cause after my own heart and being the true claimant of my mother’s title, I couldn’t let this one pass up!! So here is a makeover that started off with 3 day old idly batter, quantity that’s not enough for a meal and yet too much to allow your conscience to throw it down the drain….and some Kobbari kaaram podi that wasn’t enough to go around…….they ended up as pesarattu and spicy chutney……my entry for WBB#15 the brainchild of Nandita

Little heaps of dynamite…………and an ode to a friend

palli podi to the left and kobbari karam to the right

My dearest friend U is going back to Syracuse tomorrow where her husband is doing a Ph.D. she’s been in India for the last few months while he has been doing his research in Phillipines. We’ve spent some fantastic times together, talking, gossiping, watching movies, laughing, crying and sharing our dreams……..we’ve fought too like crazy over many things big and small….. she’s in many ways like me…and then nothing at all like I am……a bundle of contradictions and talent, she’s dabbled in many things…..….. a painter, she’s from a very famous artistic family in Andhra and has had an exhibition of some of her work in Hyderabad…..in the last few years she hasn’t been able to pursue anything more than a slow degree in fine arts because of the dependent status of her Visa….our friendship blossomed while we worked for a telecom major in Hyderabad, we spent hours in the photocopying room over mugs of chai and talking over the intercom since we sat on different wings of the office….infact to many we were a package deal – Siamese twins and we loved it…….I still remember how once before I got married, when she stayed over, she spent the whole night stiff and awake in bed because as usual my dog and cat had curled up between us and she was scared as hell……she didn’t wake me, didn’t shove them off the bed, just lay awake the whole night!! Then at my wedding, her whole family, both the grandmothers, mother, father and brother sat up packing and attaching the little bronze colored tulle bows to the little boxes that held the wedding favours……… I remember her wedding at Annavaram for the way I pressure cooked in my kanjeevaram saree in the humid August weather, and the most amazing pesarattu upma we had for breakfast the next morning!!

The reason I am writing this ode to U is because she liked the palli (groundnut) podi that my mother makes to be served with idlis / dosa. And since she is going back I made her a batch of it to take away with her. in many ways these spicy podis that we eat, are like U, spicy, tantalizing, unpredictable and totally mind blowing…… you’ll never know what its going to taste like till you actually put it in your mouth: spicy, nutty, aromatic….thats why i call it a little heap of dynamite….Ever since I read indira’s post on kobbari karam I have made it thrice already (it should tell you how much idly and dosa sustains us!)and it is a big hit. So I made some for U too. I will miss her dearly…………My crazy, unpredictable, moody, talented and utterly loving friend……..

Totally most wanted breakfast…err….lunch and dinner too ~ Mixed Dal Dosa

Dosa (and idli) are staple food at our table. I suppose I began to appreciate the true value of making a batter and storing it in the fridge twice a week only as a working woman with a house to run. Infact before I got married, I hardly paid heed to how amazingly the ladies of the house would have food on the table and in the cupboard for when hunger strikes, day after day…but then that is another story altogether!!

Anyways. Despite being severely kitchen challenged, I am grateful that I can get away with feeding K idli and dosa all the days of our lives!! Seriously. There have been times when we’ve had the aforementioned food for a couple of days and for all meals, and I haven’t had a complaint!! Just do a merry dance between variations of chutneys, podis and sambhar and I’m all set!! I can get sick of it and crave something else, but not K!! We came back from Bangalore last week with a takeaway of some podi which my mother made especially for K, he loves it and has let her know it from day one. But it lasted all of 4 days. K asked me if I could replicate, I said I’d try to but I’d give no guarantees. I made some for breakfast this morning and as a backup also ground some coconut chutney!! The result?? K loved it and said it was better than amma’s (which I seriously doubt, love makes men say the strangest things!!). I tried a little variation to the dosa batter a few weeks ago and we’re quite happy with the result. Added some other dals and beans to the usual. I’m not sure if this is the formula for adai, but it does make tasty dosas. The good part it this can be soaked for a few hours, ground and used immediately. There’s no fermentation process.

celebrating the rains – venn pongal and coconut chutney

I love the rains and wait for the monsoons to arrive…for me it is a lovely time of the year…the temperatures drop, the earth looks green, and its all very romantic…sipping garam chai, watching the traffic go by, the hazy lights, eating a hot snack, snuggling in bed with a good book, or watching a movie all covered up with a razai…..i am also painfully aware that for many people of my country, it is a harrowing time….i am safely perched in my fourth floor apartment, with a car, warm dry clothes and so many pairs of footwear that one getting wet wont matter too much……people who are daily wage earners don’t get employed for the day because it is pouring, the timing of the monsoons can make or break the fortune of the farmer…..in Hyderabad in the last two days as many children have been sucked into open manholes….which were left open in the first place to drain the water logged roads quickly…….as I grew up…in age and experience, I realized that it was possibly the most difficult times for people less privileged than I was…..and I am truly grateful for all that I receive……….

Nevertheless…I love the rain…I am a water baby….a true blue crab….and so the whole year around I wait for the monsoon….to me everything seems better in the rains…even watching the reruns on TV or solitude…..

It’s the weekend after all and I am feeling a whole lot better than last week, added to which I was feeling so jealous of all the lovely recipes and pictures put up by fellow food bloggers, I decided to treat ourselves with one of the ultimate comfort foods….tasty, wholesome, nutritious, comforting and perfect for this weather…..Venn pongal or kara pongal and coconut chutney to go with it. we had this for brunch. The recipe is my mother in law’s, simple and back to basics kinds…this is also my entry to WBB#12, the popular Weekend Breakfast Blogging event started by Nandita of the Saffron Trail Fame now hosted by Trupti of The Spice who loved me

Post the publishing of my blog, I have felt excited and anxious most times I cook something that I think is blog worthy…..you see I spend a lot of time trawling food blogs and I am both anxious and happy to bring forth my humble offerings….i love the fantastic pictures that are taken and the way the food is presented….and those are two areas that I need to work on…and I hope the food I cook and the posts I write are interesting….i haven’t tried to make anything from blogs for a few weeks now and part two of the celebration of the monsoons and my better health was making icecream….as soon as I read Anita’s post on roasted banana ice cream I had to try it…..of course when I got down to actually making it today I panicked because I hadn’t half of the ingredients it called for except the bananas!! So with inspiration from my favorite a mad tea party, I made my own version of roasted banana ice cream after looking for recipes that called for the stuff I had on hand…its really quite simple and very very satisfying. Thanks anita for the lovely post and inspiration….

this is my entry for July’s Monthly Mingle hosted by the very talented Meeta…the theme is I Scream for Ice Cream….scream on!!

The verdict: BIG HIT…in fact I’m having the last of the icecream as I type out this post…….!!