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Thengai Paal Rasam
A Pondicherry Cuisine.
No Onion No Garlic, Just with two main ingredients this dish is prepared, not taking more than 30 mins to finish off from the starting point smile emoticon . An easy,yummy and new recipe to try 🙂 My favourite curry…I like to mix the curry in rice and allow it to settle down for couple of hours so that the curry is absorbed by the rice. Usually my mother packs this curry for lunch.
This curry makes me to travel back into the time and its my grandma in the memories. I loved her cooking and this is yet another her signature dish. Whenever I prepare this curry, my grandma’s cooking and her memories do gush out.
The taste of her cooking was consistent, every time the same taste irrespective of the quantity prepared. I miss her cooking a lot. My mother who was the eldest sibling in her family had to help her mother in cooking as other than family members no one were allowed into the kitchen. That was a stringent rule in our family line. My grandma added fresh ground masala in her cooking and even grinding masalas weren’t done by others. Except cleaning and clearing was taken care by others. That’s the reason my mother had inherited her mother’s style of cooking, which in turn passed down to me. Now a days my mother has homemade dry masalas in her kitchn and if I insist for fresh ground masala, then mixie comes handy. Though I like to use Ammi Kal – rectangle shape grinding stone with a roller, for grinding coconut chutney. During my visit to inlaws home, still I use Ammi kal for preparing chutney. I love the taste of hand ground chutney, my taste buds do differentiate the taste between the hand and mixie ground chutneys. Should I say I am to sensitive 😀
Ingredients
Cocount Milk – 3 cups , Normally this recipe needs a medium size coconut.
Tamarind – lemon size
Turmeric Powder ¼ tsp
Tempering
Asafoetida – ¼ tsp
Mustard – ¼ tsp
Urad dal – ¼ tsp
Dry Red chilly – 5 to 6 (split it into two pieces)
Curry leaves
Oil – ½ tsp
Method
1. Soak the tamarind and take the extract.
2. Prepare coconut milk from the coconut by scraping and grinding. Make a cup for each extract of milk. Keep the first and second milk aside.
3. Now with the third milk add the tamarind extract , turmeric powder and salt to taste.
4. In kadai add oil , mustard, urad dhal, asafeotida , split dry chillies curry leaves, now add the tamarind and coconut mixture, let it boil till the quantity reduces to half on a medium flame. By now the raw smell of tamarind leaves from the dish.
5. Remove from heat and allow it to cool down to the room temperature. When the mixture touches to room temperature, add the first and second coconut milk. Now its ready to serve. Before serving give a stir and serve as the creamy layer gets to the top.
Jotting
This curry can be served with rice or chappathi. The consistency will be very thin just like a water. The sweetness of coconut, the sourness of tamarind and spiciness of the chilies, sure will entertain your taste buds.
Potato fry is the best combination for this Rasam.
