Cheera Thoran / Spinach Thoran

Ingredients:

1. Cheera - 1/2 Kg
2. Coconut scraped -  1 cup
3. Green Chillies - 4 Big
4. Cumin seeds / Jeerakam - 1/2 tsp
5. Turmeric powder 1/2 tsp
6. Garlic - 3 cloves
7. Curry leaves - 1/2 spring
8. Mustard seeds / Kaduku - few
9. Dry Red Chillies - 4
10. Salt
11. Oil

Method:
Coarsely grind coconut, green chilies, cumin, turmeric powder, garlic, curry leaves, adding required salt
Wash spinach and chop to very fine pieces
 Heat oil in a pan and crackle mustard seeds, add red chillies. Saute and add the ground coconut mixture when raw smell goes add spinach and mix well.
Cook covered.
Serve hot with Rice.

Carrot Pomegranate Juice

Ingredients:

Pomegranate 1
Carrot 2
Tomato 1/ tbsp of Lemon juice
Honey 1 tsp (optional)
Sugar - as per your taste

Method:

Peel pomegranate to extract the juicy beads.
Blend this in your mixie with some water for some time just right enough so that the seeds are not blended. Take special care of this step.
Keep this aside.
Blend all the remaining ingredients well and add it to the prepared pomegranate juice.
Serve chilled or at room temperature.

Kadala Curry/ Black Chana curry

 

Ingredients:

Black Chana 1 cup

Onion 1/2 sliced fine

Ginger garlic paste 1tbsp

Green Chillies 3 cut lengthwise

Red Chilly Powder 1 tsp

Hot Chilly Powder 1tsp

Coriander powder 2tsp

Garam masala powder 1 tsp

Curry leaves few

Tomato 1

Coconut Milk 1 cup (optional)

Coconut Oil

Method :

Cook the chana well with adequate water, salt, 1 garlic pod, 1 green chillies,  1/2 tsp garam masala.

Saute the onions in oil in a pan.

When they are brownish add ginger garlic paste, green chillies,curry leaves and saute for 2 mins.

Add the powders, when the raw smell is gone add sliced tomatoes and saute well.

When masala is mixed up, add cooked chana. Add the gravy also.

Stir well in low flame.

You can avoid ading coconut milk, if you prefer. Adjust the consistency by adding hot water.

Else add 1/2 - 1 cup coconut milk. 

Goes well with ari puttu, appams, chappathys, etc.

Pavakka/Kaipakka Varuthathu (Bitter Guard Fry)

Ingredients:

Bitter guard - 1 Big
Chilly powder - 1 -2 tsp
Turmeric powder 1 tsp
Salt as required
Curd (optional) 2 tbsp
Coconut Oil

Method:

Cut Bitter guard into thin pieces. You can cut them as rings or you can cut it into 4 pieces lengthwise and cut into thin pieces.
Mix all powders together with salt and curd and marinate the bitter guard pieces well.
Dry them well in sunlight.
Fry them well until they are crispy brown.
Serve hot with rice or eat them as a snack.

Varutharacha Chicken Curry(Chicken in roasted coconut paste gravy)

This recipe is a regular at my house as my family loves it a lot.
It had been waiting in my drafting list for long. Finally it gets its place. I had been holding it since I was not happy with the picture. Hoping to replace with a good one , when I make it next time.

Ingredients:

Chicken 1 Kg
Onions 4
Shallots 15
Garlic chopped 3 tbsp
Ginger chopped 2 tbsp
Green chillies 8 slitted lengthwise /chopped
Coconut 3/4 cup
Coriander powder 2tbsp
red chilly powder 1.5 tbsp
Hot chilly powder 1.5 tbsp
Garam masala powder(freshly ground) 2tsp
Curry leaves 2-3 springs
Salt
Oil

Method

1.Wash the chicken well with vinegar, salt & turmeric powder and keep aside.
2. Dry roast the coconut until dark brown colour. Stir continuously when you do   this and make sure coconut is not burnt.
3. Add the powders to this and stir well until they are mixed and set it to cool.
4. Saute onions & shallots in a pan with required oil, until they are golden brown in colour.
5. Now add in Ginger, garlic & green chillies. Saute well until all are blended well.
6. Throw in the curry leaves.
7. Grind the cooled dry roast coconut masala mixture first without water , and then add some water so that they form fine paste.
8. Add this to the pan and blend them well.
9. Check for the salt & consistency.
10. Add the chicken pieces & add some more water if you like more gravy.
11. Serve hot with rice, chappatty, Appam, bread, etc.




Notes

If you are using pressure cooker, give one whistle for the chicken to cook. Chicken gets cooked fast so be careful not to give more.

Manga Ittu Vacha Ayla Curry (Fish & Mango Curry)

Ingredients:

1. Ayla(Mackerel) - 2
2 Shallots 6 crushed
3. Green Chillies 4 large slitted
4. Ginger 1 small piece crushed
5.curry leaves 1 strand
6. Oil required
7. Red Chilly powder 2 tsp
8. Chilly powder - 1/2 tsp
9.Turmeric powder 1dsp
10. Mango 1 small,cut into pieces lengthwise, after skin is removed
11. Coconut milk thick - 1/2 coconut's

Method

Whenever possible use a manchatty for cooking fish.It gives the real taste to the fish curry.
Heat oil when the pot is hot and add the shallots, green chilies, ginger, curry leaves when the oil is hotel.
Stir them well until the shallots are translucent.
Stir little more time until everything has combined well.
Meanwhile make a mixture of chilly powder and turmeric powder with little amount of water.
Add this to the shallot mixture in the pot and continue stiring.
Stir for around 7-10 mins continuously.
Add coconut milk, salt and mango and improve the flame a bit.
Now add the mango pieces and improve the flame bit more, a little less than high.
Let it cook covered.
Check out if cooked well after 7-10 mins
Server with rice..Yum..

Green Pepper Mutton Masala

Whenever we buy mutton I always cook it with roasted coconut gravy. I hesitate to try out any new recipes with mutton. This week decided to try out mutton masala. The outcome was delicious

Ingredients:

1. Mutton 1.5 kg
2. Shallots 1/2 cup
3. Ginger 1'' piece crushed
4. Garlic 6 pieces crushed
5. Tomato, chopped (optional) 1 small
6. Turmeric powder 1.5 Tsp
7. Red chili powder 1tsp
8. Green pepper  1 strands
9. Green Chillies 4
10. Curry leaves 1 strands
11.Garam masala powder 1 tsp
12. Salt

For Marinade:
1) Shallotes 1/4 cup
2) Ginger 1/2'' piece crushed
3) Green Chillies 3
4) Garlic pods crushed 4
5) Green pepper crushed 1 strand
6) Curry leaves 1 strand
7) Garam masala powder 1 tsp

Method:
Clean mutton pieces well.
Marinade them with 1/2 tsp turmeric powder, salt & keep aside as soon as you have finished cleaning.
Grind together the ingredients under marinade and marinade the mutton pieces well with it.
Keep aside for 1/2 an hour.
Cook well adding required water.
If mutton is cooked right, transfer the gravy to another vessel and boil  it until it thickens to form the Masala.
If mutton is not cooked enough, you can boil the excess gravy along with mutton in the same Vessel.
In another pan saute shallots. When they strat turning pale add garlic ginger, gree chillies, curry leaves, green pepper.
Saute very well and in low flame until they form a nice masala mixture.
Now add the rest of the ingredients one by one.
Once raw smell is gone, add the cooked mutton to the masala and saute well.
Simmer for 5 minutes & switch off.