Mixed vegetable pickle

Ingredients:

1. Mixed, finely chopped vegetables - 4 cups (Carrot, cabbage, potato, chow-chow, knol-khol, fresh peas, cauliflower, keerai thandu, etc)
2. Lemon - 6 big
3. Red chillipowder - 1/2 cup
4. Salt - 1/2 cup
5. Oil - 1/4 cup
6. Mustard - 1/2 tsp

Dry roast and powder:

1. Fenugreek (Methi) - 1/2 tsp
2. Cumin seeds - 1/2 tsp

Preparation:

• Wash and scrape the outer skin and dice vegetables into small pieces
• Pressure cook vegetables till one whistle (Steam cook without adding water)
• Allow it to cool, spread over towel to remove excess moisture
• Mix with powdered salt, chillipowder, and lemon juice
• Heat oil, add mustard seeds to splutter and remove from fire
• Cool down to room temperature and mix with pickle
• Add fenugreek (methi) and cumin powder at the end
• Mix the pickle once or twice every four hours for one day
• This can be served immediately

NOTE: This pickle stays good for one week only as the veggies are steamed.

If prepared without steam cooking the veggies, and removing excess native water from the chopped veggies, follow the same procedure: mix daily once or twice for 1 week. This can be stored for 1 month in the refrigerator.

Mango ginger tamarind pickle

Scrape outer skin and cut ginger into thin rounds. Cook in thin tamarind extract for 5 to 10 mins. Add salt, jaggery, and chillipowder at the end. Heat oil separately, add mustard seeds, asafoetida and add to the pickle. Dry roast fenugreek (methi) - 1 tsp - and powder it. Add to the pickle after removing from fire.

Mango ginger pickle

Scrape and chop mango ginger (a type of seasonal ginger) into thin, round pieces. Mix salt and lemon juice with that. Heat little oil, add mustard seeds, sliced green chillies ( 1 or 2) and mix with the mango ginger. Allow it to soak for one day and use.

Fresh green pepper can be made like this. Omit the green chillies and use more lemon juice.

Capsicum in small pieces can also be pickled the same way.

Carrot, cauliflower, cabbage, fresh peas mixed and chopped and seasoned as above.

Avu chutney (Karnataka)

Ingredients:

1. Cucumber - 1 or 2 small
2. Thick tamarind extract - 2 tsp
3. Oil - 1 tsp
4. Mustard seeds - 1/4 tsp

Grind together:

1. Grated fresh coconut - 2 tbsp
2. Roasted gram - 1 tbsp (level)
3. Green chillies - 1 or 2
4. Red chillies - 2
5. Asafoetida - a pinch
6. Mustard seeds - 1/4 tsp
7. Salt - to taste
8. Jaggery - little
9. Turmeric powder - a pinch
10. Cumin seeds - 1/2 tsp

Preparation:

• Scrape outer skin and slice the cucumber into thin 1 1/2 inch long pieces
• Grind the ingredients mentioned to smooth paste with minimum water possible
• Mix tamarind extract after grinding
• Just before serving mix sliced cucumber
• Heat oil, add mustard seeds to cracle and add it to the chutney

You can use grated carrot or finely chopped tender snake gourd instead of cucumber. Also, finely diced tomatoes with reduced tamarind can be substituted for the cucumber.

Raw mango gotsu

Ingredients:

1. Raw mango - 1
2. Asafoetida - 2 pinches
3. Green chillies - 2
4. Turmeric powder - 1/2 tsp
5. Salt - to taste
6. Jaggery - 1 tbsp
7. Oil and mustard seeds - for seasoning

Preparation:

• Select mango which is sweet and sour in nature
• Scrape outer skin and slice into think, broad pieces
• Heat oil in a frying pan, add mustard, slit green chillies and then mango pieces
• Fry for a minute, add enough water to cover the pieces
• Mix salt, turmeric and jaggery to the mixture
• Cook till mango becomes soft and mix becomes thick

Variation:

Omit green chillies in above. Grind 3 red chillies, grated fresh coconut - 2tbsp, chutney gram - 1tbsp, coriander seeds - 1 tsp, cumin seeds - 1/2 tsp to smooth paste. Add when mangoes are cooked till soft. Boil for one or two minutes and remove from fire.

Thengai (Coconut) Thogayal

Ingredients:

1. Grated fresh coconut - 1/4 cup
2. Urad dhal - 1 tbsp
3. Red chillies - 6
4. Tamarind - 1 tbsp
5. Salt - to taste
6. Oil, mustard seeds for seasoning

Preparation:

• Heat little oil and fry chillies and dhal together till golden
• Grind with coconut, salt, tamarind to coarse paste, with little water
• Season with mustard seeds

Variations:

Ginger and Coriander Thogayal: Omit coconut, fry chopped ginger and grind with fried ingredients, salt, coriander leaves and tamarind

Onion thogayal: Dice onion to medium sized pieces. Fry till transparent, fry urad dhal and chillies and follow the same recipe

Paruppu thogayal

Ingredients:

1. Gram dhal - 1/4 cup
2. Red chillies - 5
3. Tamarind - 1 tsp
4. Salt - to taste
5. Garlic - 6 teeth peeled
6. Oil - for frying and seasoning
7. Mustard seeds - 1/4 tsp

Preparation:

• Heat little oil and fry chillies and dhal together till golden brown
• Cool down and grind to coarse paste with tamarind, salt, garlic with little water
• Season with mustard seeds.

You can also use thuar dhal instead of gram dhal and follow the same recipe.

Pudina (Mint) chutney

Ingredients:

1. Grated dry coconut - 1/2 cup
2. Fresh mint leaves - 1 cup
3. Red chillies - 4
4. Salt - to taste
5. Tamarind - 1 tbsp
6. Jaggery - 1 tsp/tbsp shavings
7. Oil - as required
8. Finely cut onions - 2 tbsp

Preparation:

• Grind coconut, chillies, tamarind, mint, salt and jaggery together to coarse paste
• Heat oil and fry onions till golden brown
• Add ground paste and fry till good smell comes
• Cool down to room temperature and serve

Raw mango thogayal

Ingredients:

1. Firm, green and sour mango - chopped - 1 heaped cup
2. Red chillies - 5
3. Coriander seeds (Dhaniya) - 2 tsp
4. Urad dhal - 1 tsp
5. Turmeric powder - 1/2 tsp
6. Salt as required - as required

Preparation:

• Heat little oil and fry red chillies, coriander, and urad till it turns golden color and then powder in mixie
• Add salt, turmeric powder, and mango pieces.
• Mix well and season with mustard seeds

Mix with rice and eat - or it might even be a good sauce for plain pasta ;)

Brinjal (Eggplant) Thogayal

Ingredients:

1. Finely chopped brinjal pieces - 1 heaped cup
2. Red chillies - 5
3. Coriander seeds (Dhaniya) - 2 tsps
4. Urad dal - 1 tsp
5. Tamarind - 1 tbsp
6. Salt - to taste
7. Diced big onion - 1/2 cup

Preparation:

• Heat little oil and fry red chillies, coriander and urad till it turns golden color and then powder it in mixie
• Fry the vegetable pieces in 3 to 4 tbsps of oil till complete moisture is absorbed.
• Remove excess oil after frying
• Add the fried pieces to the powdered ingredients along with the tamarind, salt, and diced onion.
• Pound together to coarse paste.
• Season mustard seeds in hot oil and mix with the paste.

The eggplant can be substituted with ladies finger, snake gourd, ridge gourd, tomato ripe or raw, raw wood apple.

If using ladies finger, add 1 tsp of curd (yoghurt) to prevent it sticking to each other.

Here - more oil is used for frying which helps the veggies to fry evenly and it gets fried fast. Drain off excess oil before pounding.

Edible leaves chutney/thogayal... :D

Ingredients:

1. Edible leaves - 1 1/2 cups
2. Green chillies - 6
3. Big onion - diced
4. Coriander seeds (Dhaniya seeds)
5. Fenugreek (Methi) - 1/4 tsp
6. Mustard seeds - 1/4 tsp
7. Garlic - 3 teeth (crushed)
8. Oil - 2 tbsp
9. Asafoetida - a pinch
10. Salt - to taste

Preparation:

• Heat oil in a frying pan, add mustard, fenugreek, asafoetida and remove when it sputters.
• Fry coriander seeds and green chillies for a minute in the same oil and remove.
• Fry leaves separately in oil till it shrinks.
• First pound the spices and then add leaves, diced onion, salt, and pound to coarse paste.
• Heat little oil, season little mustard seeds, and fry crushed garlic in that oil
• Add to the leaves and mix well.
• If possible, pound into coarse paste normally in olden type of stone and pestle which makes it tasty - else use a mixie and grind into a coarse paste, mixing occasionally while sprinkling little water.

Mix with rice and ghee and ensoyyy! :)

Thanks to Mrs. S. Mallika Badrinath...

Sweet Rice Pudding (Arisi Paayasam)

Ingredients:

1. 1 cup of rice
2. 1 cup of milk
3. 1 cup of water
4. ½ - ¾ cup of sugar
5. ½ tsp of Kesar (kumkumapoo)
6. pinch of Elaichi powder
7. 1 tbsp Cashew
8. 1 tbsp raisins
9. 3 tbsp ghee

Preparation:

• Cook rice with the milk and water in a cooker and make it nicely mashed
• Remove and heat the mixture in a pan on the stove and add the sugar (add ½ in case less sweetness is preferred or ¾ for more)
• Boil the mixture till it becomes thick
• Remove and add the kesar and elaichi powder
• The mixture after cooking should be in a thick, liquid form
• On another small pan, fry the cashews and raisins in ghee and add to the prepared mixture

Arisi paayasam is served.

This is one of our revered recipes because it is easy on the stomach and so is used on a lot of festival days. Due to the ease of preparation, whenever a small event of significance happens, it is quite common to find this being prepared. Other preparations include a lentil pudding, or this same rice pudding with coconut.

Ingredients of Chutney podi

1 cup each of the following:

1) urad dal
2) channa dal (or gram dal)
3) fried gram dal (pottu kadalai)
4) ground nuts
5) coconut (dessicated)
6) dried red chilies

2 tablespoons sesame seeds
1 tsp asofoteida

Dry fry all the ingredients except the chilies - fry the chilies alone in 1 tsp oil
Dry grind all the fried stuff together adding 2 tsp salt to taste

Mix and store and ensaaay :)