Tag Archives: Curry

Pavatkai Curry

Today’s recipe is a slightly different variation of bitter gourd/ pavatkai curry that my mother makes. The recipe for the more common way that my mother makes this dish is given in this earlier post.

pavatkaiContinuing with my sharing of Indian movie songs, today I would like to feature one of my mother’s favourite singers – S.Janaki and a few of the songs I like of hers. Janaki was born in 1938, started her musical training at the age of 3 and her movie musical career in the latter part of 1950s. According to my wikipedia source, she has sung around 20,000 songs in various Indian languages and won state and national awards for some of them. She made headlines last year when she refused to accept the Indian government’s prestigious award – the Padma Bhushan.

The first song here is from K.Balachander’s movie Varumaiyin Niram Sivappu (translation: The colour of poverty is red, 1980) starring Kamal Haasan and Sridevi. The music composition is by M.S. Viswanathan (MSV), who was more popular between the 50s to 70s. The singers are SPB and S. Janaki.

I couldn’t resist sharing another song from one of my favourite movies, Salangai Oli/ Sagara Sangamam (1983) whose music was composed by Ilayarajaa. This time it is a solo song by S.Janaki and the two actors/ dancers, Kamal Haasan and Manju Bhargavi, in the song are trained classical dancers.

The last song is a relatively more recent song from the movie Sangamam (literal translation: Confluence, 1999) and the music was composed by A.R.Rahman. The singers are Janaki (lead vocalist), Unnikrishnan and Madhumita.

Hope you enjoyed the movie clips and do try out this bitter gourd recipe!

Pavatkai Curry

  • Servings: 3
  • Difficulty: easy
  • Print

Ingredients:

  • Bittergourd – 1
  • Tomato – 1
  • Onion – ½
  • Green chilli – 2
  • Tamarind extract – 1 cup (light)
  • Coconut milk – ¼ cup
  • Sugar – 1 tbsp
  • Salt, to taste
  • Vegetable oil – 1 tbsp

Method:

  1. Wash and cut the bittergourd into small pieces. Keep aside.
  2. Chop the chillies and onion. Lightly fry them in a tablespoon of oil in a pan.
  3. Add the chopped bittergourd to the pan and continue frying for a few minutes.
  4. Add the tamarind juice and salt to the pan. Cover and let it simmer for around 10 to 15 mins until the curry thickens.
  5. Chop the tomato and add it to the pan together with ¼ coconut milk.
  6. Add a tablespoon of sugar and salt to taste.
  7. Cover and cook for another 15 mins.
  8. Remove from heat and serve warm with rice.

Recipe source: Raji Thillainathan

Mulai Keerai Curry

Today’s recipe is another way my mother cooks mulai keerai (amaranth greens, I think the scientific name is amaranthus blitum). I have posted earlier the traditional way it has been cooked in my home across generations.

Mulai keeraiSince selecting the movie clips that I shared yesterday, I have been listening to lots of 80s and early 90s Indian movie music and remembering the stories behind the songs. I felt like sharing some over the next several posts. If you are not interested in reading about or listening to some south Indian movie songs, please skip directly to the recipe given below.

As today is S.P.Balasubrahmanyam(SPB)’s 68th birthday, I will share a couple of his popular songs. While not having had formal musical training, SPB’s natural inclination towards music made him drop out of his engineering studies and pursue a musical career in the 60s. SPB is most known as a playback singer, having recorded more than 40,000 songs in several Indian languages according to my Wikipedia source. In addition to winning several Indian state and national awards for his songs, he has also composed music for several movies, acted in some and given voice overs for popular actors due to his multilingual skill. The Indian government awarded him the high civilian awards, the Padma Bhushan (2011) and Padmashri (2001) awards, for his distinguished service.

The first is an upbeat song from K.Balachander’s Tamil movie Punnagai Mannan (translation: King of Smiles, 1986). This is the first song that SPB and Chitra sang together and features Kamal Haasan and Revathi. The soundtrack of the movie was composed by Ilayarajaa with A.R.Rahman, then a part of Ilayarajaa’s music team, at the keyboard.

The second clip is from a concert where SPB sings a song of his from the 1979 movie Pagalil Oru Iravu (translation: A night in the day), soundtrack composed by Ilayarajaa.

Hope you enjoyed SPB’s songs from the 80s as much as I enjoyed listening to several and selecting these two.

Now, for the recipe… 🙂

Mulai Keerai Curry

  • Servings: 3
  • Difficulty: easy
  • Print

Ingredients:

  • Mulai keerai – 1 cup, chopped
  • Green chilli – 1
  • Capsicum – 1
  • Onion – 1
  • Tomato – 1
  • Salt, to taste
  • Crushed chilli – to taste
  • Vegetable oil – 1 tbsp

Method:

  1. Wash the green leaves and chop them up finely.
  2. Cook the green leaves with a little salt and water for about 10 mins till the water dries up. Remove from heat.
  3. Slice the green chilli, onion and capsicum.
  4. Add a tbsp of oil to a separate pan and lightly sauté the three.
  5. Chop the tomato and add it to the pan. As per your taste, add salt and crushed chilli and continue to lightly fry for a few more minutes.
  6. Transfer the contents of the pan to the cooked green leaves. Mix and serve warm with rice.

Recipe source: Raji Thillainathan

Karunai Kilangu Curry

The recipe I would like to share today is my mother’s recipe for karunai kilangu/ elephant yam curry.

karunai kilanguI also felt like sharing some music clips. Today is the birthday of Ilayaraaja, one of South India’s famous movie soundtrack composers, who has composed music for more than 1000 movies (around 4500 songs). His debut in South Indian cinema was in the 70s and while he continues his work to this day, I think the peak in his musical career was in the 80s. Having grown up watching a lot of South Indian movies, I felt like sharing three of my favourite Ilayaraaja compositions in honour of his 71st birthday.

The first song is from one of my all-time favourite movies Salangai Oli (translation: the sound of a dancer’s ankle bells, 1983), the Tamil dubbed version of the Telugu movie Sagara Sangamam. The movie has a Bharathanatyam theme and has a great cast including one of India’s best actors, Kamal Haasan (featured in the song). The movie won the Indian national award for best music direction and best male playback singer (S.P.Balasubrahmanyam).

The second song is from one of my mother’s favourite movies, renowned director K.Balachander’s movie Sindhu Bhairavi (1985). This movie’s story has a Carnatic music theme running through and a great soundtrack which again won Ilayaraaja the Indian national award for best music direction. The movie also won the best actress award (Suhasini Maniratnam, featured in the song) and the best female playback singer award (K.S.Chitra who made her Tamil movie music debut through this song) for the song shared here. This song is a fusion of folk and Carnatic music.

The third song that I am sharing here is a song from Maniratnam’s movie Thalapathi (1991). It’s simply a lovely short song.

Hope you enjoy the music as much as you enjoy the curry! 🙂

Karunai Kilangu Curry

  • Servings: 3
  • Difficulty: average
  • Print

Ingredients:

  • Yam – 1 cup, chopped
  • Brinjal – 1 cup, chopped
  • Onion – ½
  • Fenugreek – 2 tsp
  • Tamarind extract – ½ cup
  • Coconut milk – ½ cup
  • Curry powder – 1 to 2 tsp
  • Salt, to taste
  • Oil, as required

Method:

  1. Boil the yam for about 15 mins. Then, roughly chop into smaller pieces.
  2. Lightly fry the chopped brinjal and yam. Keep aside.
  3. In a pan, add a tablespoon of oil and lightly fry the chopped onion and fenugreek for a few minutes.
  4. Add the lightly fried brinjal and yam to the pan.
  5. Add the tamarind and milk to the pan together with curry powder and salt to taste.
  6. Cook the curry for about 15 mins and then remove from heat.
  7. Serve with rice.

Recipe source: Raji Thillainathan

Hathmalu

Today’s guest blogger is renowned independent film-maker Asoka Handagama. His movies have garnered much critical acclaim and have been screened at numerous major international film festivals (Toronto, Edinburgh, Tokyo etc.) around the world. His most recent movie ‘Ini, Avan’ had its world premiere at the ACID programme in the Cannes festival in 2012. Asoka is currently working on his newest film project which he plans to partially fund through crowd-funding. If you would like to participate in Sri Lanka’s first partially crowd-funded movie production, do check out the film’s Crimso page. 

Today, Asoka shares his favourite dish, Hathmalu – a specialty dish made during the Sri Lankan New Year/ Avurudhu/ Puthaandu.

Hath Malu ( A curry made of Seven vegetable/ingredients )

This traditional curry dish is prepared for an auspicious AVURUDU meal; popular in Sabaragamuva province in Sri Lanka. Uniqueness in this dish is that it is not prepared for any other occasion than AVURUDU.  It is so yummy that you can swallow a whole load of milk-rice in a few seconds!

Hathmalu

Hathmalu Recipe

Ingredients

  • Cashew Nuts (raw un roasted)

And any six (or seven) of the following:

  • Egg plant/ aubergines
  • Jackfruit Seeds
  • Snake beans
  • Sweet potato
  • Sweet potato baby leaves or pumpkin leaves
  • Desha-ala (indigenous potato)
  • Desha-ala leaf stems
  • ‘Ambul’ banana (unripe bananas)

For the curry: 

  • Turmeric
  • Chili powder (un roasted)
  • ‘Thuna paha’ local spice mix such as cinnamon, cardamom, cloves (un roasted)
  • Salt
  • Red onions
  • Green chili
  • Curry leaves
  • Coconut milk: thick cream (first squeeze) and diluted (second squeeze)

Method:
Chop aubergines and other vegetables and potatoes into 1cm x 1cm x 1cm cubes. Add the seven main ingredients along with salt, spice mix, curry leaves, chili powder, red onions, green chili, turmeric and diluted coconut milk to a (preferably) clay pot. Place on stove and allow to cook slowly on low heat until all ingredients have cooked and softened (15-20 minutes). Then add thick coconut milk and (on medium heat) allow to simmer until the curry thickens and take it off the heat.

Serve curry with milk rice.

hathmalu2Recipe source: Asoka Handagama.

 

Vengayapoo Varai

Today’s recipe is one of my mother’s quick and easy to prepare, delicious stir-fried dishes made with onion stalks and flowers/ vengaya poo.

Stalk

Vengaya Poo Varai

Time taken: 25 mins

Serves 2

vengaya poo varaiIngredients:

  • Spring onion stalk and flower/ Vengaya poo – 1 cup, chopped
  • Carrot – ½ cup, chopped
  • Onion – 1 tbsp, chopped
  • Green chilli – 1, chopped
  • Fennel – ½ tsp
  • Crushed red chillies – 1 tsp
  • Gingelly/ Sesame oil – 2 tbsp

Method:

  1. Clean the onion stalks and carrot and chop them into small pieces. Add some salt and keep aside.
  2. Heat 2 tbsp oil in a pan. Add the fennel seeds, chopped onion and green chilli. Fry for 2 mins.
  3. Add the chopped and salted onion stalks + flowers and carrots to the pan. Add 1 tsp crushed chilli and mix well.
  4. Cook for around 10 mins over low heat.
  5. Remove from heat and serve warm.

Recipe source: Raji Thillainathan.

Papaya Curry

Today’s recipe is that of a papaya curry recipe. While papaya is used in pickles or acharu here, a curry is not so common but my mother likes experimenting with her curries and this turned out delicious. This is also the dish I am sharing for Angie’s Fiesta Friday #2.

Papaya Curry

Time taken: 20 mins

Serves 3

Papaya curryIngredients:

  • Papaya, half-ripe – 1 cup, chopped
  • Onion – ½
  • Capsicum/ Malu miris – 1
  • Fennel seeds – 1 tsp
  • Cloves and Cinnamon – 1 tsp, crushed powder
  • Crushed chillies – 1 tsp
  • Lime – 1 ½
  • Sugar – 1 tbsp
  • Low fat oil – 1 tbsp

Method:

  1. Heat 1 tbsp oil in a pan and lightly fry the chopped onion, malu miris and fennel seeds for 2 minutes.
  2. Then, add the chopped papaya, crushed chillies and the crushed cloves and cinnamon powder to the pan, together with ¼ cup of water.  Cover and cook for about 5 minutes.
  3.  Squeeze and add the juice from 1 ½ limes and the sugar to the pan. Mix well and cook for another 5 minutes. Add a little water if the liquid dries up before that.
  4. Serve with rice.

Recipe source: Raji Thillainathan.

Garlic and Shallot Curry

Another garlic curry recipe of my mother, this time with shallots. For another version of a garlic curry, do check out the earlier post of the beetroot and garlic curry recipe.

Garlic and Shallot Curry

Time taken: 20 mins

Serves 3

Garlic and Shallot CurryIngredients:

  • Garlic – ¼ cup
  • Shallots – ½ cup
  • Fenugreek seeds – 1 tbsp
  • Tamarind extract – ½ cup
  • Curry powder – 1 tsp
  • Salt, to taste
  • Coconut milk – ¼ cup
  • Sugar – 2 tsp
  • Low fat oil – 1 tbsp

Method:

  1. Clean the garlic and shallots.
  2. Heat 1 tbsp oil in a pan and add the fenugreek seeds. Then, add the shallots and fry for a couple of minutes, before adding the garlic and frying further for a few minutes.
  3. Add the tamarind juice, curry powder and salt to taste to the pan. Mix well and cook for about 5 minutes.
  4. Add the coconut milk and sugar to the pan and cook for another 5 minutes, until gravy thickens and a nice aroma wafts about.
  5. Serve warm with rice or pittu or stringhoppers.

Recipe source: Raji Thillainathan.

FFF

Pudalangai Kulambu

Today’s curry recipe is one of the dishes that I like a lot – pudalangai kulambu or snake gourd curry.

Pudalangai Kulambu

Time taken: 30 mins

Serves 2 or 3

Pudalangai KulambuIngredients:

  • Snake gourd – 1 cup, chopped
  • Onion – ½ , chopped
  • Fenugreek seeds – 2 tsp
  • Curry leaves – 1 sprig
  • Tamarind – ½ cup
  • Coconut milk – ½ cup
  • Curry powder – 1 tsp
  • Salt, to taste
  • Low fat oil – 2 tbsp

Method:

  1. Heat 1 tbsp oil in a pan and fry the onion and fenugreek seeds for a couple of minutes.
  2. Then, add another tbsp oil to the pan and add the chopped snake gourd and curry leaves. Continue frying for a few minutes.
  3. Add the tamarind and milk to the pan, together with the curry powder and salt to taste. Let the curry cook for about 10 – 15 mins over medium heat.
  4. Remove pan from stove when the gravy thickens.
  5. Serve warm with rice or pittu.

Recipe source: Raji Thillainathan.

Tomato and Potato Curry

Today’s recipe is a lovely tomato and potato curry, which my mother calls her tomatish potato dish. It is a simple and easy to prepare dish that you will certainly like.

Tomato and Potato Curry

Time taken: 30 mins

Serves 2

Tomatish potatoIngredients:

  • Potato – 1
  • Tomato – 1
  • Onion – ½
  • Green chilli – 1
  • Crushed red chillies – 1 tsp
  • Ginger – ½ tsp, crushed
  • Garlic – ½ tsp, crushed
  • Salt, to taste
  • Low fat oil, for frying

Method:

  1. Boil the potato and then, peel and chop it into smaller pieces.
  2. Lightly fry the potato pieces and keep aside.
  3. Heat a little oil in a pan and lightly fry the chopped green chilli, ginger and garlic. Add the chopped tomato pieces and crushed red chillies to the pan and continue frying for a few minutes.
  4. Remove the pan from the stove and transfer its contents to a blender to grind it to a paste.
  5. Transfer the tomato paste back to the pan and heat it over a low heat.
  6. Add the fried potato pieces to the pan and salt, to taste. Stir well.
  7. Serve the tomato and potato curry with rice or pittu.

Recipe source: Raji Thillainathan.