Tag Archives: Side dish

Kiri Koss

Today’s guest blogger is Indika and her favourite recipe is Kiri Koss.

Kiri Koss

Cooking time: 30 mins

Serves 5

Ingredients:

  • 3 cups of unripe Jack-fruit
  • 1 medium onion, finely chopped
  • 2 green chillies
  • 2 cups coconut milk
  • curry leaves
  • 1/2 tsp turmeric powder
  • 1 tsp curry powder
  • 1 tsp chillie powder
  • salt to taste

Method:

  1. Clean and de-seed the the Jack-fruit. Cut the Jack-fruit into thin long stripes. Clean the seeds and cut them into two.
  2. Mix the Jack-fruit, the seeds and all the other ingredients and the the coconut milk in a pan.
  3. Put the pan on a medium flame, cover and cook for about 30 mins, until the jack-fruit is well done.

Recipe source: Indika K.

Polos and Kos Mallung

Jackfruit, both the unripe and ripe fruit, is very popular in Sri Lanka. The unripe jackfruit is cooked in different styles across the country. My mother and I like the Southern style. My mother’s unripe jackfruit dishes therefore are a slightly adapted version of her friend’s recipes for polos and kos mallung.  While I will certainly post the long and traditional way of cooking polos when someone sends me the recipe for it, today I would like to share the adapted recipes that my mother uses.

(a) Polos

Cooking time: 1 hour

Serves 4

Polos

Ingredients

  • Unripe jackfruit/ kos/ palakkai – 2 ½ cup (250 g), chopped and cleaned after peeling off skin
  • Chillies – 2
  • Coriander seeds – 1 tsp
  • Cumin seeds – 1 tsp
  • Cloves – 3
  • Cinnamon – small piece
  • Cardamon – 3
  • Ginger – ½”
  • Garlic – 3 – 4 cloves
  • Curry leaves – 1 sprig
  • Rampe leaf/ pandan
  • Onion – ½, large and chopped
  • Freshly scraped coconut – ¼ cup
  • Salt, to taste – 1 tsp
  • Tamarind extract – ¼ cup or Goraka/ Garcinia Cambogia – small piece
  • Water – 1 ½ cups

Method:

  1. Put the cleaned and chopped up raw jackfruit in a pot. Add 1 ½ cups of water and cook for about 15 – 20 minutes till the water dries up. Remove from heat and drain off the water.
  2. Dry roast the chillies, coriander and cumin, grind them and add to the pot.
  3. Crush the ginger and garlic and add the ginger-garlic paste to the pot.
  4. Add the cloves, cinnamon and cardamom together with the chopped onion, curry leaves and rampe leaf to the pot.
  5. Blend ¼ cup of freshly scraped coconut with 2 cups of water. Strain and add the coconut milk to the pot.
  6. Add the goraka piece or tamarind extract to the pot.
  7. Add salt to taste and mix all ingredients in the pot well.
  8. Put the pot back on the stove and cook for 10 minutes.
  9. Then, reduce to low heat and simmer for about 30 mins. If the ingredients are scaled up, the simmering time also needs to be increased. For e.g. if 1 Kg of jackfruit is being cooked, the simmering time will need to be at least 2 hours.
  10. If you prefer having more gravy in your polos curry, add a little coconut milk and cook for a few minutes more before removing from heat.
  11. Serve with rice.

(b) Kos Mallung

Cooking time – 25 mins

Serves 4

Kos Mallung

Ingredients:

  • Young, unripe jackfruit/ kos/ palakkai – 2 cups, finely chopped after peeling off the skin and cleaning it
  • Salt – ½ tsp + more, as per taste
  • Pepper – ½ tsp
  • Turmeric – ½ tsp
  • Garlic – 4 – 5 cloves, chopped
  • Green chillies – 2
  • Onion – 1, small, chopped
  • Curry leaves – 1 sprig
  • Scraped coconut – 1 tbsp (optional)
  • Lime juice – 1 tsp
  • Low fat oil (canola or sunflower) – 1 tbsp
  • Water – ½ cup

Method:

  1. Marinate the finely chopped unripe jackfruit flesh and seed with ½ tsp salt, pepper and turmeric powder. Keep aside for about 10 minutes.
  2. Heat 1 tbsp oil in a pan and sauté the chopped garlic, chillies, onion and curry leaves for 2 minutes.
  3. Add the marinated finely chopped jackfruit to the pan. Mix well.
  4. Add ½ cup water and test for salt, adding more if required. Cover and cook on low heat for 10 minutes.
  5. Uncover after 10 minutes and if there is still water in the pan, cook till the water dries up.
  6. If you like adding scraped coconut, you can add the freshly scraped coconut now and remove from heat.
  7. Add 1 tsp lime juice. Mix well and serve hot with rice.

Recipe source: Lalitha Senadheera and Raji Thillainathan.

Mushroom curry

My mother tells me that my grandmother was very fond of wild mushrooms and she liked picking them fresh. It seems that mushrooms sprout overnight after a heavy rainfall with a lot of thunder but they turn poisonous once the sun rises and they bloom. My grandmother used to go to her field just before dawn and pick the mushrooms, with its stalks, which grew under a particular huge tree. There were also snake holes around that tree where snakes did live but my grandmother was quite a fearless woman.

While her children and grandchildren no longer neither live near fields nor would we know how to identify good mushrooms and when we should pick them, my grandmother’s fondness for mushrooms has been transferred to everyone at home.

So, here’s my grandmother’s mushroom recipe as remembered and very often replicated at home by my mother.

Mushroom curry

Cooking time: 15 mins

Serves 4

Mushroom curry

Ingredients

  • Mushrooms (Button/Agaricus or Crimini) – 1 cup, sliced
  • Garlic – 3 or 4 cloves
  • Ginger – 1” piece
  • Curry leaves – 2 sprigs
  • Coconut milk – 1 cup (thin or ½ cup coconut milk mixed with ½ cup water) + ¼ cup thick (optional)
  • Curry powder – 1 tbsp
  • Mixed dry roasted spice powder – fennel, cardamom, cinnamon and clove (3C + fennel) – 1 tsp
  • Salt, to taste

Method

  1. Heat 1 tsp oil in a pan and sauté the garlic, ginger and curry leaves.
  2. When the aroma begins to waft about, add the sliced mushrooms and mix well.
  3. Add 1 cup of thin coconut milk and add curry powder and salt. Cook for around 10 to 12 mins.
  4. Add the mixed dry roasted spice powder together with ¼ cup milk, if the curry has dried up or if you prefer it with gravy, and let the curry simmer for a few minutes before removing from heat.
  5. Serve hot with rice or rotis.

Recipe source: Raji Thillainathan.

Mulai keerai aviyal

This is my grandmother’s recipe, as often cooked at home by my mother. Since I was on an Indian culinary journey last month, I realize that this recipe resembles a simpler variant of the Kerala avial, sans the curd.

Mulai keerai aviyal

Cooking time: 10 – 12 mins

Serves 4

Mulai keerai

Ingredients:

  • Amaranth greens/ mulai keerai/ thampala – 2½ cup, washed thoroughly and finely chopped
  • Carrot – ½ cup, sliced
  • Chilli – 1, chopped
  • Onion – 1 small, chopped
  • Garlic – 1 or 2 cloves, chopped
  • Salt to taste
  • Water
  • Scraped coconut – 1 tbsp

Method:

  1. Put the washed and chopped vegetables in a pot with ½ cup of water and salt. Cook till the veggies are tender and the water dries up.
  2. Add the scraped coconut, mix well and cook for another 2 mins.
  3. Serve hot with rice.

Recipe source: Raji Thillainathan.

Fish cutlets

Today’s guest blogger is Krishanti Weerakoon, a staff of UN and wife of the Sri Lankan High Commissioner to Canada.

FISH CUTLETS

This is a fool-proof  Sri Lankan recipe and on all of our postings overseas, this was an absolute favourite.  A versatile and excellent snack for coffee mornings, afternoon teas, lunches , cocktail parties,with pre dinner drinks or even  with dinner!! Make sure you have enough to go around as these small morsels have an explosion on your taste buds with the spices and aromatics and they are very popular. Reduce the intensity of the chillies depending on your guests’  tolerance for spice!!

Ingredients:
1 tin tuna ( 450 gram)
2 small green chillies cut finely
1 small onion diced
1/2  tsp black pepper
1/2 tsp chillie powder

I large potato peeled and boiled and mashed
I clove garlic crushed
1 tsp chopped ginger
I tsp each ground coriander and cummin

I tsp lime juice
I lb bread crumbs ( 450 gms)
2 eggs

3 tbsp flour
salt

1 pint oil for deep frying.

Method:
Mix all the ingredients except one egg and flour , breadcrumbs and oil in a bowl. Make small balls about the size of a  walnut.

Break the other egg into a bowl and beat lightly with a fork. Then  put the flour and breadcrumbs into two seperate bowls. Follow this order; first roll the cutlet in flour, then egg and lastly breadcrumbs. Treat it like an assembly line!! Use up all the fish mixture this way!

Heat oil to smoking point in a wok or fryer. Fry the cutlets until golden brown . Do not add too many at a time as it will lower the temperature of the oil and will not fry evenly. Ensure that oil stays hot when frying to ensure crispy cutlets. Serve with a nice dip either sweet chilli sauce or tomato/barbecue sauce.

Recipe source: Krishanti Weerakoon.

Spicy bean curd curry

My mother is quite fond of tofu ever since she first came across it while living in Jakarta in the 80s. A regular dish at our home for many years, my mother enjoys cooking it in different styles. This bean curd curry is my mother’s creation and what I call fusion cooking.

Spicy bean curd curry

Cooking time: 20 – 25 mins

Serves 4

Ingredients:

  • Bean curd – 150g, cut into 1 inch pieces
  • Tomatoes – 2, chopped
  • Fenugreek seeds – 1 tsp
  • Fennel seeds – 1 tsp
  • Cumin powder – ½ tsp
  • Coriander powder – ½ tsp
  • Cinnamon, cardamom, clove powder mix – ½ tsp
  • Onion, chopped
  • Curry leaves – 2 sprig
  • Rampe leaf/ pandan
  • Crushed chillies – 1 tsp
  • Salt, to taste
  • Oil – 1 tbsp + deep fry
  • Water – 1 ½ cups

Method:

  1. Deep fry the bean curd pieces.
  2. Heat 1 tbsp oil in a pan. Add the fenugreek and fennel seeds and fry for a few seconds. Add the spice powder mix (cumin, coriander, cinnamon, cardamom, clove).
  3. Then, add the chopped onion, curry leaves and rampe leaf and fry lightly.
  4. Add the chopped tomato pieces, crushed chillies and salt and mix well.
  5. Adding 1 ½ cups of water to the pan, cook the curry for around 10 to 15 minutes.
  6. Add the bean curd pieces and simmer for another 5 minutes, before removing from heat.
  7. Garnish with fresh curry leaves and serve hot with rice.

Recipe source: Raji Thillainathan.

Drumstick curry

This is my mother’s recipe and this is the way she makes drumstick curry often at home. It is delicious.

Drumsticks

Cooking time: 25 – 30 mins

Serves 4 – 5 persons

Drumstick curry

Ingredients

  • Drumsticks – 2
  • Fenugreek seeds – 1 tbsp
  • Onion – ½
  • Curry leaves – 2 sprig
  • Curry powder – 1 tbsp
  • Salt – ½ tsp
  • Oil – 1 tbsp
  • Tamarind extract – ½ cup
  • Non-fat milk or coconut milk (for vegans) – 1 cup
  • Water – ½ cup

Method

  1. Cut the drumsticks into 2 inch pieces and clean by scraping lightly the skin.
  2. Deep fry drumstick pieces, till they are lightly browned.
  3. In a pan, heat a little oil and sauté the fenugreek seeds, onions and curry leaves.
  4. Add the fried drumstick pieces and mix well.
  5. Add the tamarind extract, non-fat milk or coconut milk and water, along with the curry powder and salt, to the pan.
  6. Cover and cook on medium heat for around 15 mins.
  7. Taste for salt and then increase heat and cook further for about 5 mins.
  8. Remove from heat and serve with hot rice or stringhoppers.

Recipe source: Raji Thillainathan.

Paithangai Curry

Today is Aadi amaavasai or the New moon day during the month of Aadi, which generally falls between mid-July and mid-August of the global calendar. For Tamils, it is a remembrance day of fathers who have passed away. As both my grandfathers passed away at quite a young age, my parents have always observed this day for as long as I can remember. Lunch on this day is always kind of special – food that I associate with fasts and temples. One curry that is sure to be there on this day is Paithangai or yardlong beans.

Yardlong beans

I thought of posting the recipe for this dish today. My mother went one step ahead and not only did she give me the recipe for paithangai curry  across three generations of my family, she actually prepared it in the three different styles so that I could take photos of them. Each of the recipe below takes about 20 – 25 mins to cook and serves 3 – 4 people.

So, here goes…

(1) Paithangai curry (early to mid 20th century recipe)

This is my great grandmother’s recipe, as remembered and replicated by my mother. As this is a dry curry recipe, it can be refrigerated and used over a few days without spoiling as opposed to curries that are cooked in coconut milk.

Paithangai curry

Ingredients

  • Yardlong beans – 200g
  • Curry powder – 1 tsp
  • Onion – ½ medium sized, chopped
  • Curry leaves
  • Salt to taste
  • Oil – 2 tbsp
  • Water – 2 cups

Method

  1. Wash and cut the beans into 1 inch pieces.
  2. Add the beans and chopped onions to a pot together with the curry leaves and curry powder. Add 2 cups of water. Cover and cook on medium heat.
  3. When the water has almost dried up and the beans are cooked, add 2 tbsp of oil and mix well. Reduce heat and let the curry simmer for about 2 mins before removing from the heat.
  4. Serve hot with rice.

(2) Paithangai curry (mid to late 20th century recipe)

This is my grandmother’s recipe, as remembered and replicated by my mother.

Paithangai curry

Ingredients

  • Yardlong beans – 200g
  • Carrot – 1
  • Curry powder – 2 tsp
  • Onion – ½ medium sized, chopped
  • Curry leaves – a sprig
  • Coconut milk – 2 cups of second milk and 2 tbsp of first milk
  • Salt to taste

Note: The first milk is the coconut milk obtained when blending freshly grated coconut with a little water. The second milk is the coconut milk obtained when blending the used grated coconut, after the first milk has been obtained, with about 2 cups of water. The second milk will be thinner in consistency to the first milk. My mother uses non-fat milk as a substitute for coconut milk for health reasons.

Method

  1. Wash and cut the beans and carrots into 1 inch pieces.
  2. Add the beans, carrots and chopped onions to a pot together with the curry leaves and curry powder. Add 2 cups of the second coconut milk. Cover and cook on medium heat.
  3. When the milk has almost dried up and the beans are cooked, add 2 tbsp of the first coconut milk and mix well. Reduce heat and let the curry simmer for around 5 – 10 mins before removing from the heat.
  4. Serve hot with rice.

(3) Paithangai curry – my mother’s recipe

Paithangai curry

Ingredients

  • Yardlong beans – 1 cup, finely chopped
  • Carrot – ½ cup, finely chopped
  • Cabbage and leeks – ½ cup, finely chopped
  • Onion – 1 medium-sized, finely chopped
  • Garlic – 2 cloves, finely chopped
  • Green chilli – 2 or capsicum – 1, finely chopped
  • Turmeric – ½ tsp
  • Pepper powder – ¼ tsp
  • Salt, to taste
  • Low fat Oil (Canola or Sunflower oil) – 2 tbsp
  • Water – ¼ cup

Method

  1. Heat the oil in a pan and sauté the chopped garlic, onions and chillies.
  2. Then, add the beans. Mix and fry for about 5 minutes.
  3. Add the rest of the chopped vegetables and cook for another 5 – 10 mins.
  4. Add ¼ cup of water, turmeric, pepper and salt to taste. Mix well. Cover and cook for 5 minutes or until the water dries up.
  5. Remove from the heat and serve hot with rice.

Do post your feedback below, if you do try one of these recipes.

Mashed pumpkin salad

This is a simple and quick to prepare recipe of my mother’s, which is a huge hit with visitors. My mother generally likes experimenting. She can also replicate something she has once tasted. As this dish is something that falls under the two, I have labelled it under ‘Colombo’ (the city where different Sri Lankan cuisines meet) – which is also the city my mother has lived nearly three decades so far and where she feels most at home.

Mashed Pumpkin Salad

Time taken – 20 minutes

Serves – 4

Mashed pumpkin salad

Ingredients

  • Pumpkin – 250g
  • Coconut milk – 2 or 3 tbsp
  • Green chillies – 2
  • Onion – 1 medium sized, chopped
  • Salt and pepper to taste
  • Lime juice

Method

  1. Chop the pumpkin into chunks, does not need to be small, and leaving the skin on. Remove seeds and clean the chunks.
  2. Boil the pumpkin until it is tender and cooked, for around 15 minutes. Remove skin and mash the pumpkin.
  3. Add the coconut milk, green chillies, onion to the mashed pumpkin and mix well.
  4. Season with salt and pepper, according to your taste, as well as some lime juice.

Recipe source: Raji Thillainathan.