Secret Recipe..

From next week its “Eat what you cook”, it doesn’t meat that I will stop dining out, twice a week its “Eat what others cook”. With inspirations from Amaravishy, I shifted to a new location, in real, there is nothing much to shift, I am learning purchasing.
Boiling milk on the first day is very auspicious, we all know that. I purchased a Stove where you have to pump for pressure and use kerosene as fuel. My first purchase was a real bad one, because if you stop pumping the flames goes down and the first day I pumped for continuous fifteen minutes to boil half liter milk.
Where do is start, the first day with and without any ingredients to cook, we managed with milk and biscuits and for brunch, a good restaurant (Annapoorna) nearby with wonderful sambar and slightly on the higher selling price is one which I chose for dinner, rather dining out I packed four masala dosas home. The waiter made me wait thirty minutes only to say that there were no more masala dosas, then why did he took the order?
His response was an alternative tomato masala dosa, without the potatoes, I didn’t mind, just drinking sambar for dinner would be enough. Everyone in Coimbatore knows about that popular sambar, one of my student who worked there, as supervisor couldn’t get the recipe, at last he gave up after six months. So what? It’s an assignment and an experiment for the next cooking session, where the students will prepare sambar similar to that of Annapoorna ‘s sambar. Experimenting with so many sambar recipes is a good teaching and learning experience, but soon will try to find and reveal the secret.

A sample recipe:

Ingredients

Sambar Thoor dhal- 1 cup Any Vegetable of your choice- 1 cup (drumstick, carrot, beans, raddish, kohl rabies) Onions- 2 (chopped) Tomatoes- 2 (chopped) Tamarind extract- 1/2 cup Sambar Powder- 1 tsp Red Chili Powder- 1 tsp Turmeric Powder- 1/4 tsp Asafetida Powder- 1/8 tsp Garlic- 3 flakes (crushed) Mustard Seeds- 1/2 tsp Urad Dhal- 1/2 tsp Salt Oil- 1 tablespoon Chopped coriander leaves (cilantro)

methodPressure cook thoor dhal with garlic and mash well. Steam the chopped vegetable with onions, tomatoes, turmeric powder and salt. Mix the cooked thoor dhal and steamed vegetables together. Add tamarind extract, red chili powder, asafetida and sambar powder. Boil this until the raw smell of tamarind vanishes. Heat oil in a small pan. Add mustard seed. When it starts to pop add urad dhal and fry until it becomes golden. Remove from fire. Pour this seasoning over the sambar mixture. Heat for 5 more minutes. Garnish with chopped coriander leaves .