Gugi the Cook Strikes Again!

And so the cooking continues. It's a lovely rainy day and I continued my cooking spree. Today I made the following:

• Baingan Fry
• Peanut Korma
  
• Tomato Chutney

Baigan Fry is the simplest thing in the world to make. Well that's true for cooking as well I suppose. As long as you don't mind chopping and grinding and sauce making, and have a store of patience, cookings easy as falling off a buttered log.  

Baingan Fry 

(baingan/brinjal/egg plant/aubergine)  

The way my mom makes it, I think.

1. Take 2 baingans (medium sized), wash them, chop off the stem parts (off with their heads!), and cut them up into cubes of any size you want. The theory is the smaller the better.
2. Heat oil in a kadhai/vessel/saute pan on meduim high flame.
3. Once hot add mustard seeds/rai. Allow the rai to splutter, hold a lid close to the top of the pan and contain the splutters.
4. Now turn down the heat to lowest and add the following:
   
    - Hing
    - Curry patta
    - Haldi
    - Dry red chilli
    - Chilli powder
    - Cumin powder
    - Coriander powder
    - Amchur or Tamarind powder
    - Salt to taste
   
   
5. Mix all this up and increase the flame to medium high again. Give it a good browning and allow the fragrance of all the spices to permeate the air around you. Hmmm...
   
6. Now toss in the chopped baingan and give it a good mix up so all the spice powders coat the baingan pieces.
   
7. Add 1/4 cup of water to the kadhai, cover it, lower the heat to medium low and cook till the baingan is done. Check and add more water as needed. Don't add too much or it'll all turn to mush.
8. Once the baingan is done, take off the lid, dry up any residual moisture by turning on the heat to highest and stir frying the baingan.
9. If you want your baingan to be crispy, then add some more oil to the vessel and let the baingan roast in the open pan.

Tomato Pachadi/Raita

My mom's recipe

1. Take 3 medium sized tomatoes and blanch (add to boiling water) them in hot water till the skin comes off.
2. Remove the skin, and chop up the tomatoes.
3. In a tempering spoon (huge spoon/tiny pan), add 2 tsps oil.
4. Once the oil is hot, add mustard seeds, curry leaves, hing (asofesita), green chillies, dried red chillies.
5. Let it all sizzle and crackle and become fragrant.
6. The moment it becomes all fragrant, turn off the heat and pour it tempering on the chopped tomatoes.
7. Add curd or thick buttermilk to the tomatoes and you are ready to spoon the raita! 

Peanut Korma

Insipred from Chitra Amma's Kitchen blog.

The only changes I made were to use groundnuts/peanuts instead of avare kaalu, adding a tomato and cooking everything in a pressure cooker. I had to cook it for 15 whistles or so 'cause the peanuts took forever to cook. If you are one of those lucky people with a farm, or get your produce straight from a farm, you'd have to cook it much less.

P.S. - Add chopped coriander/cilantro on top of everything, it's a très Indian thing to do.