India Trip Food Round-up – Chennai Part 2
You’re correct in the assumption that of the 12 days I spent in India, more than 8 were at restaurants. I visited 4 cities in 12 days, and each one had its own specialty, Hyderabadi Biryani, Bombay pav bhaji and gujarati food. I probably spent the most time eating at home in Chennai. I had to ask my sister in law Meena, to make this dish for me and of course share it on Roz Ka Khana. Its called Ambat (Sour) Bhaaji (vegetable dish). Its made from sour greens like amaranth or puli keerai as we say in Tamil. Can also be made from spinach leaves. The sourness to the dish comes from adding the tamarind.
Ambat Bhaji is a Tanjore Marathi inspired dish and is sort of a hybrid between a sambar (lentil and vegetables soup) and a koottu (vegetables in gravy).
Ingredients:
Spinach – 1 bunch. You may also use amaranth.
Tamarind – lemon sized ball
Turmeric – 1 tsp
Asafetida – a pinch
Toor dal (yellow pigeon peas) – 1 cup boiled and mashed
Methi seeds (fenugreek) – 1 tsp
Dry red chilies – 4-6
Chopped Cilantro – for garnish
Method:
1. Wash and chop the spinach. You can chop the spinach and steam in a heavy bottomed vessel with a little bit of water. This helps retain the green color better. You can also microwave the fresh spinach. Alternatively, you may use frozen spinach.
2. While the spinach cooks, soak the tamarind in a little warm water, and squeeze it to extract tamarind paste. Alteratively, you may use about 1 to 1 1/2 tsp of tamarind paste. Add water to this paste (about 1 cup) and take this tamarind water in the heavy bottom vessel (kadai)
3. Add the spinach, salt and asafetida to the tamarind water. Let this mixture boil till the raw smell of tamarind goes away.
4. Now add the boiled and mashed toor dal. Boil for another 5 to 10 minutes till everything is well blended.
5. Now dry roast the methi seeds and the red chilies, grind to a fine powder. Add this powder to the dal mixture and boil one more time for another 2-3 minutes. Garnish with cilantro leaves and serve hot with white or brown rice.
In the above picture, we mixed the mashed dal with the ground powder and then added the mixture to the tamarind water. You may do this as well, but I think adding the powder at the end and then boiling provides an added taste.
