Gunpowder, originally "Molagaipodi"

Gunpowder, Chilli powder, or  Molagai podi

The “dosai”  travelled beyond its boundaries of South India, largely thanks to the India Coffee House chain run and managed by members of the workers union of the India Coffee Board. But  the traditional , simple accompaniment, the “molagaipodi”—chilli powder—was never part of the dosai they served , with sambar and coconut chutney.

Two varieties of chill powder

Only South Indians, or those who had been fortunate to have home-made dosais at a friend’s house, had tasted , and loved the chilli powder,  till restaurants like the Sagar Ratna chain, and later, the branches of Sharavana Bhawan, came into being. They served what came to be called “gun powder” in the North. 

In no time at all, this  spicy powder that is mixed with sesame oil, to go with idlis or dosais, caught on like wild fire across India, and wherever Indians live.

 Many small and big Udipi joints in the South however did serve this—ready made, from a steel mug-- from when I can remember.

Lentils 

Both chilli powder and gun powder are misnomers. For though chillis are a definite part of this powder, lentils—chana dal and urad dal— form the greater part of it, by weight and volume.

In  south Indian homes, the chutney or sambar are optional side dishes—time and other things permitting. This powder is a must. Dosai with molagapodi, they say. 

But for many, the preference is clearly, molagaipodi with dosai—meaning a huge heap of this powder and may be one dosai!

Here goes the receipe, that will fill a 500 gram jam bottle, and leave you with a little more in a bowl.

Chillies and Tamrind

Ingredients:

Dry Red Chillies 20 (I used 16 of the pungent variety, and 4 Kashmiri chillies that give colour without fire!)

Chana Dal(Gram lentil) 1 cup

Blackgram(dehusked, split)/dhuli urad 1 cup

Tamrind- the size of a small lemon

Asofeatida/Hing—a little bit

Salt to taste-(I used 3 level teaspoons)

Sugar or jiggery- one teaspoon shakkar is what I used

Til/sesame seeds -1 teaspoon (Optional)

Vegetable oil-1 teaspoon

Method

Heat a large karhai/wok/frying pan, and pour one teaspoon of oil. When it is hot, put the red chillies and tamrind, and sauté for three minutes or till they turn a rich red. Take it off in a bowl, and put the wok back on the gas stove.

Now  put the chana dal and sauté for five minutes, stirring all the time. Now add the dhuli urad and hing, and sesame seeds and continue stirring till both the dals have turned a nice golden colour, and you can smell a lovely, aroma of the roasting dals. 

Take care that nothing gets burnt, or turns dark. Switch off, and add the red chillies, tamring in this, and blend well. Let it cool for half an hour.

Transfer the  prepared chillies and dals into the mixie jar, add the salt and jiggery/sugar/shaker, and grind till it  acquires a coarse texture, with some of the lentils remaining slightly bigger for that crunchy taste and feel. People with dental problems though prefer it finely ground.

 It is best  served  as a heap on the plate, leaving it to the impatient person to form a well in the middle with the  index finger. Fill the well with til /sesame oil.

Molagaipodi with til oil

PS:  You can add  a piece of “copra”—dried coconut—in place of til.  It is delicious, but the shelf life stands reduced. If you are sure the jar will be empty in a  fortnight or a month, go for this option.

Karhi, that curry of yoghurt and gram flour

Who can resist "karhi chawal" when hunger pangs hit?

Karhi Pakoda

Yoghurt in any form is good for health. And as “karhi”, it is not just healthy, but also tasty and wholesome, a one stop accompaniment for rice— plain white steamed basmati, or with some jeera, or jeera and peas.

Most fast food joints that offer “chawal rajmah”  also serve “karhi chawal”, for it is home food that fills the tummy.

The last few years have seen  this humble dish, basically of the  farmers and peasants, the countryside , make their way into the menu of fine dining restaurants as well. Served in lovely handis, the humble “karhi” acquires a gourmet status here.

Because of the origin of this dish in the countryside, it is typically made of yoghurt that is too sour to be had plain or as a “raita”. And most often, it is made of “chaach” – the buttermilk from which all the butter has been removed. And so, it is almost fat free, though people tend to make it rich, by adding a generous drizzle of ghee. That is totally optional

For the same reason of its origin, you don’t need too much of yoghurt— in fact, it is whisked with water into  “buttermilk “  or “lassi” at home, and then converted into karhi.

.

This is how I make the “karhi”, some of my own touches have evolved out of making this with  a glutton’s passion more than that of a cook, wanting it to be tasty, and also having to manage my time.

Spices for Karhi

Ingredients:

1.Sour yoghurt— 1 cup

Water- 3 cups

Gram flour or Besan, roasted for three minutes- 3 heaped tablespoons

Turmeric- Half a teaspoon

Chilli powder-1 teaspoon

Asofeatida or hing- a touch

Salt to taste

Gram flour, roaste

2.Oil(any) -3 teaspoons

Jeera-1 teaspoon

Coriander seeds-1 teaspoon

Fenugreek seeds-1 teaspoon

Cardamom-2

Cinnamon stick- an inch

Cloves-three or four

Bay leaf-2

3.Ginger-1 inch piece, chopped fine

Garlic-4 pods

Onion-One large one, finely chopped

Green chillies-five or six, chopped

Curry leaves-10 or 12

Gram flour,turmeric, chilli powder go into yoghurt

4.My magic ingredients

Mango pickle, along with the spices ,oil that is coating it (preferably Punjabi)-1 teaspoon

Fenugreek leaves , dried and crushed(kasoori methi)-1 teaspoon

The karhi batter

5.For garnish

Green coriander chopped—a little bit

Method:

Whisk all the ingredients numbered 1, till you get a smooth paste that could be a bit watery. Keep aside.

Saute spices and other ingredients

Heat a deep pan, add the oil, and when it is hot, add all the spice ingredients numbered 2. Saute till the aroma is releaed.

Now add all the ingredients numbered 3. Saute for two minutes.

Now gently pour the yoghurt with gram gram flour  , and stir well and completely at once.  Keep stirring it from time to time , till it begins to boil. Now add the pickle. 

Reduce heat to sim, and let it simmer for ten minutes if you are in a hurry. Five minutes more will be bonus cooking time for this “karhi”, which actually means something that has slowly reduced on flame, getting cooked at the same time.

(If  you find the yoghurt splitting, panic not. Just whisk two teaspoons of gramflour in water, add and stir.)

Colour and texture of karhi change as it is getting cooked!

Ghiya pakoda

Pour over prepared pakoda. 

I have used ghiya(squash) pakoda

Now garnish with chopped coriander.

Don’t see the coriander on the karhi?

Well I did not have any.

Kashmiri chillies, colorful but not fiery, is the garnish

The secret to good home cooking is  taming the ingredients. Don’t have something, don’t let that defeat you. Look for something that can serve the same or a better purpose.

Now this karhi will not exactly become less delicious without green coriander.But to make it presentable and well dressed, I sauted a couple of Kashmiri red chillies in a teaspoon of ghee—clarified butter—and there..the karhi wore red finish instead of green !

Paneer & Grilled Vegetable Platter

Cottage Cheese, Capsicum,Tomato and Onions, from the Gas Tandoor.

Paneer,Capsicum,Onions and Tomatoes, grilled in a gas top   tandoor

The best way to eat vegetables, I’m told, is to grill them very simply, add a dash of lime juice and whatever else you like, and enjoy them. This line of thinking  has gained currency more of late, as people fear that salads--- which enjoyed the distinction of being the best way to eat many vegetables,till recently--- have become suspect. Thanks to pesticides, dirty water etc etc, that make the health conscious want to distance themselves from raw vegetables.

I love raw vegetables and eat them unmindful of what the Doubting Thomases say. Not that I doubt the wisdom of their view. It is just that I feel it is important to keep one’s immunity in good form , instead of becoming a delicate darling who can’t eat raw vegetables or drink regular water, from a home filter.

Marinated paneer, veggies on the screwer

The smokey aroma of  chicken being roasted in the tandoor, has always kindled my appetite, made me crave. Unfortunately, one doesn’t get to take in the aroma of vegetables being grilled likewise.The good and popular  streetside places for tandoori food rarely do vegetable platters.

But grilling /barbecuing vegetables  is simple. Much of the total  time taken goes towards the cutting of vegetables and  the marinading . Once those are done, and your  BBQ or gas tandoor(like the one I have) or oven is hot, it hardly takes a few minutes.

All the great looking, colourful  vegetables—yellow and red bell peppers, green capsicum, broccoli, carrots, potatoes, cauliflower,tomatoes, onions-- are great on the tandoori platter. Cottage cheese and mushroom add that extra body, oomph and taste to it.

 I’ve had cubes of pineapple also , cooked with these. The simple rule is—don’t fret over what you don’t have. Use whatever vegetables you can find in your fridge.

This is how I made the BBQ vegetables you see in this post:

Ingredients:

For the marinade:

Vegetable oil-1 teaspoon

Yoghurt-Half a cup

Garlic-5 pods

Ginger- one inch piece

Pepper—Half a teaspoon

(you can also use 2 tsps ofginger-garlic instead of 

ginger and garlic)

For the platter:

Paneer-200 grams

Capsicum- 1 bit one

Onion-1 big one

Tomato-1 big one

For the side:

Green chutney

Tomato ketchup

Method:  

Cut the cottage cheese into big cubes. Cut the capsicum into four pieces vertically, and halve them. Cut the onion into half, and separate a few parts.  Cut the tomato into halves.

Mix all the marinade ingredients  in a blender, for two minutes. Pour it over the cut vegetables, and gently toss to ensure all the pieces get a coat of the marinade.Leave it  covered in the fridge, for at least half an hour. A couple of hours is great.

The Gas top tandoor

Fire up your oven/tandoor/BBQ, string the vegetables in the screwer and place them in its  hot, hot,  womb   . Turn the sides of  the vegetables after  about three minutes, and drizzle a touch of  vegetable oil every time. 

Enjoy the sight of the flames licking the paneer , leaving a golden telltale mark in the edges. See it char, a wee bit, the capsicum, and defeat the tomatos into squishy, somewhat limp form. 

Take them off the fire, after you  have enjoyed the smokey, tandoori armoma whafting in the air, for eight to ten minutes.

Carefully, take them off on a plate. Sprinkle salt, and  some “chaat masala” if you like. Serve with green chutney and tomato ketchup on the side.

Some crunchy raw greens will be great…but the purpose of this BBQ is to eat vegetables—grilled, not raw!                    

Sambar powder, freshly roasted and ground

Curry Powder  also...

Sambar Powder

There is one basic sambar powder  for which the ingredients are best given to a flour mill to grind. The hard , dried rhizomes of turmeric, and pungent and tough to home grind dry red chillies, the chana dal, coriander seeds etc , cannot easily be ground to an almost all-purpose flour-like texture at home. If it can, it is laborious, and unless one  lives far from civilization, it is not worth the effort!

Most flour mills will accept only quantities that are a kilogram or may be, even more. Ideally, you share with  friends who use sambar powder regularly; or you pack them in separate ziplock pouches and keep them in the freezer compartment of your fridge.

One can use this powder for dry subzis, in dals..any Indian cooking really.

The other is the FRESH ROASTED & GROUND SAMBAR POWDER. In Tamilnadu, it is called “Varuttu arachcha sambar”. In most  Tambram homes, this is the powder made and used in the sambar, except on a lazy day ! Nowadays, people have started making a jar full of it, and keep it in the fridge, to save themselves the bother of roasting and grinding the powder every day. What is more, it is used  on dry vegetables  too, to add a lot of volume ,texture and taste to it.

Here goes the receipe:

Dry Red Chillies—about 20 of them

Chana Dal—One cup

Dhania seeds- Two cups

Asoefiatida—a couple of pinches

Fenugreek seeds-two teaspoons

Vegetable oil-2 teaspoons

Dry (dehydrated) curry leaves- a few (optional)

Heat a frying pan, and add the oil. When it is hot, put the dry red chillies, and  turn it around, so that all the chillies turn a deep red, almost maroon, and get roasted. The pungent air around will tell you they are done. Take them off the pan, and now add the chana dal, dhania seeds,fenugreek seeds and asoefiatida.

When they are  nicely roasted, add the chillies back,  add the curry leaves, and give them a couple of minutes on the pan, to blend flavours and aromas, as you stir them. Take it off the gas.

After it has cooled down, grind them nicely in a blender. The powder  will, however, remain coarse.

Transfer it to a clean jar, and use it over the next few days, try to finish it in a month at most. For , it is meant to be roasted and ground fresh !