Vendakka Theeyal

We all love tamarind based gravies and when I saw this at nandoo's kitchen, I was tempted to try it right away. This is a recipe from Kerala. This is similar to the puli kulambu in Tamilnadu. And there are so many varieties in it such as ulli theeyal, vendakka theeyal, pavakka theeyal, muringakka theeyal and there is even a fish theeyal when I was browsing through blogs. As puli klambu is always welcome at my place, I made this vendakka theeyal using okra/ ladies finger and served it along with rice and cabbage poriyal. It was a wonderful combination and we had a filling lunch today. This is my final post for the Blogging Marathon #34. 

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Malai Kofta Curry

For this month's South Vs North Challenge, started by Divya, Nupur of Northern team challenged the Southern team with a delicious and rich gravy. Malayi Kofta curry is a rich creamy gravy served along with soft paneer koftas. This is a restaurant style gravy which goes very well with tandoori roti, naan and other flat breads. The paneer koftas are actually deep fried, but it is completely your choice. You can either deep fry them or shallow fry or bake or cook them in paniyaram pans. However you cook the koftas, the final gravy turns out delicious. I recently purchased a grill plate for making rotis. To go with the gravy I made some rotis made on the grill plate. The combination was quite fantastic. 

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Maa Vatral Kulambu - Announcing March WTML and February Winner

For this month's Walk Through Memory Lane, the host, due to some unexpected reasons couldn't guest host it. So I had to jump in. And so this month, WTML will be hosted here at Gayathri's Cook Spot and I request all my friends and readers to support the event by sending in your entries. If you are a regular reader of my blog then you will be familiar with the event I have been conducting for the past two years. This event is about recreating your childhood favourite recipes. Every month a blogger guest hosts the event at her space which has increased the popularity of this event. I am really thankful to all my friends for making this event a great success. 

Today I will share with you a speciality of mom - Maa Vatral Kulambu as the first entry of the event. Every summer, my mom prepares vatral and vadagam which lasts the whole year. One vatral is the maa vatral made with raw mangoes. The mangoes are sliced and soaked in slaine water. Then they are sun dried. This process is repeated for 3-5 days until a salty crust is formed on the mangoes. Then they are completely dried and stored in airtight jars. The gravy made with this vatral tastes delicious. Even when I am typing this post, I am feeling hungry. Just serve this gravy with rice and papad and it will surely make you crave for more. This when prepared in manchatti ( pan made out of terracotta) tastes fantastic.

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Dhokar Dalna

For this month's Indian Cooking Challenge, Srivalli chose a Bengali delicacy from Sandeepa's Bong Mom Blog. I have made dhokar dalna previously for another monthly challenge. So I was in two minds to prepare it again. But still I went through Sandeepas's recipe. She has also listed some of the variations of dhokar dalna in the blogosphere. I read all the recipe links she has given and chose one which was very different. The recipe is from One Hot Stove. I liked the recipe as it had coconut, one of our favourite ingredients, in it. And it also didn't have potatoes. I though this would be perfect for my DH. I prepared it in the morning, had it for breakfast along with dosa and also had it for lunch with rice. Both combinations were tasty and I think it would taste good with roti too.The preparation of the lentil cakes/ dhokas is quite elaborate but the result was very good. Try it once and you will surely love it. 

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Wattakka Kalu Pol Maluwa

The very first time I heard of this curry was while watching Peter Kuruvita's Srilanka which airs on Fox Traveller. I usually watch all the cookery shows and in one episode, I saw this recipe. Seeing that the name starts with W, I at once noted it down for the Blogging Marathon A-Z theme. Wattakka is the yellow pumpkin and this is a curry with pumpkin and is coconut based. As Srilankan curry powder is not available here, I searched for the recipe and prepared the spice powder at home. It was very tasty and I served it with multigrain dosa for breakfast one day. I also served it for lunch with rice and both the combinations were good. The Srilankan curry powder was very flavourful and it gave a nice aroma to the dish.

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