LAAL RAJMA NI DAAR

My recipe s for Parsi cuisine continues and in that list here comes a delicious recipe from one of our blogger friend and a great cook and also this month’s host forRCI – Parsi cuisine. Yes Meera of Enjoy Indian Food hats off to her and her blog is just a mirror to Indian food I can say. This Rajma recipe is from meera yesterday I was browsing her blog and got so many wonderful recipes and bookmarked some of them at that time I saw some mouthwatering Parsi recipes in her blog and I tried it for yesterday’s lunch. The recipe came out so very well and we enjoyed it with rumali roti and geera rice (cumin rice). Thank you so much for the wonderful recipe Meera. 

Let's check the recipe....

                                                                          

CHECK OUT FOR THE ORIGINAL RECIPE HERE

INGREDIENTS:---

Rajma(Red Kidney Beans) – 2 ½ cup s (soaked and cooked)

Coconut milk – ¾ cup

Jiggery – 1 tab sp

Salt to taste (3/4 tea sp)

Dhansak masala – 1 tea sp (if you don’t have dhansak masala then take ½ tea sp kitchen king masala and ½ tea sp pav bhaji masala. If you want to make dhansak masala check my recipe here.)

Coriander and cumin powder – ¼ tea sp

Red chilli powder --- ¼ tea sp

FOR TEMPERING:-----

Oil – 2 tab sp

Onion --- 1 medium chopped

Garlic --- 3 cloves minced

Turmeric powder – ¼ tea sp

Red chili – 1 halved

Tomato - 1 medium chopped

Fresh coriander leaves --- 1 tab sp chopped

METHOD:----

Take dry rajma soak them in water for overnight and cook in a pressure cooker and leave a side.

Now heat oil in a pan add halved red chili ,turmeric powder, chopped onion, minced garlic and fry till onion become soft.

Then add chopped tomatoes and cook for 5 min. and add masala powders rajma, salt to taste, jiggery and mix well to coat masala all over the beans.

Now add coconut milk and bring to a gentle boil and remove from the heat

Garnish with chopped coriander leaves.

Serve hot with plain rice, jeera rice, brown rice or even with roti

We enjoyed it with Rumali roti.

Recipe source from Meera of enjoy IndianFood

PARSI BROWN RICE

Today also one more recipe from Parsi cuisine in my kitchen. parsi brown rice, like all ather Indians parsis also use rice in their mid day meal a lot .Like Parsi pilau, Khichri, Sabji polo,Adas polo, Beghali polo, Kateh and Brown rice and many more. I wanted to try a rice recipe traditionally parsis serve with Dhansak . So first comes the combination for dhansak is Brown rice. A very simple rice recipe and a perfect combination for Dhansak and Kachumbar. Here I go with the recipe.

  INGREDIENTS FOR BROWN RICE:---------

Basmati rice – 2 cups

Sugar – ½ tea sp

Black pepper corns – 5 corns

Cloves – 4 no.

Bay leaf – 1

Cinnamon – 1 inch piece

Water – 4 cups

Butter – 2 tab sp

                                                                     

METHOD:--

Wash and drain water from rice in a sieve and leave a side.

1. Now heat butter in a pan and add cloves, cinnamon,bayleaf, pepper corns let them fry till they release their aroma then add sugar and allow to caramelize(let sugar turn in to dark brown color).
2. Add rice to this and fry foe 2 min.mix in between. In the same time heat 4 cups water
3. Then add this 4 cups hot water to rice mix well and bring to a full boil, reduce the flame and cook till almost water dries up. This will take 15 – 20 min.
4. To check if rice is cooked pick up a few grains of rice and press between your thumb and index finger the rice should feel frim but mash fully. If rice is not mashed or you feel hard then add 4 tab sp s more water on top of the rice cover and cook for few more min.
5. Turn off the heat and let it rest for 5 min. then serve with Dhansak and Kachumbar

DHANSAK - A PARSI DELICACY

Parsi cuisine is a mix of vegetarian Gujarati cuisine and non-vegetarian Iranian cuisine.Parsi dishes are famous for their deliciously blended with the flavor s of Gujarati and Irani cuisine. So that the cuisine is very nearby to our Indian cuisine.Dasicaly Parsis like to have their lunch with rice and lentil s and a curry which is made by vegetables and coconut and Kachubar (a salad made with chopped onions and cucumber. Lentils, potatoes, brinjals (Aubergine), carrot and tomatoes are widely used in vegetarian Parsi cuisine; in that list Dhansak is one of the very popular dishes in Parsi cuisine. Dhansak is mainly made with lentils and lots of vegetables and greens in Parsi dhan means lentils sak means vegetables and greens. traditionally dhansak is made with seven verity of lentils, but here I have only 5 verity of lentils so I used only 5 lentils and coming to the vegetables I used is brinjal, carrot, one small potato and a small cup of chopped spinach (you can use fenugreek leaves also in this recipe with spinach).And dhansak is made with chicken and mutton also and its very popular too. Here I go with the recipe for DHANSAK……….

Lentils I used in Dhansak…………….

Toor dal – Yellow pigeon peas – Kandi pappu ---- ¼ cup

Masoor dal – Red lentils – Masoor pappu ---- ¼ cup

Moong dal – split mung bean – pesara pappu --- ¼ cup

Urad dal – Black gram – minappappu --- ¼ cup

Channa dal – split chick peas – senaga pappu – ¼ cup

Vegetables I used in Dhansak….

Brinjal – 1 small (what we use for bingan bhartha) cut in to 1 inch cubes

Carrot – 1 cut in to 1’’ cubes

Potato – 1 small cut in to1’’ cubes

Spinach – 1 bunch chopped (for this recipe you can use 1 cup chopped)

Onion – 1 big sliced

Tomato -1 cup chopped seeds removed

Other ingredients…………

Freshly grated coconut – 1 tab sp ground in to a smooth paste or you can use ¼ cup of coconut milk also

Ginger garlic paste – 1 tab sp

For dhansak masala powder...

Red chilies – 2

Cinamon – ½ inch piece

Black pepper – 10 no.

Bay leaves – 2

Nutmeg – a small piece (you can take a ¼ piece of medium sized nutmeg)

Cloves – 8

Fenugreek seeds – 1 tea sp

Sesame seeds – 1 teasp

Mace – ¼ inch piece

Cumin seeds – 1 tab sp

Coriander seeds – 1 tab sp

Dry roast all above in gredients in a fry pan one at a time and grind in to a fine powder in a coffee grinder or mixee and store it in an airtight container. This will stay fresh for one week. You can use this powder as Garam masal in any non-vegetarian dish.

Instead of making this powder you can use garam masala in this recipe but freshly ground masala gives a great aroma to the dish.

For garnishing…….

Chopped coriander leaves – ½ cup.

Method ……

Mix all lentils in a bowl wash well and add 1 cup of water and soak for half an hour.

After ½ hour add ½ more cup water and carrot and potato pieces to lentils and cook till they become soft and mash. Mash lentils well.

You can cook lentils in a pressure cooker for 2 whistles

Now in a pan add onion slices, chopped tomato, chopped spinach and brinjal pieces stir for a while and cook till vegetables become soft.

When the vegetables become soft switch off the heat and mash the vegetables little bit (traditionally they mash vegetables in to a fine past but I didn’t mash them in to a paste. I just mash them with a spoon a little bit)

Now heat a other pan add cooked lentils then add ginger garlic paste(traditionally parsis don’t use oil in Dhansak but if want you can use 1 tab sp of oil here and season with 1 tea sp cumin seeds and then add lentil mixture) stir well and let it cook for 5 min. in a low flame. Stir in between.

After 5 min. add cooked vegetables and spinach, coconut paste or coconut milk stir well and cook for 5 more min .Now you can see the mixture reduced and become like a paste.

Now add dhansak masala mix well to blend and salt to taste, 1cup water and cook in a very low flame for ½ hour. Here if you want to add chicken or meat cook it and add with its stock mix well and let it cook for ½ hour mix in between. If the mixture is very thick then add ½ cup more water mix well bring to a boil and remove from the heat. Garnish with chopped coriander leaves.

Serve Dhansak with BROWN RICE and KACHUBAR.

THIS DHANSAK IS ON THE WAY TO RCI-PARSI AT MEERA S ENJOY INDIAN FOOD EVENT BY LAKSHMI