MANATHAKKAALI VATRAL KUZHAMBU

Vatral kuzhamvu can be prepared with either chili and coriander powder or sambar powder. In chetti nadu and Brahmin cooking, only sambar powder is used. But in most of the houses in south, chilli powder and coriander powders are used. In some places around Mayuram, Chidhambaram and Cuddalore area, they use ‘kuzhambu podi’ for all the kuzhambu varieties. It is prepared with red chillies, coriander seeds, thuar dal, Bengal gram and a little quantities of other spices like fennel seeds, cumin seeds etc. Here I am posting a simple version of vatral kuzhambu using sambar powder. It tastes divinely with hot rice and ghee!

மணத்தக்காளி வற்றல் குழம்பு

Ingredients:

Manathakkali vatral- quarter cup
Gingelly oil- 2 tbsp+ 1 tsp
Mustard seeds- half sp
Cumin seeds- half sp
Fenugreek seeds- half sp
Asafetida- half sp
Curry leaves- 1 arc
Bengal gram- 2 tbsp
Red chillies-5
Turmeric powder- half sp
Sambar powder- 11/2 tsp
Tamarind- a big lime size
Salt to taste

Procedure:

Soak the tamarind in warm water for half an hour and extract its juice.
Heat a pan and pour the 2 tbsp of gingelly oil.
Add the mustard seeds and when they splutter add the cumin seeds and fenugreek seeds.
When they start to turn golden brown add the Bengal gram, red chillies and the manathakkali vatral along with the curry leaves and asafetida powder.
Fry them for a few minutes.
Add the tamarind juice with the sambar powder and salt.
Le it boil for a few minutes.
When the kuzhambu is thickened, pour the remaining oil.
Keep it on slow fire for 2 minutes.
Serve this with hot rice, melted ghee, pappads and chips!

Baris- dried lentil dumplings - ICC July Challenge

The Sun God, tested my patience a lot today!!!! Phew!!!! Partly my Laziness too. Attempted to do the Baris only day before yesterday!!! :) :). So, all these tests were on my Invitation!!!! :) But anyways, the Baris were worth these sothanai's!!! They tasted damn yummy as raw batter (sure, all of you wud have tasted it!!!), now when all dried, i m waiting to taste them in some curry!!!
My Mother feels that this Baris are same like the Karuvadam, we make minus the fermenting and other extra spices we add. We just Grind the batter, add Ash-gourd and salt. Both are Sun-dried, so it is normally made during those Extra-Sun Months Mar-Apr-May!!!! Though we have good sun even now, but this isnt enough for the baris to bone-dry, these comments are also from my Amma Darling!!!!
Now Coming to the recipe, I have followed a mix of Mamta' recipe and Sharmila's Recipe!!!
Lentil Grinding and Soaking was done according to Mamta's Recipe, wheras the spice mix i took it from Sharmila's.
I m giving you the measurements, which i followed.

Ingredients
1/2 cup Urad dal
1/2 cup grated Ash-gourd
1/2 tsp Methi seeds
2 Green Chillies
1 red Chilli
1 tsp Pepper
1 tsp Cumin
2 sprigs Curry leaves
A small piece of ginger
Hing a pinch
Salt to taste

Method

I Grinded the urad dal coaresely, then soaked in enough water for the dal to immerse, 1/2 inch above the dal. Added hing and left the dal overnight to ferment. Next day morning, grind Chillies, Pepper, Cumin, Curry Leaves and ginger all together and mix with the Dal mixture. Squeeze out the extra water from ash-gourd add it to the dal mixture. Mix Well. It has to be stiff, dropping consistency. If you drop a blob of mixture in a bowl of water, it should float. 

Grease Two Flat plates with little oil and Place small blobs on the plate. Pray Sun God for his Mercy and Sun-dry them. Mine is 90% Done, But need to dry some more tomorrow morning with the mercy of Mr.Sun.
I didnt want to miss this Month'a ICC, so i sun-dried yesterday and air-dried today :( (since it was cloudy) and took the pics jus now @ 11:30 PM and posting it!!!! Sorry Valli, Amma veedu, Sorgam + Somberithanam, Aug 27th reaching my place, so will come be inline for next challenge!!!! :)

It was a Good Experience making these baris, now i know how much pain both my appa and amma take to make Vadam  of all sorts for us!!! Even now i have Dabba full of these yummies!!!

Energy Audit Video

This is a great adjunct to my previous post Comments on Green (Kitchen) Remodeling.

We are seeing and experiencing more and more weather related disasters around the world and here in the U.S. The people of Haiti, or Pakistan, or Russia, would not dispute that we are in a climate crisis. We are also seeing problems with weather related disaster here at home: Flooding in Iowa; Hurricane Katrina. This is not going to get easier unless we all do something to help our planet.

Our homes here in the U.S. use 20% of our total energy consumption. TWICE as much as cars (10%). 40% of the energy we use to heat and cool our homes is wasted, by leaky ductwork, poor insulation, all kinds of small leaks that add up to a lot of $$$ and carbon dioxide going into our atmosphere.

By doing an audit and sealing last year on our home, before buying a new furnace and ductwork, we achieved a 48% reduction in our heating energy use. That's pretty amazing considering that we opted to do only part of the prescriptive measures advised. We were also able to buy a smaller furnace than we had been told by other companies that we needed. Even better is the savings month in and month out in windy, foggy, South San Francisco. Best of all is that we are truly comfortable in our home that was once drafty and cold.

Getting a home energy audit BEFORE you plan any remodeling is just good sense. It's easy to incorporate the prescriptive changes into your remodeling plans when you have a roadmap, and a home energy audit gives you the roadmap.

Watch the following video to learn how it works. You'll save lots of energy dollars and help save our planet in the bargain.

Peggy


Green Footprint: Home Performance 101 from Foster City TV on Vimeo.