Thursday, November 4, 2010

Aloo kurma






This is another dish I learnt form my pedattha while I was a student in the US.During those days, making fried rice/vegetable biryani and a aloo kurma was like a treat specially during the weekends. We used to take turns to cook daily and typically, I cooked aloo kurma's during the weekends and I guess my roomates pretty much liked it. This goes well with vegetable fried rice and poori. You could do it just with Aloo alone or if you have the other vegetables, you could also add them to make it more nutritious. I normally add potatoes,beets,carrots,beans,soya chunks and peas. Lets see how to make this.

Ingredients:

2 large potatoes
1 beet root
2 carrots
1 cup beans
1 cup soy chunks
1/2 cup peas
1 large onion
2 green chillies
1 large tomato
bunch of Mint leaves (pudina)
bunch of cilantro
2 tbsp oil
1/2 cup curd
1 tsp mustard seeds
11/2 tbsp ginger garlic paste
2 tbsp cashews (Khaju)
1/2 tsp khus khus
1/2 tsp cinnamon
2 cloves
1 tsp sajeera

You could do the kurma with just the potatoes, all the other vegetables are optional

Method:

1.Firstly, lets make the Garam masala paste. For this lets take the following into a blender. 1/4 chopped onions,1/2 chopped tomato,1 tbsp ginger garlic paste, 2 chopped green chillies, 2 tbsp cashews, few cilantro leaves, 1 clove,1/2 tsp cinnamon,1/2 tsp khus khus,1 tsp sajeera and 1/4 cup curds. Add very little water and blend it into a thick paste.
Note: No need to add much water, as both tomatoes and curds have water in them, so be careful while adding water.

2.After making the garam masala, peel all the necessary vegetables, chop them and keep them aside.

3.Now, in a pressure cooker, add about 2 tbsp oil, mustard seeds and let then crack. Now add the remaining chopped onions and Mint leaves (Pudina). At this point, you sense an amazing smell, the combination of pudina and onions is the heart of the kurma. The more pudina you add, it tastes much better. Add the remaining 1/2 tsp ginger garlic paste and fry it for a while.

4. Now, add all the vegetables and fry them for some time. To this, add the remaining curd and the garam masala. Add a little water if needed and salt and mirchi powder accordingly and cook it for about 1-2 whistles.

5.Caution-Don't pressure cook it for long as all the vegetables would turn into a paste.

6.Lastly, here you could check the salt and mirchi powder and add if needed.

+ 1(IDEA)
You could substitute the curd with sour cream, this also brings a good flavor to the kurma.

2 comments:

Lakshmi said...

I make kurma using coconut instead of curds and adding a few more ingredients.. will post it in my blog !

ANU said...

Thank you for suggesting, Lakshmi....Yeah, My mom makes it with coconut milk as well, will prepare it that way sometime! Yeah, sure share me your recipe blog too, I would love to learn more in different styles.