Inji Curry | Puli Inji | Onam Sadya Recipes

Inji Curry or Puli Inji is a Kerala Sadya special, particularly made and served for Onam Sadya. Amma. I have a weird relationship with ginger (inji in Malayalam). It's weird I can't really explain it. Let me try though, stay with me ok?

So here's the thing. If I sniff a piece raw ginger, I feel nauseous. It's ironic because ginger is what people sniff when they feel nauseous. I can never eat a ginger candy. I hate biting into ginger pieces that are added to upma (I always grate and add it) and such. BUT. I love the flavour of it as long as it's not dominating the dish - like ginger chicken, or adding it to coconut chutney, or even fresh lime juice with ginger. There's an exception though (I told you this is weird) - Inji Curry. Inji curry is a condiment that's an essential part of an Onam sadya and the star ingredient is obviously. ginger. AND, I love it.

Amma makes inji curry and stores it in the refrigerator for weeks. She never restricts dishes to festivals, and makes them as she pleases, when she wants. The inji curry in the pictures here are made by her to send back with me during my last trip to Kottayam.

It's super easy to make Inji Curry so I hope the lack of step by step pictures doesn't deter you. Will try to update if and when I make this myself. Here's a list of Onam Sadya Recipes, just for you. Pulissery and Cabbage Thoran go really well with this Inji Curry.

Inji Curry / Puli Inji Recipe

Preparation time: 10 minutes
Cooking time: 20 minutes
Makes ~ 2 cups of Inji Curry

Ingredients:
1 cup of peeled and chopped fresh ginger
1/2 cup of thick tamarind juice (soak and squeeze juice of a lemon-ball sized ball of tamarind in 1/2 cup warm water)
1 tsp of red chilli powder (adjust to taste)
2 of green chillies
1/4 tsp of kaayam / asafoetida
2-3 tbsp of grated or powdered jaggery (adjust to taste)
1/4 cup of oil
1/4 tsp of mustard seeds
1/4 tsp of fenugreek seeds
Salt to taste
A few curry leaves

Instructions:

1. Heat the oil in a pan and fry the ginger until dark golden brown. It should be just short of burning but do not burn it, that would ruin the flavour completely. Before removing the fried ginger, throw in the green chillies, fry for a few seconds, and drain along with the ginger. Set aside to cool.

2. Once the ginger cools down, grind well and aside.

3. From the oil used to fry ginger, remove all except 3 tbsp oil. Heat it and add the mustard seeds. When they pop, add the fenugreek seeds. They will brown quickly so as soon as they do, throw in the curry leaves. Fry for a bit.

4. Next, add the ground ginger, asafoetida, red chilly powder, jaggery, tamarind, and salt. Mix well and simmer for about 10-12 mins until the oil starts to separate. If you've added too much water, this may take longer.

5. Remove from fire, cool, and store in a dry bottle in the refrigerator. We usually keep it for around a month, so you can too, provided you always remember to use a dry spoon to take some.

Notes:

- you can follow the same recipe for maa inji (mango ginger) too. It tastes equally, if not more, delicious
- you can adjust the sweetness level according to your personal taste. This quantity results in a perfect balance that suits us
- the spice level with these quantities tend to be on the slightly higher side so lower it if you have lesser tolerance
- the picture was taken of refrigerated Inji Curry. When you make it fresh, it will be a bit 'looser' than this
- even if you hate ginger, give this one a shot. Trust me on this :)

I know it's a bit early to post an onam recipe but I was going through some of the pictures and when I saw this, I was reminded of amma bottling it up for me and me keeping it for weeks and weeks, eating a little at a time, fearing it will be over soon. Made me smile, so felt I should share it with you immediately!

PS: This year I will be in Kottayam for Onam. Wheeee! :D

Vanilla Panna Cotta Recipe with Blueberry Coulis (Easy Panna Cotta Recipe)

You know what? I always thought panna cotta was this incredibly difficult thing to make. I even thought it would be something like doing the inverted dog position and staying there for 5 mins without moving. Yeah, yoga taught me how tough it is to stay in one position doing nothing.

And blueberry coulis. I couldn't even pronounce that 2 years back. Thanks to Masterchef Australia and watching 8-year olds whip up perfect berry coulis, I finally got around to making it myself.

This is a perfect dessert for entertaining for many reasons:

- it's easy. like really really easy to put together
- it needs to set in the refrigerator which means you can make it well in advance
- few people would dislike it. I mean, it's milk and cream and sugar.
- you can set it in individual portions and serve it as is which is not only pretty but also means you don't have to share dessert. That's my idea of perfect situation. Not sharing dessert
- this is an eggless dessert!
- did I mention it's easy?

You may also want to check out this no-bake mango cheesecake recipe, eggless oreo cheesecake recipe, and my 3-ingredient mango ice-cream recipe!

Eggless Vanilla Panna Cotta Recipe

Preparation time: 5 minutes
Cooking time: 10 minutes
Serves 2-3

Ingredients:
1 cup of cream (any kind that you can pour should do)
1 cup of milk (full fat works best)
1/3 cup of sugar, heaped
1 vanilla bean pod (or 1 tsp extract)
1 tsp of gelatine (or 2 tsp / 5gm agar agar or china grass)
2 tbsp of boiling water

How to make Panna Cotta:

1. Pour the cream and milk into a pan.

2. Scrape the caviar (seeds) out of the vanilla pod and add to the cream mixture. You can throw in the pod too, we'll remove it later. Vanilla pods are expensive so make the most of them!

3. Bring this mixture to a boil and add the sugar.

4. Mix well and simmer until the sugar dissolves. Remove from fire, strain, and set side.

5. Bring 2 tbsp water to a boil (I did this in the microwave) and add the gelatine or agar agar to it. Stir until combined with no traces.

6. Add the gelatine mixture to the strained cream mixture and mix well.

7. Pour this mixture into moulds, small cups, ramekins, a pudding dish, anything that takes your fancy. I used silicone cupcake moulds. Lightly oil (with any neutral oil) whatever mould you use, otherwise it will be tough to unmould later (if you plan to serve it that way).

8. Let it cool completely and refrigerate for at least 8 hours or overnight.

Now we need to make the Blueberry Coulis to serve it with. It's even easier than the panna cotta as if that was even possible!

Blueberry Coulis Recipe

Preparation time: 3 minutes
Cooking time: 2 minutes
Serves 2-3

Ingredients:
1 cup of blueberries
2 tsp of sugar
A few drops of lemon juice

How to make Berry Coulis:

1. Blend the blueberries and extract as much juice as possible. If using frozen blueberries and you don't have time to thaw it out, just rinse in tap water a couple times and use as normal.

2. Pass the blueberry puree through a sieve and discard the pieces of skin and tiny seeds. You should get smooth, thick blueberry juice when done.

3. Add the sugar to this and mix well...

... followed by the lime juice.

Now technically, you're supposed to simmer this mixture for 2-3 mins but I just gave it a whirl in the microwave for a minute on medium heat. Stir again to combine, cool, and refrigerate. You can make this immediately after the panna cotta and let them both sit together in the refrigerator. You know, get to know each other before they get served together or something.

We're done! Once the panna cotta has set, unmould by inserting a knife along the edges, placing a plate over the mould, and gently overturning it. I'd recommend not going through the hassle and just serving it in the dishes that you set them in. Either ways, looks and tastes delicious!

Sweet panna cotta perfectly balanced by the tangy blueberry coulis.

Notes (because I feel like I haven't talked enough!)

- You can make the coulis with pretty much any berries you can lay your hands on. You can also skip it and serve the panna cotta with warmed chocolate sauce.
- You can layer the panna cotta and coulis before setting. I really wish I'd done that actually. Layer the bottom of a shot glass with the blueberry coulis, pour some panna cotta mixture on top, layer again with the coulis, etc. That would be super pretty!
- The amount of sugar mentioned makes a mildly sweet panna cotta so add more if you want it sweeter.

How to prepare banana stem for cooking

Vazha Pindi, Vazhai Thandu, Banana Stem, whatever you call it, it's a pain to prepare before you cook. There, I said it. I postponed buying it for a long time because I just didn't feel it was worth it to spend this much time and end up with just one dish for two people. I would still need to make the rest of the meal!

But, BUT, it's not all bad. Banana steam is fibrous and nutritious so once in a while, maybe like once a year which is what I do, it's good to take the time out and do this and maybe eat it with leftover rasam and rice from the previous day.

How to Prepare Banana Stem for Cooking

The outer layer of the stem is usually removed when you buy it from vegetable stores. But, it's good to strip off one more layer before using, unless your banana stem is super fresh. Mine wasn't that fresh so I did that.

Cut the banana stem into thin discs, gently. As you do this, you will notice fibres refusing to let the discs go from the larger chunk. With your index finger, remove those fibres using a circular motion. Or however you please. Just remove them.

Side story: I remember my mom doing this. She would use the traditional aruva mona for chopping and use a swift motion to remove the fibres. At the end of it, she would have a thick, darkened, layer of banana stem fibre wound around her index finger.

Dunk these discs into a bowl of diluted buttermilk. I just added a spoon of yogurt to some water and used that. Once you are done cutting up the entire stem, you can chop these further depending on what you are making.

Need ideas for recipes with banana stem? Check out vazhai thandu poriyal or vazha pindi thoran. Another interesting, unique recipe coming soon!

Irvin's Live Seafood House, Upper Thompson Road, Singapore

It definitely doesn't seem that long but just over 2 years back, I had posted a review of Irvin's Seafood Place when they were in River Valley Road.

Well, a lot has changed since then. They have moved to Upper Thompson Road, changed their name slightly, set up a lovely more upscale restaurant space, and revamped their website and even their menu.

Steph from Irvin's invited TH and me for a meal so we headed down there last week for dinner. We got the most amazing welcome ever and TH was all "wow! what did you do to get treated like this?". Hehe.

We were greeted by a beautifully arranged buffet but we were there for food tasting from the ala carte menu, which btw, is quite extensive.

Irvin's is known for their very reasonably priced crab dishes, especially the salted egg crab which I tasted the last time I was there. So this time, I was recommended the salt and pepper crab that comes with a lot of fried garlic garnish.

Admittedly, I get a bit thrown off by the look of a crab on a plate but this was quite delicious. It's cut up nicely for our convenience so there wasn't any awkward moment with me and pliers and crab legs.

TH got a pretty nice plate of mixed vegetables cooked with mock meat. The vegetables were cooked perfectly and very fresh. He didn't care for the mock meat much but I thought it was very good.

We ordered one plate of Hong Kong noodles (vegetarian, with egg, you can request for no egg too) and one plate of steamed plain rice. The noodles was excellent. I would go back just for this.

But I don't need to because this right here is one of the tastiest plate of chips I've ever eaten. They are yam chips doused in salted egg sauce. It was absolutely delicious and very very addictive.

This here is butter chicken. Looks very different from the Indian butter chicken, right? Well, it tastes different too. There's a ton of curry leaves and the chicken is super crispy. However, it's very heavy. I couldn't eat more than 2 pieces and had to pack the rest for home. This is a perfect dish to order if you are large group and have enough to share with.

Salt and pepper tofu with mayo dip, another favourite for TH. He likes tofu and it is usually the only vegetarian item on the menu for him but Irvin's is super good about customizing dishes so this was a sure win, We brought back the rest and re-heated it the next day. Still tasted great!

Oh, our drinks. How could I forget that? The one on the right is the Eat Your Vegetables drink which is a mix of orange, beets, and spinach. I was skeptical so I ordered the melon juice on the left but the EYV was yum. You really can't taste the spinach and there's an undertone of beets, but mostly you just taste the orange juice. It was fresh and refreshing.

We were too full for dessert but definitely plan to try the fried ice cream on the menu. Irvin owns the Leban HK Cafe next door too so you can order from both the menus. In fact, our drinks were from Leban cafe next door.

Final verdict: I was impressed by Irvin's Seafood House the first time around and I will say that again. It's a great place to go in large groups, especially. In their new restaurant, they have private spaces for you to reserve and that leaves you and your group alone. On the day we went, there was a b'day party going on and I hear that corporates love booking the place too because the food is great, the portions are family-sized, the crab is cheap, and they have a space for themselves to crack confidential office jokes in!

Avg price per person - SGD 25-30
Ideal for groups of 4 or more

Irvin's Life Seafood House
No. 4 Jalan Leban, Upper Thompson Road
Singapore, 577548

Website

For reservations, enquiries, takeaways, deliveries and catering, call 6836-5020.

Disclaimer: This is an unpaid, unbiased review. Our meal was complimentary but there was no obligation to write about them, especially good things.