This is a good time to talk about my mom-in-law and her blog. Yep, she has started blogging over at Suvaikka Suvaikka in tamil, so if you can read tamil, hop on over. She would love to hear from you.
Like all mothers, she cooks amazing food but what I particularly find fascinating with her cooking is, all her dishes are super quick and easy ones. They are simple, mostly with only 5-6 ingredients and get done in less than half an hour each, at the most. In fact, when I visit my in laws, most of MIL's cooking is done by the time I wake up (which I should admit is not very early :D) and usually there's only some rasam boiling in the eeya chombu, a unique tamil brahmin practice of making rasam in pots that are alloys of many metals including lead. Although there are many schools of thought regarding the harmful effects of lead in food, she continues to use it for rasam. The taste difference is said to be significant if you don't use an eeya chombu for your rasam!
This tomato rasam recipe (thakkali rasam recipe) uses no tamarind since the required sourness is from the tomatoes that we cook, blend, and make the tomato rasam with.
One of my favourite rasams is tomato juice rasam. It uses no tamarind, and since my FIL's mom doesn't take onion or garlic, this version doesn't contain garlic either. So that makes this a very tasty and easy recipe that can either be taken like soup, or poured on steaming white rice for a nice and hearty lunch.
Tomato Juice Rasam Recipe
Source: Mom-in-law
Serves 4 to 6
Ingredients:
5-6 ripe tomatoes
1/2 cup cooked, mashed toor dal
1 heaping teaspoon rasam / sambar powder
A generous pinch of hing / asafoetida / perungaayam
A pinch of turmeric
1/2 tsp jeera / cumin seeds pounded in a pestle and mortar or coarsely ground
1/4 tsp freshly cracked black pepper
Salt to taste
How Its Made:
0. Pressure cook the dal with enough water until soft and mushy. Mash further with a potato masher to remove any lumps. Set aside.
1. Chop the tomatoes in small pieces, place in the eeya chombu, and add enough water to cover it by an inch.
2. Add turmeric, sambar powder, hing, and salt and boil for about 15-20 mins until the tomatoes turn soft. Then, take out the chunky pieces and blend / grind to a smooth paste and return it to the rest of the cooked tomato mixture along with the dal. Add about 1 to 2 cups more water until rasam reaches the right consistency (not too watery but more soup-like). Add pepper and jeera powder, bring to boil and remove from fire.
3. Garnish with chopped coriander leaves (or you can add curry leaves when you add dal).
4. Note that my MIL does not temper this rasam but if you'd like to, heat some ghee / oil in a small pan, add mustard seeds and they pop, dunk into the rasam at the final stage.
Like all mothers, she cooks amazing food but what I particularly find fascinating with her cooking is, all her dishes are super quick and easy ones. They are simple, mostly with only 5-6 ingredients and get done in less than half an hour each, at the most. In fact, when I visit my in laws, most of MIL's cooking is done by the time I wake up (which I should admit is not very early :D) and usually there's only some rasam boiling in the eeya chombu, a unique tamil brahmin practice of making rasam in pots that are alloys of many metals including lead. Although there are many schools of thought regarding the harmful effects of lead in food, she continues to use it for rasam. The taste difference is said to be significant if you don't use an eeya chombu for your rasam!
This tomato rasam recipe (thakkali rasam recipe) uses no tamarind since the required sourness is from the tomatoes that we cook, blend, and make the tomato rasam with.
One of my favourite rasams is tomato juice rasam. It uses no tamarind, and since my FIL's mom doesn't take onion or garlic, this version doesn't contain garlic either. So that makes this a very tasty and easy recipe that can either be taken like soup, or poured on steaming white rice for a nice and hearty lunch.
Black granite kitchen top in my MIL's kitchen, works so well for food photos!
Tomato Juice Rasam Recipe
Source: Mom-in-law
Serves 4 to 6
Ingredients:
5-6 ripe tomatoes
1/2 cup cooked, mashed toor dal
1 heaping teaspoon rasam / sambar powder
A generous pinch of hing / asafoetida / perungaayam
A pinch of turmeric
1/2 tsp jeera / cumin seeds pounded in a pestle and mortar or coarsely ground
1/4 tsp freshly cracked black pepper
Salt to taste
How Its Made:
0. Pressure cook the dal with enough water until soft and mushy. Mash further with a potato masher to remove any lumps. Set aside.
1. Chop the tomatoes in small pieces, place in the eeya chombu, and add enough water to cover it by an inch.
2. Add turmeric, sambar powder, hing, and salt and boil for about 15-20 mins until the tomatoes turn soft. Then, take out the chunky pieces and blend / grind to a smooth paste and return it to the rest of the cooked tomato mixture along with the dal. Add about 1 to 2 cups more water until rasam reaches the right consistency (not too watery but more soup-like). Add pepper and jeera powder, bring to boil and remove from fire.
3. Garnish with chopped coriander leaves (or you can add curry leaves when you add dal).
4. Note that my MIL does not temper this rasam but if you'd like to, heat some ghee / oil in a small pan, add mustard seeds and they pop, dunk into the rasam at the final stage.
I must add this memory I have associated with the pictures of the tomato juice rasam above. This was made by amma when I was visiting them this June. I was complaining about the lack of a good spot to take the final pics (the light in the kitchen was bad by afternoon). The balconies had harsh direct sunlight and I explained to appa (my father in law) that that was not ideal. He immediately went and got a sheer white cloth and held it up beside the small table in the bedroom balcony while I clicked a few pictures. Thanks for the support appa, otherwise this juice rasam would've never shown up here :)
No comments:
Post a Comment