Sambar

Sambar is very famous South Indian Recipe. This is a good combination for most of the Tiffins like Idli, Dosa, Pesarattu and also for Rice. There are lot of ways that you can do Sambar. One of the way is explained below. I used home-made Sambar Powder. But if you dont have any then use MTR, it tastes good. I dont have much experiance with other powders so I cannot comment on it. In the near future I shall publish how to do the sambar powder at home. It is pretty simple too. Now lets turn on to recipe.

Ingredients
Toor Dal - 1/2 Cup
Bottle Gourd - 1/4 Cup (Chopped length-wise)
Carrots - 1/4 Cup
Raddish - 1/4 Cup
Red Onions - 1/4 Cup (Can use normal onions chopped length-wise)
Chinese Okra - 1/4 Cup
Tomato - 1/2 piece (Optional)
Tamarind - small piece (Soaked in Water)
Oil - 4-5 Table Spoons
Mustard seeds - 1/2 Table Spoon
Cumin seeds - 1/2 Table Spoon
Asafoetida - a pinch
Sambar Powder - 1-2 Table Spoons
Turmeric - 1/2 Table Spoon
Chilli Powder - 1 Table Spoon
Coconut - Grated (4 Table Spoons)
Curry Leaves
Coriander
Salt to taste

Method of Preparation
1. Soak tamarind in water for about 15-30 minutes.

2. Cook dal and vegetables(Raddish, Carrot, bottle gourd) in the rice cooker. Cook until 3 whistles or until toor dal is done.



3. Take a deep pan and add oil to it. Let the oil get heated.

4. Add mustard seeds, cumin seeds, Asafoetida, Curry leaves and then Onions.
Note: If you wish to add ginger garlic paste then add it at this point.

5. let the onions turn brown or fry for few minutes. Then add Chinese Okra. Let the above cook for 2-3 minutes



6. Now add the cooked dal and vegetables to above.

7. Add Turmeric, Chilli Powder, Sambar Powder, Salt and cook for 2 minutes.

8. Sqeeze the pulp of tamarind in water, so that we can tamarind juice. Add this tamarind juice to the above. If you want it to be more liquid, you can add water also.

9. Cook until it comes to boil. Before removing from flame, add grated coconut and coriander. Cook for a minute and remove from flame. Serve with anything you like.

Rice with Sambar, Beans Curry and Mint Chutney is our dinner yesterday.



Preparation Time:10-15 minutes(Excluding from cooking toor dal)
Category: Main Coarse(Liquid)

Terminology:
Toor dal - Kandi Pappu(Telugu)
Bottle Gourd - Sorakaya(Telugu), Kaddu(Hindi)
Chinese Okra - Bendakaya(Telugu), Bhendi(Hindi)
Raddish - Mullangi(Telugu), Muli(Hindi)
Asafoetida - Ingu(Telugu)
Cauliflower - Gobi(Telugu), Phool Gobi(Hindi)


Variation:
1. Maharastrian people add cauliflower also in Sambar. It tastes good too. :)

2. Can add Tamarind paste if Tamarind is not available.

3. All the vegetables can be optional. You can add most of the vegetables in the sambar or can add only onions and make it too.