On Tap For This Weekend: Lazy Belebath

The husband is a bit depressed or stressed this week, so I think some comfort food is in order for him. 

Thanks to Subbus Kitchen, I now have a very good visual of what dishes go with other dishes--love this visual of dish combinations, it really helps me out a lot, given I wasn't raised cooking (or eating!) South Indian food, and it's helpful to know which dishes complement others.  

My mother-in-law gave me a set of Cook & See cookbooks by S. Meenakshi Ammal years ago, and I cannot say I got much use out of them, as I don't believe there's something so necessary in the book: Menu suggestions. It's just straight recipes, no pictures, and the measurements are in metric--so prior to me getting a digital scale, this was a small obstacle for me as I never mastered metric conversions in school and today, I rely on either my digital scale for cooking--or a metric converter at work.

So my mind drifts to visiting with relatives this past October, and in the discussion I mentioned how I make bise belebath with leftover sambar. Maharajah's uncle quipped:

"That's not bise belebath--that's LAZY belebath!" 

Now, mind you, this uncle has always been so serious, and I don't get much opportunity to socialize with him (if I'm lucky, maybe 1-2 visits every two years or so), but this particular visit he really let his hair down. In India I've seen him only wearing dothis, and yet there he was (in Austin, not India!), wearing jeans and a "Super Dad" tee shirt, joking about "lazy belebath!" What a pleasure, and of course his joke just struck me EVEN MORE hilarious, as it was so unexpected. It's nice when I finally meet the "real" person, after being married into this family for many years now.

So! Rather than go to the trouble of typing out my recipe or formula, I'm just going to share this particular recipe from Cooking With Meena, as it PERFECTION, and is QUITE nearly identical to the method I use. Perhaps I'll share the link, and then herein on my blog, I'll merely identify whatever additions/"tweaks" of mine. 

Like the uncle said, "Lazy belebath," well, today I'm feeling very lazy (or is it tired/exhausted?).

ADDITIONS/TWEAKS:

I dry roast the masala, omitting 2 chiles (as my sambar is usually firey enough--perhaps even too firey for the Maharajah!).

I then dry roast the coconut, with: 1 tsp white Poppy Seeds, 1T almond meal and 1T ground cashew meal (from Trader Joes), and set this aside. 

Optional: I have 1/2 a bag of frozen pearl onions (also from Trader Joes!) on hand, which might be put to good use!

I use an electric pressure cooker--yes, even for this dish! It goes so quick, plus I can fry the tadka directly in the cooker, add the sambar and rice, and fresh roasted/ground powder for the sambar sadam, and pressure cook it all together for five minutes.

I then decide to "finish" the dish in the manner the French do, by putting the butter (or in this case, the fresh made ghee) in towards the end.  

As I said before, since he seems a bit "blue," I will probably make a small batch of pineapple rasam and thayir sadam to accompany, with possibly vendakai fry, too.

Luckily for me (and yes, this is going to sound crazy), I stowed a quart of sambar in the freezer here at work (don't look at me crazy--I always have storage issues in my freezer at home, and one day I had the brilliant idea to stow stuff at work. I figured if anyone complained, that would be the end of this storage solution. And so far no one has complained, and here we are).

It's 10:43 a.m. on Friday, and I've removed the sambar from the freezer (and it'll sit on my desk all day, thawing out), so I'm "halfway there" to the bise belebath.  

I just hope it cheers him up!

My Streamlined Pulicutchal Recipe

Tamarind Measurement: Enough shelled, fresh tamarind where it is roughly the size of a lemon if you mush it all together in your hand (before soaking)
Roughly 2 cups boiled water

Shell tamarind and remove stringy membrane. Soak in boiling hot water and leave it alone until it cools.

In a dry pan, dry roast then set aside to cool:
1 T. Urad
2 tsp. Split channa dhal
1 T. Coriander seed
½ tsp Fenugreek seed
Dry red chiles (to taste--if you like hotter, add more; if you like less heat, just add 1-2)

In a separate pan, dry roast 1 T. sesame seed. Do this separately as the sesame seeds might burn before everything else is done being toasted.

Once tamarind and water have cooled sufficiently, start removing the seeds and the membrane around the seeds, keeping the fruit pulp in the water.

Put the tamarind pulp and water in blender and add the toasted dhals and seeds you dry roasted in the blender, and grind well. Set aside.

Tadka :
2 T. Gingelly oil
1 tsp black mustard seeds
3 sprigs (approx 12 leaves) curry leaf
1 fresh green chile, minced fine

Fry up mustard seeds until they start to splutter and sizzle. Add remainder of tadka ingredients. Fry up until the curry leaves start to get fried and brittle (but not burnt). Add 1/8 tsp (or a few dashes) of Hing (asafatoeida).

Pour blended tamarind pulp mixture into pan. Bring to a boil. Stir well. Add:

½ tsp Turmeric powder
2 tsp Grated Jaggery
Salt - To Taste

Boil well. Stir well. Ensure it does not scorch. Contents need to cook down until thick. Not like a paste, but not like a thin syrup either.

In separate pan, put 1-2 tsp gingelly or peanut oil and fry up (a minimum of) 3 T. peanuts. (I love, love, love peanuts in tamarind rice!)

Taste. Adjust salt if it needs more salt. If it needs more fire, add a pinch or two of red chile pepper. If not tangy enough, adjust with a bit of fresh lemon juice (to taste). Toss in peanuts. Stir well. Let cool before put into clean glass container.

Can keep well in refrigerator for a while.

Good for use as a pickle w/curd rice, and great way to make puliyogare in an instant.