ISHTOO

Dish of the Day- Ishtoo
Place- Kerala

Ishtoo is Kerala's traditional stew made with potatoes swimming in coconut milk. Mallu cuisine uses a lot of coconut and this is a classic example of a coconut-laden Malayali dish.

As to how its name came about, I have a theory. When they first tasted it, Britishers probably called it stew and Indians couldn't pronounce it very well so the pronounciation of 'stew' was tortured by Keralites until it agreed to be called 'ishtoo'! But this is just conjecture on my part- please don't go around quoting my theory. Although on second thought, I would love it if someone quoted me..;)

The first time I ate ishtoo was at a friend's place. Poppu calls us for an aunthentic, traditional home-cooked South Indian meal every Onam and I personally await it more than my own harvest festival! The best part about it is we get to eat on banana leaves and we have to fold it up and keep our steel tumbler on the leaf once we're done. There's just some charm to these customs which makes me proud that I'm a South Indian.

I'm dedicating this post to Mini aunty who took time out to give me this recipe. She makes the world's best fish curry, and some day she'll teach me how to..:)

How to Cook it Up:- (serves 4 people)


Potatoes..............4 to 5 medium potatoes, peeled & cubed
Onions..................1 medium coarsely chopped
Ginger..................1 inch piece
Green chillies.....6 to 7
Curry leaves.......2 stems
Coconut oil...........1 tsp
Coconut milk.......1 cup of the thick milk (first extract) and  3 cups of the thin milk (second and third extract)
Salt to taste


Directions:-

* These days, you get the dried and liquid variants of coconut milk in the market. For each cup of thick milk, you can dilute it with one cup of water and use it as thin milk. If you want to do things the old-fashioned way (and I would suggest you do that because the flavour gets enhanced in a way I can't explain), here goes.

1) Grate 2 coconuts. Sprinkle some warm water over it and knead it slightly to squeeze out the milk. Strain it using a muslin cloth and keep it aside. This is the first extract or the thick milk.

2) Repeat the kneading, squeezing, straining procedure to get the second and third extracts.

Now back to the ishtoo.

1) Boil the potatoes, onions, ginger and green chillies in the thin coconut milk and keep stirring it continuously because it has a tendency to crack.
2) Then lower the flame to a simmer and leave it like that until the potatoes get cooked.
3) Add salt and the thick coconut milk to it and let it cook for some time- but take it off the flame before it starts to boil.
4) Sink in the curry leaves and drizzle it with coconut oil.


Ishtoo HAS to be eaten with Vellayappam- a Kerala version of the Tamilnadu dosa. If not, it goes really well with hot rice too.

VELLAYAPPAM

Dish of the Day- Vellayappam
Place- Kerala

This post is dedicated to all the dosa lovers who were disppointed that my blog would have nothing to do with their favourite South Indian snack.

Vellayappam is the Kerala variant of a traditional dosa that we all are so familiar with. It's a crisp rice dosa- like item which is fried in a shallow wok: very different from the flat pan of the dosa.

Appam/ aapam (the pronunciation varies depending on the region) is a South indian pancake that has many different types, depending on what stuffing goes into it or how it served.

If the appam is made out of curly spirals of rice noodles, it's called idiyappam (Kerala)
When mashed plantains are put into the batter, it becomes unni appam. (Kerala)
With a rawa filling, it is sujiappam. (Andhra Pradesh)
Suppose the appam is made on a stone griddle, it has the name kallappam. (Tamilnadu)

Like I've said in the Ishtoo recipe, Vellayappam tastes best when dipped in Ishtoo.
Some non- vegetarians like substituting the ishtoo with fish/ mutton curry.

How to Cook it Up:-

Rice.....................................2 cups washed n soaked in water for 4 to 5 hrs
Fresh grated coconut.....1 cup
Cooked rice ......................1/4 cup
Yeast..................................1/2
Sugar..................................2 tsps
Salt to taste
Oil


* The batter should not be too runny, so that the dosas come out crisp.
Directions:-


1) Grind the raw rice, coconut and cooked rice to a batter. 
2) Take a cup of warm water and add sugar and yeast to it. When the yeast begins to activate, pour this into the batter.
3) Let the batter with the yeast in it rest for about 3-4 hours in a warm place so that it can ferment.
4) Once the dough is fermented, it would've risen to twice the quantity. Stir it well.
5) Then heat the shallow wok to make the vellayappam. Grease the pan with a cloth dipped in oil.
6) Pour a ladleful of batter into the centre and holding the wok from both the sides, tilt it so that the batter gets smeared all over the wok.
7) Let it cook on low heat for a few minutes and once it's done, scrape it off with the a dosa pick.


Vellayapam is soft in the centre and papery thin and crisp on the sides. 

MULAKA PACHADI

Dish of the Day- Mulaka Pachadi

Place- Northern Kerala

This is the Malayali version of what I've essentially grown up calling Pulimolangha Chutney. It's spicy, it's tangy and it has a lot of punch! 


It has that chatpata taste which leaves you tingling in the mouth. That feeling is what I love the most about Mulaka Pachadi. 


Mulaka Pachadi is the authentic chutney from Malabar and like most delicacies, it derives its name from the ingredients that go into it. Mulaka means chilli in Malayalam and pachadi is another word for chutney so the name of this dish very simply is 'chilli chutney' (Whoa! I love how that sounds)


The chillies make the pachadi very hot which is why we use jaggery and tamarind in it for that sweet-sour taste. It's probably starting to sound like Maggi Hot n Sweet, but that sauce is light years away from being as mouth-wateringly delicious as mulaka pachadi- especially the one that my mom makes.:)


*Be careful not to overdo the chillies while sauteing them, because otherwise they lose their colour.


How to Cook it Up:-

Long Green chillies…………….……...........5-6

Lemon sized ball of tamarind…..........1

Jaggery……………………………................….1/4 cup

Sesame oil or any other cooking oil..2 tbsps

Mustard seeds………………………..........…1 tsp

Curry leaves……………………............………one stem

Dried red chillies……………………........….2-3

Roasted sesame seeds………………........1/2 tsp

Mustard seeds for tadka………...1/4 tsp

Directions:-
1) Soak the tamarind in warm water for about 30 minutes.
2) Saute the green chillies in 1 tbsp oil. Keep this aside.
3) Squeeze the pulp out of the tamarind and put this pulp into some water and let it boil for about a minute.
4) Add the green chillies to this and let it simmer for about ten minutes.
5) Add the jaggery and let it melt into the tamarind. Add some salt to taste.
6) Powder the sesame seeds and mustard seeds and blend this into the tamarind and jaggery and tamarind mixture.
7) Stir it well and then take it off the flame.
8) Heat one tbsp of oil and put the red chillies, curry leaves and mustard seeds into it for the tadka.
9) When it splutters, add it to the chutney and let it cool before you serve.

Mulaka pachadi tastes best with kozhakattai- a Ganpati favourite! For the kozhakattai recipe, stay tuned..:)

PAZHAMPURI

Dish of the Day- Pazhampuri

Place- Kerala.

The first thing I tasted in Kerala was Pazhampuri so this dish holds special memories for me. 

When I told my Mallu friend that we were going to Kerala for our Industrial visit, the first thing he told me to do was to get off at a random station and order Pazhampuri. I didn’t even know what that was but it sounded exciting and because even has a passion for food like me, I trusted him.

I waited excitedly for us to get to the first station in Kerala so that I could start looking for fresh, hot pazhampuri.  So when the train pulls into Thirur, I hop out in search of it.

I was insanely excited on seeing vendors with big vats of oil in front of them, insisting that theirs is ‘fresh’; but once you pop one into your mouth, you realize that their definition of fresh ranges from three days to a week old! Still, this fried sweet dish that is the specialty of Mallu street food, appealed to me and Malavika. (We’re the only two South Indians in class!)

For those of you who are clueless about what Pazhampuri is, they’re banana fritters, which are invariably fried in coconut oil since Kerala is famous for its coconut trees and pretty much everything there is cooked in coconut oil. 'Pazham' means fruit and in this case, it's banana because ;like coconut, banans are also readily available in God's Own Country.

* ‘zh’ in Tamil and Malayalam is pronounced as ‘r’ while rolling your tongue and touching it to the roof of your mouth. So this is in fact, “pa- rum- puri”. :)

How to Cook it Up:-

Ripe Bananas……….……………………4

All purpose flour/ Maida……………1 cup

Fine rice flour …………………………...2 tbsp

Turmeric powder ……………………...a pinch

Baking soda………………………………1/8 tsp

Sugar………………………………………..1 tsp

Salt…………………………………………..1/4 tsp

Coconut Oil……………………………………………for frying

Directions:- 

1)Cut each banana lengthwise and then breadthwise into 4 pieces.

2)  Mix the maida, turmeric powder, rice flour, sugar, salt and baking soda with a little water to make a batter with a consistency that’s not too thick and not too thin.

3) Heat oil in a kadhai and dip each banana piece into batter before slowly putting it into the oil to fry.

4) Turn the heat down to medium and fry all the pieces the same way.

5) When one side turns light golden brown, turn it over and let it stay in the oil until the other side also looks like that.

I personally love eating this hot with vanilla ice- cream. Mmmmm. Yummy! J

VANAKKAM ( Welcome)

Welcome to the land of curries, coconut and coffee! Karnataka (language:Kannada), Kerala (language: Malayalam), Tamilnadu (language: Tamil), and Andhra Pradesh (language: Telugu) are the four states that make up this region.

When people mistake me for a Bengali, I usually correct them saying I’m a South Indian. Promptly, the next question I get is, “Toh matlab Madrasi na?” That’s when I go on to describe how there are four states that exist and  how they’re all very different from each other but have a few common elements with respect to their cuisine, attire and style of living; and that the difference between Tamilnadu and Kerala is as vast as that between West Bengal and Assam.

“Arre lekin Bengal aur Assam mein toh bahut farak hai!”

That’s why I decided to start a blog. A blog that lets me write about my passion and that helps people understand what South Indian cooking is all about. Using the three C’s (coffee, curry, coconut) and four states;  with various permutations and combinations you can stir up a meal peculiar to each one of those states. The dishes are similar yet different, complicated but easy to cook, laden with spices yet not spicy! 

I invite you to try a few. You can taste them, rate them and maybe even whip them up at home! 
Most importantly, don't forget to get your banana leaf!