Paruppu Usili (Scrambled Steamed Dal/Vegetable)

SrilathaSides, South Indian Leave a Comment

Paruppusili is a side dish that combines dal that’s been soaked, ground into a batter, steamed, and then scrambled with a vegetable.
Paruppu means dal, and to usili means to scramble.
This version is a Tamil version, a star in many south Indian Brahmin weddings and functions, along with more kozhambu (yogurt based gravy). I have used green peppers for the vegetable in this recipe. Traditional vegetables used are green beans, long beans, cluster beans. Broccoli is popular with my son. You can make it with cauliflower too.
The process is a bit involved, but it’s absolutely worth it. This dish packs a protein and vitamin punch with the dal and the vegetable. The process involves soaking the dal for a couple of hours, blending into a batter, steaming, and then crumbling it with sautéed vegetable.
But not to worry, this recipe will teach you a hack that would cut down the time to a mere 30 minutes, from start to finish, with a little bit of prep work done ahead.

Green Pepper Masala Rice With Vangi Baath Masala

SrilathaMain Dish, South Indian Leave a Comment

This is a 15 minute recipe, if you have the vangi baath masala (spice powder) ready.
Basically, cook the rice. Chop and saute the green peppers. Mix them up together in a bowl with the masala powder, and temper. Done!

Vangibath Masala Powder

SrilathaBasics, South Indian Leave a Comment

Vangibaath is a dish from the Indian state of Karnataka. It is a spiced rice dish made primarily with eggplant, and a special spice mix (masala). I learned this recipe from my very first friend in the US, Usha. When my babies were, well, babies, we used to spend a lot of time with Usha and her husband Shivu. They adopted our young family as their own. There was a lot of cooking that happened. As a delicious result, my cooking has been influenced by Usha’s karnataka style cooking quite a bit, and I still, after 20+ years, make a lot of dishes I learned from her. This is one of them.

This is the masala powder that is added to cooked rice and eggplant/brinjal. I also learned to use this powder with other vegetable+rice combos such as green pepper, and cauliflower.

Anyway, this powder, though readily available in most Indian grocery stores, tastes best when made fresh at home, and it doesn’t take a long time to make. I make it in small quantities whenever I need, but you can make it in small batches and store in the refrigerator.

Kollu Rasam (Horsegram Rasam)

SrilathaRasam, Soups, South Indian Leave a Comment

Today’s recipe is made out of the grains that are fed to horses, ergo horse gram. Yep! Instead of the toor dal that is traditionally used in rasam, this recipe bases its protein content on horse gram. Horse gram is supposed to have some magical properties such as helping in weight loss. I don’t know if that’s a confirmed fact or not, but on cold rainy or winter days, it’s a good hearty soup/rasam to have piping hot with some steamed rice.