Friday, February 13, 2009

Bottle gourd - curd curry (surai kaai thayir pachadi)

Bottle gourd is a popular Indian vegetable .Village people believe that it has some property to reduce our body fat.
The Tamil meaning of Bottle gourd is surai kaai. Koottu means a watery side dish .

Bottle gourd is a watery vegetable and tastes somewhat similar to white pumpkin or cucumber. Mostly it is used in making sambar , dhal or a watery side dish called koottu . The most common way is to cook it with Thoor dhal or green gram dhal.
Cooking it with Curd belongs to South TamilNadu cuisine.

In Tamil nadu a grand vegetarian feast should be served on a Banana leaf (gently cut with its tip). The rice must be accompanied by a koottu (watery side dish), a poriyal (cooked and tempered vegetables with shredded coconut) , a varuval (deep or shallow fried vegetable ), a curry (a spicy side dish with some dry gravy), sambar (dhal based stew), vatha kulambu (tamarind based stew), more kulambu (curd based stew), rasam (a soup poured on rice.. good for digestion), Payasam (a rice or vermicelli based sweet ) and at last the Buttermilk on rice. The other dishes are a an appalam, vadai , some sweet. Oh , my God ...What an elaborate lunch menu .Isn't it?.Believe me , we people cannot take every day like this . But the very thought makes us nostalgic. Right?

Just because of my love for our native cuisines , I am eagerly collecting as many recipes as possible . And this curd based recipe is my favorite koottu .




Surai kaai Thayir pachadi koottu / bottle gourd - yogurt curry.


Ingredients:

Bottle gourd - 1/2 kg (1 small)
curd - 1/2 cup
onion - 1 (small)
olive oil - 1 tbsp
mustard seeds - 1 tsp
curry leaves - 1 brig
Turmeric powder - 1/4 tsp
salt - to taste.
To grind:
ginger - 1 inch
green chilli - 3
channa dhal - 2 tbsp
shredded coconut - 2 tbsp
cumin seeds - 1/4 tsp

Method:
Soak the channa dhal for 30 minutes.
Peel the skin of the bottle gourd. Chop it into small cubes. Donot discard the seeds. Tender seeds tastes good.
Heat 1 cup of water and add the chopped bottle gourd, salt, turmeric powder and cook it .
Grind together the items given .
Pour the ground masala to the cooked bottle gourd.
Let it come to boil.
Now add the curd and switch off flame. Check for salt.
Heat oil in a separate pan. Add the mustard seeds , after it crackles , add the chopped onion, curry leaves and fry till the onion becomes red.
Add this tempering to the cooked bottle gourd.
Mix well.
Bottle gourd thayir koottu is ready.

Serving suggestions:

Serve as side dish with plain rice or rice and sambar or with chapathi.

19 comments:

Chutneytales said...

Nice recipe,viki.We too make surai Kaai kootu in our home..But never tried it with curd..Thanks for sharing..

Malar Gandhi said...

I know Suraikai Paal kootu...thayir kootu sounds different to me...must be like aviyal taste, I guess. Hardly find our Indian veggies here...if I spot one, this will be my dish!

Finla said...

Looks so yummy delicious.
We don't get bottle gourd here .

Chitra said...

we make surakkai paal kootu.but thayir kootu is different viki.hope it tasted great..will sure try this dear:)

Varsha Vipins said...

My hubby loves anything with this veggie..so yummy dish..guess wil try it out..:)

Cham said...

Sounds delicous ur version of kootu Viki

Yasmeen said...

This is a unique bottle gourd recipe with curd,looks tasty.Please trail back for my
token of gratitude

Vikis Kitchen said...

Thanks Madhu, Malar, yasmeen, varsha, Happy cook, chitra and cham.
Actually , I had this koottu in a marriage in Nagercoil (a town in South TamilNadu). Then learnt this recipe from my friends there.
They serve a lot of yummy and unique side dishes like this.
Should post them also:)

Vijitha said...

Yummy! nice post.

Vibaas said...

looks yummy, viki. i make it with ashgourd.

sriharivatsan said...

Viki, this is new to me da, never heard of thayir kootu..But this is my hubby's favo veggie, let me try once for him..Tx for sharing..

Priya Suresh said...

Woww looks creamy n awesome, completely new to me..

FH said...

Thank you Viki. You too have a wonderful V day today! :))

Koottu looks delicious, will try it.

Swapna said...

Nice recipe. Kuttu is looking & sure it will taste delicious. Happy v.day:)

Sujatha said...

nice write-up about tamilnadu food :) Its indeed elaborate, and nothing can beat that vazhai ilai saapadu.. :)

Nice recipe too, I never tried suraikai this way..

gtyuk said...

looks yummy; I don't need any virundhu, just plain rice kooda appadiyey saapittu viduven!

They used to serve sorakkai kootu when I was a small girl in a hostel and I used to throw it away now,I regert so much for doing that because now, I'm searching the Indian shops for this vegetable and I'm not getting it.

Raaga said...

this is new... I will bookmark it to try in summer when bottle gourd comes up in our menu at least twice a week.

Bets.. said...

Hi,
This recipe looked so yummy & for the first time I was trying Bottle gourd with ur recipe & my husband ended up appreciating it. It was yummy. It was as though I travelled back to South India & tasted. I do collect few of my tried good recipe & blog it. I'm sure to blog this recipe of yours as well. Thank you.

Vikis Kitchen said...

Thanks Bets. Feel free to try my koottu and link back this recipe. Happy blogging dear.

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