Cabbage Koottu

Many a times I feel blessed to have some vegetables that lasts longer in our fridge ♥   Those veggies are the saving stocks when we need something quick. I am sure you all would have your own experiences on how a cabbage in fridge saved you  ☺

Cabbage is a staple vegetable in USA, and it would be on a  lesser price range always (less than 39 cents - 79 cents / lb). On a lucky day, we can get a whole big cabbage for a dollar . So it would be the first to climb a shopping cart and the last to get cooked ☺ . While many say otherwise, I like cabbage also very much. For Indian foods , I choose the cabbage that is sold in Indian grocery stores only (tastes same as Indian cabbage), as there are a lot of varieties here and some taste like lettuce and won't go with Indian cuisine. 

Stir fry is the common recipe for cabbage in Tamilnadu. Have you ever considered preparing something delicious using cabbage other than the regular poriyal (stir fry). Cabbage always needs a good cook, who would give it a face lift ☺
I learned this recipe from one of my best friends Parvathi. This koottu recipe belongs to her mother inlaw . So I guess its origin as Tanjore cuisine.
I like this recipe very much and we believe that it goes yummy as side dish with sambar rice or puli kulambu and rice.

Ingredients:
cabbage - 200 gm (small piece)
onion - 1/2 cup (chopped)
tomato - 1 (optional)
oil - 1 tbsp
mustard seed - 1 tsp
urid dal - 1/2 tsp
salt - to taste
curry leaf - few

To grind:
coconut - 2 tbsp (shredded)
fennel (sombu) - 1 tsp
green chilly - 3
puffed channa dal (pottu kadalai) - 2 tbsp

Method:
Shred / chop the cabbage into small pieces and keep aside.
Heat oil in a wok.
Let the mustard starts to crackle and add urid dal.
Add onion as soon as urid dal starts turning mild red.
Saute onion with some curry leaf.
Then add chopped tomato and cook well (no need for tomato if using as side dish with tamarind based curries over rice. But adding tomato tastes good when served with chapati).
As the onion turns soft, add the cabbage and saute for a minute.
Add 1 cup water and cook till it turns tender.
Put enough salt.
Grind the items mentioned to a coarse paste.
Add this to the koottu and bring to a boil.
Let it cook covered for a minute and turn off.
Garnish with chopped cilantro.
Cabbage koottu is ready!

Serving suggestion:
Serve as side dish with sambar or puli kulambu rice or with chapathi.

Kadappa

Kadappa is the traditional side dish for Poori or Idly, dosai in Tanjore of TamilNadu, India.

As the theme of this blog is to remember my mom's passion for cooking, I am narrating here how she got this recipe. Long back, as a newly married couple mom and dad visited her sister's family in Tanjore. And there she had this kadappa with poori and dosa in a restaurant. Then she searched for the recipe through cook-books and finally arrived at this one. After that it has become our favorite too.

This dish resembles a kuruma like gravy with dhal as a base. Turmeric and tomato are not generally added, as the primary color of the kadappa should be white / beige. So easy to prepare and great to enjoy for a special weekend:)



Ingredients:
Potato - 4
green gram dhal (paasi paruppu / chiru paruppu) - 1/4 cup
Red onion - 1
mustard seed - 1/2 tsp
Bay leaf - 1
oil - 1 tbsp
salt - to taste
lemon - 1/2

Masala - 1
puffed channa dhal (pottu kadalai) - 1 tbsp
poppy seed - 1/2 tsp
green chilly - 6
cinnamon - 1 inch
cloves (kirambu) - 2
fennel seed (sombu) - 1 tsp
shredded coconut - 1/2 cup

Masala -2
ginger - 1 inch
garlic - 5 pearls

Method:
Wash the potatoes well. Pressure cook the potatoes and green gram dhal for 2 whistles.
Peel and chop potato into small cubes.
Slice the onion into small pieces.

Heat oil in a wok and splutter the mustard seed. Then add bay leaves.

Now goes the chopped onion. Fry till it becomes tender. Then add the ginger garlic paste and fry till the raw smell vanishes.
Then add the cubed potatoes and green gram dhal.

Grind the items given under masala 1 and add it to the potatoes in wok.

Add salt and let it boil for five minutes.

After switching off , add the lime juice and serve hot.

Kadappa is ready!

Serving suggestions:
Serve with dosa or poori / roti /idly / chapathi.

Note :
1.we can prepare it without tempering also.

2.Pressure cook raw, chopped potato with green gram and all masalas including ginger garlic together. Then temper after it gets cooked. Add lime juice at the end. This is the short cut method.