Spicy Baby Back Ribs

Filed Under Good with Drinks, India - Kerala, Pork | 24 Comments

In my last post, I didn’t mean to convey that I hate cooking. I just meant that it is the outcome that I enjoy more than the process. When it comes to cooking, the benefits outweigh the effort normally. That is the reason I cook certain dishes and would never even attempt certain others. I know I will never be able to bake a cake as tasty or as beautiful as our neighborhood baker. Even if I do it will take me hours of hard work, so I’d rather just buy it. But there are some other dishes, especially here in a foreign land, only way for me to satisfy my cravings is to cook those myself. In such cases, yeah the actual cooking process is tiresome, but the output makes it totally worth it.

These pan-fried baby back ribs is a great example for that. It is an original Chef Sig recipe, I have to do the work myself, but luckily the effort here is minimal and the taste is phenomenal if I say so myself.

I normally make ribs in the oven, but my oven has been broken for a while. So I tried the recipe on the stovetop and got a different but absolutely amazing result. These were so tender but with a slightly crispy texture, we loved it! I will give you both versions of the recipe, oven and pan-fried, even though I only have a picture of the pan-fried version today. You can use regular spareribs or baby back ribs. Ask your butcher to cut the rack into individual ribs. If using spareribs, cut the individual ribs into half widthwise.

Ingredients

• 2 lbs baby back or spareribs
• 2 tbsp plain yogurt
• 2 tbsp vinegar
• salt to taste
• Roast and Grind
• 6 dry red chilies
• 1 tbsp coriander seeds
• 3 cloves
• 2 cardamom pods
• 1″ piece of cinnamon
• 1 tsp fennel seeds
• a few curry leaves

Method

Dry roast the spices and curry leaves and grind to a smooth powder. Mix the spice powder and salt with the yogurt and vinegar and 2/3 cup of water to form the sauce.

Oven method

Pre-heat the oven to 425F. Place the ribs in a large roasting pan and roast for 15 minutes. The fat will separate from the ribs, pour the fat out.

Pour the prepared sauce over the cooked ribs and turn the ribs so that the ribs are completely coated with the sauce.

Reduce the oven temperature to 350F and roast for 45 minutes turning the ribs once after 25 minutes.

If there is still liquid remaining in the pan, remove the ribs and reduce the liquid down to a sauce, and serve on the side of the ribs.

Stove-top method

With the same ingredients on the stove you will get a totally different texture. Place a very lightly oiled large frying pan on the stove. When the pan is hot, put the ribs in the pan, reduce the heat down to medium-low, cover and cook for about 15 minutes. The ribs will get tender and some of the fat will separate. Remove and save the fat for later.

Pour the prepared sauce over the ribs and turn the ribs so that the ribs are completely coated with the sauce. Cover and cook for about 20 minutes. After most of the liquid is absorbed, uncover the pan and cook till the ribs are dry and slightly charred. You can use some of the saved fat from the previous step if the pan gets too dry.

I can’t decide which method I like better, the oven method gives you the saucy ribs which will make you lick your fingers, but the stove top method gives you a more dry, crispy texture still keeping it tender inside. 

A Gingery Lemongrass Soup in a Clear Chicken Broth

Filed Under Chicken, Mushroom, Soups and Salads, South East Asia | 37 Comments

I pretend to be a great chef. I try to believe that cooking is therapeutic, but I don’t really believe that! I do like to pretend that I am a big time cook, I love the accolades that come with it. I love the glory so much that I’ve even deluded myself into thinking that I actually enjoy cooking. But there are so many other things I’d rather be doing. 

Therapeutic, yeah right! I think watching TV is therapeutic, reading is relaxing and happy hour is pure bliss. But cooking, it is something that I do out of necessity.  And to keep my sanity, I have trained my mind to think that cooking is fun. It works, most of the time!  Why else would I sign myself up for a class that teaches the fundamentals of cooking? Where they teach you how to hold a knife properly and the proper way to cut an onion! Or how to make the perfect stock at home by simmering it for 24 hours! Yep, a whole day dedicated to stock… And I did this to myself even before I had a food blog, so it wasn’t even for research purpose, I genuinely thought I needed to know all these.

Well, needless to say, making my own stocks at home is not something I do. They say the only way to get the depth of flavor in your sauces and soups is to make your own stock. That might be true, but I am normally happy with the canned broth, especially when used in small amounts. But when it comes to clear soups where the main ingredient is the broth, even I stay away from the canned broth. Main reason being that I make clear soup only when Siv is sick, and I wouldn’t feed him that much stuff out of a can when he is feeling ill. But even then, I can’t imagine putting that many hours into making a stock, so what do I do? I turn to the greatest kitchen invention known to mankind, a pressure cooker!

I am sure there is a difference in taste between a slow brewed stock that takes 8-24 hours to complete, and a pressure cooked version that takes just 45 minutes. But my palate is not that sophisticated to notice the difference. So, here is my version of a chicken soup that cleared all the congestion out of Siv’s chest, the best medicine for the common cold! If you have a more evolved palate, replace the first part of the recipe with your homemade broth. Or if you are lazy and just want to use a store bought broth, feel free to do so too… You can use a vegetable broth to make this a vegetarian soup.

Chicken Broth

Traditionally the broth is made with a Bouquet Garni, but since I strain everything out of the liquid anyway, I didn’t bother doing so. You can also add different veggies and herbs as you wish. I sauteed the chicken bones before boiling, which isn’t very common either, but I don’t like the raw taste of the meat, and wasn’t in the mood to roast the bones as you would normally do for a brown stock.

Ingredients

• 1.5 lbs chicken breast bones after most of the meat is removed
• 1 tsp butter
• 1 cup sliced onions
• salt to taste
• 1/2 tbsp freshly ground pepper
• 1/2 cup diced celery
• 1/2 cup diced carrots
• 4 bay leaves
• 1 tsp fresh/dried thyme
• 2 star anise

Method

In a large pressure cooker, melt the butter and add the sliced onions. Saute till the onions are soft. Add the chicken bones and season with salt and pepper. Saute for about 6-7 minutes till the chicken pieces turns completely white and the raw smell disappears. Add about 12 cups of cold water to completely cover the chicken. Add the rest of the ingredients and close the lid. After the pressure is built up completely, reduce the heat to medium high and cook for about 45 minutes. Once the cooker is cool enough to handle, remove the lid and pass the liquid through a large strainer. Discard the solids, there is no more flavor left in those. Now youl have a clear aromatic chicken broth ready for the next step.

Lemongrass Chicken Soup

Use any veggies and greens and mushrooms of your choice. I used oyster mushrooms and baby spinach, only veggies I had. The measures are approximate.

Ingredients

• 8-10 cups of chicken broth
• 3 lemongrass stalks
• 2 tbsp thinly sliced ginger pieces
• 8 small Thai chilies slit (3 jalapeno peppers)
• 1 cup oyster mushrooms
• 1 cup baby spinach leaves
• 1 large tomato cut into 8 pieces.
• fresh basil leaves for garnish
• 1 tbsp light soy sauce/ tamari sauce
• juice from half a lime
• salt and pepper for seasoning

Method

Discard the tough outer layers of the lemongrass, and cut the soft inner part into small finger long slices. Place the lemongrass stalks and the ginger slices in a mortar, and crush lightly with the pestle.

In a large saucepan, place the broth and bring it to a boil. Add the lightly crushed lemongrass and ginger, along with the sliced chilies. Reduce the heat and cover and simmer for about 20 minutes. Remove and discard the lemongrass, ginger and chilies from the liquid and bring it back to a full boil.

Add the mushrooms and spinach and tomato slices into the liquid and let it boil for about 8-10 minutes. Add the soy sauce and lime juice and season with salt and pepper.

Transfer to serving bowls and garnish with fresh basil leaves. Serve piping hot.

This soup was so hot and spicy and tangy and aromatic, it was exactly what my poor sick darling needed.

Guess who got a mention in Seattle Magazine!!

Filed Under Random Musings | 58 Comments

Ok, it is not that big a deal, it didn’t even make it to the printed version, but still I was really happy to see a note about my little space in the Seattle Magazine April 2008 edition web exclusive section.

Best Foodie Web sites or Blogs

Thank you Leslie Kelly!

Oh and Siv has a new car now. Since I dedicated a whole post to my car last year and I want to drive this baby once in a while, I better give it a little face time too. He didn’t even take a picture, so I took these pics from the Benz web site, he has the same black car with cognac leather interior.

Presenting Siv’s new love - Mercedes Benz E350 Sedan. I still think my Mini is way cooler!

Kerala Beef Fry (Beef Ularthiyathu)

Filed Under Appetizers and Snacks, Beef or Veal, Good with Drinks, India - Kerala | 19 Comments

I can’t believe I still haven’t blogged about one of the most famous non-vegetarian preparations from Kerala, the good old beef fry! Succulent beef pieces cooked in freshly ground spices and sauteed dry with onions and coconut slices, this is one of those famous Thattukada dishes.

Thattukada is Kerala’s version of a fast food joint. While the beef fry is not fast food, the fact that time works in favor of the flavors in this dish and it actually tastes better after reheating makes it an ideal candidate for the fast paced Thattukadas. Beef fry is normally served with hot Kerala Parathas at these places, and it used to be the cheapest non-veg dish in most restaurants when I was young.  I hear that things have changed now, beef is more expensive than chicken due to the reduced supply of cattle and wide spread chicken farming.

My roommate and I used to eat out almost every day when we were in college since the hostel food was completely unpalatable. Some days we were totally broke, this beef fry used to be the savior those days. It was only 10 rupees a plate (about 25 cents), divide that by two, you can’t get anything cheaper than that! I still remember how good it was and how the slight sweetness of the fried coconut slices contrasted the heat from the spices. I don’t think I can ever recreate that exact taste, but over time I have come very close to the taste of that Thattukada beef fry.

This is one of those dishes where you really need tons of curry leaves to get that authentic taste, but due to the curry leaves ban in the US, I had to make it without those.

Ingredients

• 2 lbs beef cut into small cubes
• 2 tbsp thinly sliced garlic pieces
• 1 tbsp thinly sliced ginger pieces
• 1 tsp fat free mayonnaise
• 2 tbsp vinegar
• 1/2 cup thinly sliced coconut pieces (available frozen in Indian grocery stores)
• 2 cups thinly sliced onions
• lots of curry leaves (not really optional, but I made it without these)
• salt to taste
• 2 tbsp oil

To roast and grind

• 2 tbsp coriander seeds
• 10 dry red chillies
• 1/2 tsp black peppercorns
• 1 tbsp fennel seeds
• 2 cloves
• 2 cardamom pods
• 1″ cinnamon

Method

Heat a skillet and dry roast the ingredients under to “to roast and grind” section. Grind these to a smooth powder in a spice grinder or a coffee grinder.

Place the beef pieces in a pressure cooker. Add the spice powder, garlic, ginger, coconut, mayonnaises and vinegar and mix well. Keep it marinated for about 15 minutes. Add 1/4 cup water and pressure cook for about 8 minutes after the first whistle.

(If you don’t have a pressure cooker, add about a cup of water and cook in a pan with a tight lid, occasionally stirring to make sure that the bottom doesn’t burn. Cook for about 20 minutes till the beef pieces are tender. )

In a large frying pan, heat the oil and add the onions and curry leaves. Add salt to taste and saute till the onions start to brown.

Stir in the cooked beef mixture to the pan, and saute on medium heat for about 15-20 minutes till it is completely dry.

Serve with some lime/lemon wedges. This goes best with cold beer. I love having it with white rice and yogurt.

Note: This is a pretty hot dish. You can reduce the quantity of the chillies and peppercorns to tone down the heat.

Spicy Green Beans with Shrimp Stir Fry

Filed Under Appetizers and Snacks, Beans, Shrimp or Prawn, South East Asia | 16 Comments

This is my favorite way to eat green beans. This picture was taken a long time ago, I have been waiting to take a better picture since the beans look a little overcooked and tired in this version. I actually like my beans tender, but the normal restaurant version has the beans very crisp, which would make a better picture for sure. But after we got back from India, I have gotten real lazy, and haven’t cooked much. I have a bunch of pictures in the draft from before, but I just can’t remember the exact proportions or even the method in most cases! I will have to make those again before I can post them I guess.  I had already written this recipe down, so this was the only bloggable draft. I am hoping to get back to schedule from this week onwards.

I am not sure what the origin of this dish is, I have seen it in most Chinese restaurant menus and in some Thai restaurants as well.  But then again, none of those restaurants claim to be authentic, so let’s just call it a South Asian dish. This version was made with French beans, but I have also made it with regular green beans, and both are great.

Ingredients

• 1/2 lb fresh French beans (substitute regular green beans)
• 1 tbsp minced garlic
• 1 tbsp diced shallots
• 1 tbsp shrimp paste
• 2 tbsp dried shrimp, chopped
• 1 tbsp Sambal Oelek (1 tbsp red pepper flakes)
• 1 tbsp light soy sauce
• 1 tsp rice vinegar
• 1/4 tsp brown sugar
• salt to taste
• 1 tbsp oil 

Method

Place the beans with about a tablespoon of water in a microwave safe dish. Cook on high for 2 minutes.

Heat oil in a large wok or frying pan, add the dried shrimp and saute for about a minute or so.

Now add the shallots and garlic and saute till soft. Add the shrimp paste and red pepper flakes and mix well. Add the green beans and stir fry for a couple of minutes.

Add the soy sauce, sugar, vinegar and salt to taste and mix well.

Stir fry on medium heat till the beans are tender.

Serve warm. This is a great appetizer on its own, or goes well with steamed rice also.

Note: If you like your beans crisp, skip the first step of pre-cooking the beans.

A Long-winded Rant and Murgi Kalia - A Bengali Chicken Curry

Filed Under Chicken, India - Other | 36 Comments

This is a two part post with the two parts having no connection to each other. I am too jet-lagged and sleepy to come up with some twisted way of joining the two as I sometimes do. So feel free to skip the first part and jump to the recipe directly. Sorry, but I must rant!

I am jinxed when it comes to air travel. Really, I am not exaggerating! Anything that can go wrong on a trip (apart from the obvious deadly ones of course) has happened to me, at least that is what I think until the next thing goes wrong! Siv, who travels about five times more than me normally, has very uneventful journeys, unless he is with me. I don’t remember many trips in my life where things were just normal. This last India trip was no different. We used our Northwest miles to book a free trip, which was so not worth it!

It started with Continental airlines failing to find Siv’s reservation for the first leg of our trip since Northwest forgot to send the details over to them!!! How does that even happen, doesn’t it all just happen via some automated process??? We missed the flight while they were trying to sort this out. Continental very generously offered to put us on an evening flight, where we would have to go to NY, stay a night and take the next day’s flight from there to Mumbai. A very angry phone call to NWA fixed it immediately, they put us on a direct SEA-BOM flight, which was an awesome route.

But NWA again forgot to inform Continental about the change in the itinerary. So as far as Continental was concerned, we were no-shows for their flight, which meant we were still in Seattle, so our return trip from BOM-SEA was automatically canceled. Sure, they didn’t inform NW either, so when I reconfirmed our reservations on nwa.com everything seemed just fine.   Somehow I sensed something might go wrong, so I checked Continental website for our trip details and found the mistake in time. Continental obviously couldn’t help me, because the tickets were booked through Northwest! Northwest conveniently doesn’t have any local numbers in India, and I had to talk to their customer service in the US. It finally took me three hours of international talk time- mostly hold time - with Northwest customer service to get it fixed. Every time I called, they would forget to do something, and I had to call back and talk to a brand new person who would shamelessly blame the previous agent and of course Continental airlines for the mistake.

I was planning to write a long e-mail to Northwest about the whole experience, but I know that they will just send me some NW flight coupons to make up for this, which means I will have to fly Northwest again to use those up.  So I am not sure if I should even write that letter!

The icing on the #$%^ cake was when we tried to get seats together on the last flight segment on Alaska air. We had seats 6E and 10D. But when they tried to find us seats together, they somehow managed to lose 10D, and got us 30D instead and no seats together. I gave up my 6E to get the 30E, just so that I have a shoulder to sleep on for the six hour flight. 30 is the last row of the flight, which meant our seats were right in front of the toilet. I was sitting so close to the loo, if someone kept the door open I could fall into it in my sleep! On a six hour flight I think about 90% of the passengers would use the toilet at least once, and after about three hours the smell got so unbearable in that area. I used up one very expensive bottle of perfume as an air freshener just to keep myself from throwing up. And the worse was when occasionally a queue formed in front of the loo and people thought it was okay to just lean on my seat or stand right in front of me with their rear ends on my eye level! Seriously, so many times I opened my eyes to see an ass just inches away from my nose!

It really was the flight from hell!

As I said before the story has nothing to do with the recipe. We got back yesterday and after all the crappy airline food, we were in the mood for some home cooked meal, and a quick peek at the blogging events showed me that today is the last day for RCI Bengal. I pretty much doubled the number of my cookbook collection this trip, I picked up a bunch of $2 pocket cookbooks on various regional Indian cuisines among others, and luckily there was one on Bengali cuisine as well. 

This easy breezy chicken curry recipe is from this book called Bengali Kitchen by Sujit Bose. I more or less stuck to the original recipe, except for the addition of Panch Phoron. This recipe didn’t call for it, but another chicken curry recipe in this book did. I badly wanted to use the Panch Phoron that Musical sent me, it could only add to the authenticity right?

Ingredients

• 1.5 lb Chicken cut into medium pieces
• 1 tbsp oil (original recipe calls for ghee)
• 2 tsp panch phoron
• 1.5 cups chopped onions
• 1 tsp ginger paste
• 1 tsp garlic paste
• 2 cloves
• 2 black cardamoms
• 1/2 tsp cinnamon powder
• 1 cup chopped tomatoes
• 1 tsp coriander powder
• 1 tsp turmeric powder
• 2 tsp red chili powder
• 1 cup hot water
• salt to taste

Method

Heat the oil or butter in a large pan. Add the panch phoran and saute for a few seconds.

Add the onions and stir till it becomes soft.

Add the ginger and garlic pastes, cloves, cardamom and cinnamon powder. Saute for a few seconds.

Add the chicken pieces and mix well. Cook on high heat for about 10-12 minutes stirring occasionally.

Add the spice powders and mix well. Saute for a minute or so till the spices start to brown. Add the tomato pieces and mix well. Add a cup of hot water and bring to a boil.

Cook covered for about 7-8 minutes or till then chicken pieces and tender. Uncover and cook on high till the gravy is thick.

Serve hot with rice or chapatis, we had it with idiyappam (steamed rice noodles or string hoppers), not a classic Bengali combination, but still was delicious.

This goes to our dear Bong mom Sandeepa who is hosting RCI Bengal this month. RCI stands for “Regional Cuisines of India” , this event is started by LakshmiK from “Veggie cuisine”” .

Nutmeg and Mace

Filed Under Ingredient Guide | 21 Comments

Aren’t we an informed lot? An overwhelming majority correctly identified this fruit to yield nutmeg and mace. Thank you all for playing!

Nutmeg is the dried seed of the fruit, and mace is the reddish covering or arils of the seed. The fruits I found were really young, so the arils are not red yet.

Here is the picture of a mature fruit. (Picture courtesy of Wikimedia Commons)

The fruit is called Jathikka in Malayalam, Jaiphal in Hindi and Bengali, Jayikai in Kannada, Zaaphal in Kashmiri, Jathikai in Tamil and Jajikai in Telugu.  The botanical name is Myristica fragrans.  Nutmeg and mace have similar taste qualities, nutmeg having a slightly sweeter and mace a more delicate flavor.

Growing up, we never cared about the seeds, it was the outer flesh that interested us kids. The flesh has a slightly spicy sour taste which we used to devour with some salt on the side.  The seed and the aril were discarded without a second thought! Mace is the most expensive part of the fruit. The outer flesh is also used to make pickles and chutneys in Kerala, and for jams and candies in some other parts of the world.

Geetha went out of her way to give some extra information about Jathikka.

Jaathikka , Jaathipatri( Nutmeg & Mace)
Telugu: Japtri
Origin: Molocco islands, eastern Indonesia
Portugese introduced this spice to WEST
Geenus:Myristica
Species: 100 different but M.fragrans widely cultivated
Annual world production: 10000-12000 tonnes
Culinay and herbal medicine use
Exotic preparations:
Pickle, Wine with fresh jaathika thoodu

Thank you Geetha!

More about nutmeg and mace here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nutmeg

Another Spice in its Youth

Filed Under Ingredient Guide | 49 Comments

Sorry, it is yet another post with no recipe, I am on vacation after all! Since we all had so much fun with Kudampuli, here is another spice in its natural form. This one is more popular, it is used all over the world, so no Kerallite advantage here… . This fruit actually produces two different spices. Care to guess? Answer tomorrow…

Cruising the Backwaters of Kerala

Filed Under Travel | 46 Comments

Kerala is known as God’s own country, for good reason. The luscious stretches of green paddy fields and plantations, serene beaches, beautiful hill stations, pristine waterfalls, tranquil backwaters and exotic wildlife all within just a couple of hours of driving distance from the other makes this beautiful state one of the most sought after tourist destinations of the world! Add the Ayurvedic spas, exotic cuisine and the equable climate, Kerala is truly a tourist’s paradise.   

No trip to Kerala will be complete without a cruise through the stretches of emerald backwaters - a network of exquisite channels, lakes, lagoons and deltas of approximately 44 rivers emptying in the Arabian sea. Kumarakom is the home of Vembanad Lake, the largest backwater lake in Kerala, and is only an hour away from my parents’ home. In my opinion Kumarakom is the most beautiful place in Kerala, a cruise through the Vembanad lake in a houseboat is an experience of a lifetime - the lush greenery along the coastline, the serenity of the water and the glimpses of life along the way - it is a trip you will never forget! Let me take you through a pictorial tour of my unforgettable houseboat experience from last week.

How many different shades of green are there in nature? Chances are that you will get to see all of them along the way. The luscious coconut trees lining the shore…

Certain parts of the lake is completely covered with a green weed called African Payal , even though it is a nuisance to the fishermen and the boats, you can’t help but marvel at its beauty!

Vembanad lake is home to Karimeen (pearl spot fish), prawns and lobsters, three of the most expensive marine crops in Kerala. So naturally fishing is the livelihood of many people. We found many couples laying the fishing nets in the water in the evening. Then they just wait in the small boats till morning, taking shifts sleeping. Hopefully the net is full of fish in the morning!     

We came across some world famous Chinese fishing nets, a major tourist attraction in Kerala.

Three fishermen returning home in the morning with the night’s catch…

Kumarakom houseboats are luxuriously furnished, cozy floating homes that come with all necessities like running water, electricity and luxuries like air conditioning, home theater system and personal chefs! We had a three bedroom houseboat, all three bedrooms were nicely furnished with large almost king sized beds and attached bathrooms with nice working showers and clean European style toilets.

We entered into the open living/dining room with a large dining table and chairs, and cushioned seating all around the room and a flat screen TV , a DVD player and surround sound system. A small narrow corridor from here took us to the three bedrooms at the end of which is a small but fully functional kitchen. Wish I took pictures of the bedrooms!

We had three staff on the boat, a driver, a chef and an additional person to serve the dishes, help the driver, buy us things etc. That is our very talented personal chef in action. This guy was whipping out some seriously yummy food from this tiny kitchen!

Our friendly driver also acted as the tour guide and gave us just enough information about the sights along the water, and answered all our questions very patiently.

We were greeted with a Kerala style welcome drink of fresh tender coconuts, the most refreshing natural thirst quenchers. What is better than tender coconut water? A tender coconut martini of course! That is Siv pouring Grey Goose and freshly squeezed lime juice into then tender coconut.

Our trip was from 12 noon to 10 am next day. When we got into the boat, our lunch was being prepared in the kitchen. Kerala style thali- rice and a variety of vegetarian dishes with Karimeen fry on the side.

Karimeen aka pearl spot is the tastiest backwater fish and no trip to Kumarakom is complete without a taste of this. The Karimeen was getting marinated in a red spicy masala when we got in, then they were fried in coconut oil, and served hot to the table.

While the lunch was being prepared, the boat took us to a toddy shop along the coast, from where we bought some lobsters fried on a stick for lunch, and fresh lobsters to be prepared later for dinner. Our chef took these lobsters, and cooked us a spicy lobster roast for drinks in the evening.  

Fresh coconut toddy served in an earthenware pot. There are plenty of toddy shops along the way, you can get the staff to get you some right to the boat.

The houseboat trip is relatively cheap, compared to a nice hotel. Our three bedroom boat for 6 people for a night (22 hours total) came to about $250 before tips. This includes lunch, dinner and breakfast and the personal services of three men completely on our beck and call. Where else in the world can you get such luxury for that prize? You can also get customizable tour packages that includes some sight seeing side trips, multiple nights stay etc.

For more information on Kerala and Kumarakom, check out these links:

http://www.ktdc.com/

http://www.kumarakomguide.com/

Kudampuli (Gambooge)

Filed Under Ingredient Guide | 28 Comments

Not many people have seen me in my youth, they like me old and wrinkled. Can you believe I was ever this good looking!!

When I grow up, they make me up to look like this! Now do you know who I am?

Yes, I am Kudampuli, as some of you correctly guessed!

Kudampuli (scientific name: Garcinia cambogia) also known as Gambooge, Malabar Tamarind, Fish Tamarind etc is an essential ingredient in all the seafood loving kitchens in Central Kerala, the coastal South Indian state. As the name suggests (Puli = sour in Malayalam), the dried fruit is used as a souring agent in Kerala’s famous fish curries and other seafood preparations.

Kudampuli is known for its medicinal values in Ayurveda. It helps to promote digestion, and a decoction (kashayam) made out of it is used against Arthritis and some uterine deceases. It is also known to cure ulcers.

The green fruit shown in the first picture is a young version, it will turn yellow when ripe. Once fully ripe, fruits are collected, cut in half, deseeded and are sun-dried for a day. The sun-dried fruit halves are smoked till black, and are rubbed with a mixture of salt and oil before transferring to earthenware pots and tightly sealed. These will stay fresh for years. Before use, wash the pieces under running water quickly to remove any dust accumulated from the drying and smoking process, then soak these for 10 minutes in water. Kudampuli pieces are added along with the water in which it was soaked in to curries and it gives a delicious sour taste that is so unique.

Kudampuli is sometimes referred to as Kokum in some of the cookbooks from Kerala, so for the longest time I was under the assumption that Kokum and Kudampuli are the same. But Kokum (Garcinia indica) used in Marathi and Konkani cuisines is a different fruit, these two are not interchangeable in recipes.

Here are some of my recipes using Kudampuli.

Kerala Fish Curry

Meen Peera (Fish with Grated Coconut)

Bitter Gourd and Dried Shrimp Stir Fry

Prawn and Mango Curry

Kudampuli can also be used in some vegetarian curries using vegetables like plantain, colocasia, taro etc. I will soon post a vegetarian recipe using Kudampuli. 

Availability in the US: Kudampuli is available in the Indian grocery stores in Seattle, so I am guessing it will be available in other places too at least in the US.  Sorry, I am not sure about other countries.