Vendakai Pachadi/ Ladies Finger Lentil Curry

I am always reminded of my bachelorette days in bangalore with my two wingies from university- Nivi and Soumi when i make Vendaikai Pachadi . They were quite fond of this preparation of mine, and this post is dedicated to the two of them and to our lovely Indira Nagar days in Bangalore :)

Vendaikai Pachadi

Ingredients

Shallots - 10 chopped
Green chilli - 2-3 , slit length wise and cut in half
Ladies Finger - 1 cup chopped
Toor Dal - 1/4 cup , pressure cooked with a pinch of turmeric, dal must be slightly mashable.
Tamrind extract - 4-5 Tbspn
Curry Leaves - 1 sprig
Jeera - 1 tspn
Mustard - 1 tspn
Hing - a pinch.
Salt - as per taste
Oil - 2tsp + 4tbspn
water - 1 cup

Method

For most of us who cook bhindi, the first thing that probabaly comes to mind is the gooey-ness of it and the time it takes for the bhindi to cook for that gooey thing to disappear. So here is a method that is faster and easier to cook bhindi properly if you have a micowave oven.

In a glass bowl, toss the chopped bhindi,add  2 tspn of oil, 1 tspn salt  mix well, and heat it for 5 mins. Take it out at half-time, stir it and return to microwave for the remaining time. Doing this step, makes the bhindi dry, and when you proceed with the actual curry recipe, the bhindi cooks much faster and you dont see that gooey-ness. Try this,and you will always stick to this method for almost all bhindi featuring dishes.

Take a pan and heat some oil. Add hing, then mustard, let it splutter, add jeera - let it roast. Add the shallots, green chilli, curry leaves,give it a stir for a minute and throw in the microwaved bhindi. Saute it till the bhindi gets cooked well [slightly crispy and zero gooey-ness]. If you have used the microwave method to fry the bhindi, this step will maybe take only 5-7 minutes. Otherwise, if you are adding fresh bhindi , this could go on for 15-20 minutes. Please be patient.After this add in the tamrind extract, 1/2 cup water, salt and let the bhindi boil in the tamrind mix for 2-3 minutes. Now add the cooked dal, stir well. Boil the pachadi in low flame for 4-5 minutes and switch off flame.

We had this along with rice, kara-kuzhambu and carrot-thayir pachadi , the recipes of which will follow soon. :)

Notes

1. If you dont fry the bhindi in the microwave , and add fresh bhindi to the pan, it will take 15-20 minutes for the bhindi to get slightly crisp and for zero - gooey-ness. Add a tbspn of curd, and a tspn of sugar at this step to speeden the process. I used to do this initially before i came to know of the microwave method.

2.While adding tamrind extract tbspn by tbspn, make sure to taste in between, so that it doesnt get too tangy. The way i prepare tamrind extract is more diluted than how it is generally prepared. So adjust the quantity of tamarind extract as per your taste.

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