Soy Chunks Curry

If there is a vegetable source that could almost taste like meat it is soy chunks. Soy chunks is also the healthier version of meat with all the protein content and none of the fat. Tempted enough to try it? :). But I have to warn you that it takes a while to get used to the taste of this one. Being a non-vegetarian myself though not an eager one, it took me a while to get hooked on to soy chunks and now I love it. It also depends on how you cook it, you need to be careful to squeeze out all the water content from the boiled soy chunks for it to taste well and infuse in itself the flavour of the curry you put it in. If you do cook it the right way, there is a quite a strong possibility that you will like soy chunks and if you are vegetarian, soy chunks can get you all the nutrients out of the meat. So go ahead and experiment on soy chunks and try to like it because its super healthy.

Ingredients

Serves - 3
Spice Level - High
Prep Time - 20 min
Cook time - 20 min

Soy chunks - 2 cups
Onion - 1 large, chopped well
Tomatoes - 3 medium sized, chopped into medium sized pieces
Ginger-Garlic Paste - 1.5 Tsp
Curry Leaves - 1 sprig
Turmeric - a pinch
Curry Powder/Masala Powder - 3 Tsp
Salt - as per need
Hing - a generous pinch
Mustard seeds - 1 Tsp
Jeera/Cumin seeds - 1 Tsp
Oil - 1 Tbsp

How do you do it

1. Bring few cups of water to a rolling boil in a pan. Add the soy chunks pieces and boil for a couple of minutes, switch off flame. Close the pan with a lid and leave it like that for 20 min

2. After 20 min, drain off all the water, show the bowl of soy chunks under running cold water to cool and rinse. Now take few pieces of soy chunks in you palm and squeeze as much as possible to remove all the water. Repeat for all the pieces of soy chunks and keep aside. This step is important, if you don't squeeze out the water properly, they will smell differently when they are in the curry.

3. After squeezing all the water out, cut each piece in 2 or 4 pieces, the soy chunks tend to become bigger in size once they are on the curry.

4. Heat oil in a kadai. Add hing, mustard seeds, jeera seeds and let them pop. Add the onions, curry leaves and Ginger-garlic paste and cook until the onions turn translucent.

5. Now add the tomato pieces, turmeric and a pinch of salt and mix well. Close the kadai with a lid until the tomatoes cook and turn soft and mushy.

6. At this stage, add the curry powder and saute for a couple of minutes.

7. Add two cups of water to the kadai and bring to boil. Add in the soy chunk pieces, remaining salt and on medium flame let it cook with lid closed.

8. It would take about 15 minutes at this stage for all the water to be absorbed and a thick curry to be formed after which you can switch off flame.

This would be a good side dish for rasam rice, curd rice and Rotis.