Majjiga Pulusu

Majjiga Pulusu

Andhra style curd curry with ash gourd. Best with rice. Recipe from Southern Spice by Chandra Padmanabhan !!

Serves: 4 – 6

Preparation time: 10 minutes

Cooking time: 15 minutes

This is a delicious curd kuzhambu from Andra Pradesh, perfect for those who need to cut out coconut from their diet.

Ingredients

For the curd:

2 cups (500 ml) slightly sour curd, whisked

3 teaspoon gram flour (besan / kadala maav)

½ teaspoon sugar

1 ¼ teaspoon salt (or to taste)

Combine curd, gram flour, sugar and salt in a bowl and whisk till well blended (or in a Tupperware quick shaker). Keep aside.

For spice powder:

1 teaspoon oil

1 teaspoon fenugreek seeds (methi / uluva)

4 dried red chillies

Heat oil for spice powder in a deep frying pan or kadai over medium heat. Add remaining ingredients for spice powder and fry for a few moments till fragrant. Remove from heat and ground to a fine powder.

Other ingredients

300 g ash gourd, peel off the outer skin and remove seeds and cut into ½ - inch cubes

2 green chillies, slit lengthwise

½ teaspoon turmeric powder

½ - inch piece ginger, grated

Method

Place turmeric, green chillies and ginger with 1 cup (225 ml) water in the pan used for frying spices and bring to boil. Mix in ash gourd, cover pan and simmer for 5 – 7 minutes till tender.

Lower heat, pour in blended curd mixture and simmer for uncovered for 3 – 4 minutes, stirring continuously. Or please follow double boiling method.

(Or cook over a double boiler ( double boiler -a pair of saucepans, one of which fits above and partly inside the other: food is cooked in the upper one by water boiling in the lower and it helps even cooking and curd won’t curdle ).

Sprinkle in spice powder, mix well and simmer for 1 minute longer.

For seasoning:

2 teaspoon oil

1 teaspoon mustard seeds

½ teaspoon asafoetida powder (hing)

6 curry leaves

Heat oil for seasoning in a small pan and add remaining ingredients for seasoning. When mustard seeds start spluttering, pour seasoning over majjiga pulusu. Serve hot with plain rice.