Fish Curry

I love fish - Let it be curried or fried. Let me share a fish dish with you. It is ideal when served with rice or boiled tapioca.

Ingredients:
Fish - 1/2 Kg
Coconut - Grated 1/2 cup or for straining milk -1
Red Chilli Powder- 2tbsp
Turmeric-1/2tsp
Cocum- 5-6 pieces
Salt to taste
Oil- 2tbsp
Curry Leaves- 1 sprig
Onion- 3-4 pieces

Method of Preparation:
Clean the fish well . Grind coconut well with red chilli powder and turmeric. Mix the fish with the ground masala, cocum, salt and sufficient water. Cook well in medium heat. When the gravy thickens add oil and crushed onions and curry leaves. Remove from fire and serve hot.

Variation:
1. The same can be made with coconut milk instead of ground coconut. Strain first milk (1/2 cup) and second milk (2 cups) from the grated coconut by adding water. Saute crushed onions, ginger (1 small piece), turmeric, red chilly powder in oil (or you can mix all the ingredients in the second milk and bring to a boil) Add the second milk, fish, salt and cocum. Boil on medium heat. When the fish is almost done and the gravy thickens add the first milk and remove from fire.

2. You can use onions and tomatos also if you like it. If so, heat oil and cook onion and tomato fairly well before adding the fish and other ingredients. I prefer cocunut milk rather than ground coconut when i prepare fish curry.

Tips:
Instead of cocum, raw mango pieces can be used. But taste varies. Again, you should remove cocum based on the flavour after cooking / keeping it for sometime.

Kachyamoru or Pulicherry

Another easy to make dish... But I have yet another easy way to make moru curry which I will share after the typical kerala way of making moru curry.

Ingredients:
· Buttermilk - 4 cups
· Ginger Sliced - 3/4 dsp
· Grated coconut - 4 dsp
· Shallots - 2
· Green chillies - 6
· Turmeric - 1 piece
· Garlic - 2 cloves
· Cummin seeds - 1/4 tsp
· Salt

Seasoning:
· Ghee or oil - 2 dsp
· Sliced shallots - 1 dsp
· Curry leaves - 1 sprig
· Fried and powdered fenugreek - 1/2 tsp
· Mustard seeds and fenugreek - 1/2 tsp each
· Dry chillies - 2
· Chilly powder - 1/4 tsp

Method:
Grind the coconut, shallots, garlic and cummin seeds together. Slit the green chillies and cook it along with the ginger in salt solution in which ground turmeric is mixed. When almost dry, remove from fire and mix the buttermilk. Heat the oil, splutter the mustard and fenugreek and the curry leaves, put shallots and broken dry chillies. When the onion is fried remove from fire, put the chilly powder and fenugreek powder. Add the ground coconut put it back on fire and saute the coconut for sometime. Pour buttermilk diluting the coconut paste and stir well. When the butter milk is heated remove from fire and stir till cool.

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My easy way::
This is one dish which my husband is an expert.

1 thinly diced onion / 5 diced shalots
1 diced tomato
3 green chilles sliced
2 cup curd
1 sprig
Cummin seeds
Mustard
Chilly powder
Turmeric powder

Heat the oil, splutter the mustard and the curry leaves, put shallots/ onion, tomato and chillies. When the onion and tomato are properly cooked, put the chilly powder, turmeric powder and salt . Saute for sometime. Pour curd and stir well. When the curd is heated remove from fire and stir till cool.

You can put a little chicken / meat masala powder as well. It gives a nice taste;-)
Try it out!

Fish/ prawn Peera Pattichathu

This is a semi dry dish made with fish, coconut and cocum. Usually whole small fishes like kozhuva/chooda and small sardines are used to make this preparation. This is a delicious dish if made with the right amount of ingredients.

Ingredients:
Fish - 1kg
Ginger - 1 medium piece
Turmeric powder - 1/2tsp
Salt - to taste
Garlic flakes -2
Green Chilli- 1dsp
Grated coconut - 1 cup
Tamarind -Cocum (Kodampuli) - 4-5 pieces
Coconut Oil -2dsp
Onion - cup
Curry leaves

Method of Preparation:

Crush the grated coconut, ginger, turmeric, garlic, salt and Green chillies. Clean the fish well and mix it with the crushed ingredients in mud pot. Add tamarind and a little water and cook until done with most of the water evaporated. Season curry leaves and chopped onions in oil. Then add this mixture to the fish preparation and mix well.

Variation:

Small prawns can also be used to make this dish with the same ingredients. Here prawns are first cooked with 1-2 small pieces of cocum, salt and water. After seasoning, (mustard seeds are also seasoned), add the crushed ingredients to it and sauté for some time. Then add the cooked prawns kept aside to this mixture and keep on fire for some time. Serve hot.

Lady's Finger Kichadi

Another typical Kerala dish...

Ingredients:
3.5 cup Lady's finger pieces
2 cup Thick Curd from 1/2 litre milk
2 Green chillies
3 Dry Red chillies
1 dsp Mustard
Half cupGrated coconut
2 springs Curry leaves
2 tsp Oil
Salt to taste

Method of Preparation:
Slice the ladies finger in small round pieces. Fry lady's finger in oil till crisp. Ground coarsely grated coconut, green chillies and mustard. Season mustard, red chilli and curry leaves in 2 tsp oil. Lower the flame add curd and the ground ingredients. Keep stirring. Add fried ladies finger and salt. Remove from fire when it boils.

You can use Pavakkai (Bitter Gourd) instead of Ladies Finger as a variation.

Kadala Curry

Kadala curry is another traditional dish of Kerala. Puttu can be accompanied with any savories of your choice, but Kadala Curry is considered to be its better half.

Ingredients:

Black ChickPeas (Kadala) - 1 cup
Sliced Onion - 1 medium
Sliced Green Chillies - 2
Sliced Tomato - 1/2
Ginger-Garlic Paste - 1 tbsp
Curry Leaves - a few
Grated coconut - 1 tbsp
Chopped Coriander Leaves - 1 tbsp
Red Chilly Powder - 1/2 tsp
Coriander powder - 1 and 1/2 tsp
Turmeric powder -1/4 tsp
Mustard Seeds -1/2 tsp

Method:

Soak chickpeas overnight. Cook it in a pressure cooker adding enough water, salt, green chillies, half of ginger-garlic paste and half of sliced onion. Heat little oil in a pan and add grated coconut into it. Fry till light brown and remove it from the pan and clean it well. Keep aside to cool. When it is cooled, grind it along with 2 tsp of cooked chickpeas and coriander leaves. Again add oil into the same pan and add mustard seeds into it. When they pop, add the curry leaves and the rest of onion and ginger-garlic paste. Saute till the onion turn brown. Add all the maslas and tomato into it. Saute well. Add cooked chickpeas along with the water into the pan. Mix well and allow it to boil for 5 minutes. Just before switching off add ground mixture into the curry. Stir well and simmer it for 2 more minutes. Serve hot.
This goes well with Appam, Idiappam or Puri as well.

Puttu / Steam cake

Ingredients :

Puttu powder / Rice flour - 2 Cup
Fresh Grated Coconut - 1 Cup
Salt - As Required
Water - As required

Method :

Mix powder in a bowl, add salt and add water little by little and mix well.The flour should be wet enough for steaming. If you are using rice flour, it is better if you can just warm it for a while in a low flame. Dont let the colour change. If you are using puttu powder,then no need to warm. Be careful while adding water - Add little by little to get the correct consistency.
Keep your puttu maker ready, now layer it with coconut and the flour mix. First layer it with some coconut, then puttu powder, then coconut again and so on.The last and the first layer will be coconut. Steam it for 5 - 8 mins on top of the cooker or the regular puttu maker.
When done serve hot with kadala curry or steamed plantains or mutton/ chicken curry or anything else. It tastes just good with most of the curries.

Note: After cooking it, if you let the vessel stand and cool for a few minutes, the Puttu will come out clean - Inbroken.