Arbi/Colocassia/Taro Root/Sepankezhangu Roast

Arbi/Colocassia/Taro Root/Sepankezhangu Roast


This vegetable used to be on the agenda usually on Sundays as mom would have a bit more time to cook. She would usually fry it and season with salt and add lots of chilly powder. It would taste the best when still hot as the outside would be crispy and inside soft. I also used to prefer taking pieces from the bottom of the dish as most of the chilly powder would have settled there, hot, hot, hot!! There is another delicious way of cooking this vegetable by adding some spice mixture and coconut and slowly roasting. I like both but obviously the oil in deep frying is No, No! So I did eventually arrive at a compromise.

I tried to get this vegetable at the asian store and noticed something looking like Arbi. Its name was Mukhi and had no clue what that was. I googled as usual and found it was the Bangladeshi name for Arbi. My brother bought some of this nice vegetable from London as I usually ask him to buy some Indian vegetables every trip. Here is more info on my compromise...

½ kg Arbi

1 teaspoon chilly powder

Salt as required

Asafoetida

¼ teaspoon Turmeric powder

Little over a teaspoon cooking oil

1 teaspoon mustard seeds

Wash the Arbi well so there is no mud. Steam it for about 30 minutes. You could pressure cook but I would be wary of over cooking it as it may become mushy.

Peel the skin. Doing this when still slightly hot makes the process a bit easier. Cut into bite size pieces.

In a mixing bowl add the vegetable and all other ingredients except salt. Mix well and rest for about 10 minutes. In the meantime preheat the oven to 180degC.

Spread the Arbi on a foil placed on a baking tray and cook for 20 minutes.

Give the veggies a quick stir just so they get evenly cooked and cook for further 15 minutes.

Remove from oven, season with salt and mix

In a skillet add little oil to temper the mustard seeds and add the vegetables and mix.

This way you will get a crispy outside and soft inside. To spice things up I added a special powder. If you fancy this, just roast a teaspoon of channa dal, a teaspoon of coriander seeds, 2 red chillies and grind. Add and cook for a couple of minutes. This powder is optional though.

Enjoy the lovely low fat roast! This tastes great with Mor Kuzhambu.

Corn Pulav/Corn Pilaf/Corn Pulao

Corn pulav

At the end of a hot and humid day nothing could be better than a walk down the huge Marina beach. My brother usually enjoys driving so it would not really matter how late it was, we will just drive to the beach and take a walk, good old days! Common sight there was ice cream vendors, mango vendors, people selling steamed groundnut (yumyum!) and charred corn cobs! It was so much fun having the corn cob charred on a flame in front of you and rubbing lime over it and just eating the corn straight off the cob. Wow!

When I started working, I used to do food shopping more often and also with less guilt because I could pay for any of my experiments. I happened to join a diet plan in the canteen at work and was given boiled corn as a snack. I liked the sweetness and fact that it was moist and easy to eat and not dry. I then looked for and found frozen corn and it was in my routine to boil some every Saturday and sit in front of the TV and snack. Having said all that, I usually am not particularly fond of corn in a meal, like in rice or sambar. I still wanted to make corn pulav because my brother and sister-in-law were visiting us and they both like corn. Here is one way of making corn pulav and I think I will be coming up with more as corn has so much potential. All of us enjoyed this pulav, hope you do as well...

1 cup rice

1 cup cooked corn (I use frozen corn kernels)

3-4 green chillies

2-3 tablespoon grated coconut/coconut powder

2-3 handful fresh coriander leaves

1 red onion thinly sliced

1 red onion chopped

1 inch ginger piece (optional)

4-5 garlic cloves (optional)

1 cinnamon piece

2 cardamom pods

1 bay leaf

2 cloves

Cooking oil

Salt to taste

Cook the rice in water containing the whole spices (cinnamom, cardamom, bay leaf and cloves). This can be done whether you are pressure cooking or not. This way of cooking will help get all nice flavour and aroma from the spices into the rice. If you have time and energy, fry the spices in a teaspoon oil and also fry rinsed, drained rice and then cook it. Try to keep the grains separate.

Fry the chopped onions along with chillies, ginger and garlic. Cool and grind to a paste along with coriander and coconut.

Fry sliced onions until golden brown and add the ground paste. Cook until raw smell goes and nice aroma comes.

To cook the corn, either steam it or boil it in adequate water. Add corn and rice to the onion paste mixture.

Season with salt and serve hot with raita.

Typically, 1 cup rice is adequate for 2 people.

Aloo Paratha

In school, I had a couple of North Indian friends. Lunch sharing was quite common and we quite enjoyed that. My favorite was the stuffed parathas my north Indian friends use to bring. I use to love it so much that I spent some time learning from one of the mothers who made it. It is a shame I never practised it and forgot. Everytime I use to make official trips to Delhi, I would make sure I get a lot of parathas there. Once I remember I went to the extent of going to someone’s house only to have parathas for breakfast. I packed one paratha that was leftover and shamelessly had it for lunch while the rest of my team was munching on the canteen food. Ah, who cares, parathas are worth it. My better half is quite the opposite. He does not like parathas and quite obviously I do not make it very frequently as I am not prepared to make different items for each one. Recently my husband fancied Chinese food and as he was missing Wang’s kitchen (which is actually in Chennai and not China), he asked me to make vegetable claypot. I was not keen on rice for meal so decided to make paratha for me. I had boiled potatoes in my fridge and soon parathas took shape! Here is how I did

2 medium sized boiled potatoes

2 small green chillies (finely chopped)

½ teaspoon dhania powder

½ teaspoon jeera powder

2-3 tablespoon freshly and finely chopped coriander leaves

¼ teaspoon turmeric powder

Regular chapatti dough to make the parathas

Optional ingredients – ginger garlic paste/ginger paste, Amchur powder, bread crumbs

Grate the potatoes. Try to use refrigerated boiled potatoes as they have lesser moisture than freshly boiled ones.

Mix all ingredients except the dough. If the mixture is a bit sticky or very moist, add some breadcrumbs. Otherwise, the parathas will be hard to make.

Take a lemon sized piece of dough. Round it in your hands and make a chapatti out of it.

Make a ball of the potato mixture and place in the centre of the chapatti and wrap it by folding the dough over it.

Try to press this with your hand as much as possible. To help with rest, use the rolling pin. Be careful not to let the stuffing come out.

Put it on a hot pan and wait until bubbles begin to appear. Then turn the paratha and wait for it to just start to rise. Turn again and now gently press the paratha to encourage it to rise. Add a wee bit of ghee once taken off the flame.

Here are few tips and options –

You could put all ingredients in a food processor rather than grate and chop. If using the optional ingredients, just mix it with potatoes and other ingredients.

For chapatti dough, take a cup of wheat flour, pinch of salt, half cup hot water. Mix to form smooth dough and knead well. When possible, allow the dough to rest for couple of hours.

Try not to cook them on low flame as they will turn hard. For nice soft parathas, cook on medium to high flame.