Srilankan Style Dal Curry

Its been four plus years since we updated this blog but better late than never. This lockdown period has truly allowed us to dig up old interests and spend more quantitative and qualitative time at home.

Having a mixed ancestry and parentage is advantageous in a lot of ways. One of it is the food. We get to taste different types of food at home. Below is our recipe to make Srilankan Dal Curry. I love it and enjoy it with different vegetable curries to go along with. My mom has earlier posted a similar recipe too with tomatoes though if you like them added.

This is a favourite among all of us at home. In fact, my aunts in Colombo and Canada are amazing cooks too and I can't wait to taste their food again someday soon.

Ingredients: 1 cup Red Lentils / Masoor Dal
7 to 8 nos Shallots sliced
2 to 3 Green Chilly slit
3 to 4 pods of garlic chopped
1/2 cup Thick coconut milk
Mustard and Cumin Seeds for Tempering
3 to 4 Red Chillies for Tempering
1 sprig curry leaves for Tempering
Oil for Tempering
Salt to taste
Water as per need

Method of preparation: 1. Wash the Red Lentils / Masoor Dal in at least three changes of water and until the water is transparent. Soak the lentils for at least half hour.
2. Heat a wok and add the Dal along with the water. Add in the Shallots, Green Chillies, Garlic, Turmeric powder and some curry leave. Stir it well and leave it to cook for 15 - 20 mins.

3. Check if cooked well, add half the coconut milk, salt to taste and half cup of water, stir and leave it to cook again if needed for a few mins.
4. Once cooked, add the balance coconut milk, stir and turn off the flame. For the Tempering: 1. Heat oil in a tiny wok and add the Mustard and Cumin seeds
2. Once it starts to splutter, add in the red chillies and curry leaves
3. Mix the above into the Dal curry

Date Chutney

This is a specialty chutney for the Jaffna Tamils. It is a sweet and sour and has a tangy taste. It is sinfully delicious. Goes very well with Rotis, Dosa, Idli, Bread etc.

I am excited to share this recipe today and also very happy to share that my grandsons enjoyed it as well. They are 8 and 10.
Ingredients: 

½ kg dates
100 gm raisins
200 ml vinegar
150 gm sugar 
Salt to taste

Ingredients

Ingredients to grind: 

1 large pod garlic
2” piece ginger 15-20 red chilies
3 tsp mustard seeds
Method: Wash clean & chop the dates. Soak in little vinegar for an hour. Soak ginger, garlic, mustard seeds, & broken red chilies in 100 ml vinegar for an hour. Grind the spices to smooth paste. Grind the dates in a mixer to a paste. In a heavy pan boil vinegar, sugar & the paste with enough salt to a boil. Add the date paste & cook stirring continuously until colour changes.

Date Chutney getting cooked

Drop the raisins & stir for 5 more minutes. Bring down the flame & cool. Store the chutney in bottles. This can be kept out side for a week. Refrigerate if you have to store longer.

Date Chutney

Malay Pickle

Malay Pickle also known as Achaaru is typical Srilankan delicacy equivalent to any pickle in India. However, this may be consumed along with Rotis, Idli, Dosa etc and even just as a snack.

I remember my mother whenever I prepare this for my family. Her hygienic way of preparation comes to my mind every time I make any Srilankan cuisine. I try and follow the same for all forms of cooking.

When I began to think about the dish I would take for the Chennai Bakers potluck this week, I shared about the number of dishes all the lovely ladies were going to bring. My daughter then suggested that I take something for everyone that they can take back home like a little token of love. I found that as a very good idea since there would be a lot of dishes that we can relish and enjoy. That's how I decided upon making Malay pickle and Date Chutney to be given to everyone attending.

Any sweet and sour lover would definitely love this.

Ingredients: 
500 gm baby onions
4 carrots
300 gm green chilies
100 gm dates
1 cup sugar
200 ml vinegar 
Salt to taste

Ingredients

Ingredients to Grind: 
20 red chilies
1 large pod garlic
2” ginger
4 tsp mustard
1000 gm dates
Method: Cut carrot into thin strips. Peel onion and keep them whole. Remove stems of green chilies. Cut dates into thin strips. Grind the paste ingredients smooth with little vinegar. Mix the paste with sugar and the balance vinegar. Mix thoroughly and heat till the mixture begins to boil. Pour over the vegetables and stir well. Store in bottles and serve after 2 days.

Malay Pickle ready

Srilankan style Masoor Dal Curry

This is like the Dal Fry in India but my children always said that this was more tastier.  Whenever I visit my brothers' homes, this is a must in their lunch. Best when served with rice.

Masoor Dhal Curry

Ingredients: 

1 cup masoor dhal

50 gm baby onions

2 green chilies

6 flakes garlic

1 sprig curry leaves

1 small tomato
½ tsp turmeric powder

½ cup thick coconut milk (Dabur coconut milk)

salt to taste.

Ing to Temper: 

2 tsp gingelly oil

½ tsp mustard seeds

2 red chilies

1 sprig curry leaves

Method: 

Wash & soak the dhal for 20 minutes. Add turmeric powder, chopped onion, chopped green chilies, chopped garlic, chopped curry leaves & a cup of water. Cook until dhal is soft. Add more water if required. Mash the dhal lightly & add salt & the coconut milk along with ½ cup water. Cook for 5 more minutes & remove. Heat oil in a separate pan & temper all the tempering ingredients & add to the dhal & mix. Serve with steamed rice & curry or idiappam.

Masoor Dal Curry

Srilankan style Vendhaya Kuzhambu

This gravy is a very tasty house hold dish in every Srilankan Tamil homes. This is specially prepared among the Jaffna Tamil people. I remember my mother make this every Friday when she piously follows the Viratham (Fast). Daily we used to scrape coconut in the coconut scraper. Our cooking involves a lot of coconut milk & one large coconut we use every day. Another ingredient that we use extensively is baby onions (sambar onions). I helped mother in the kitchen to scrape coconut, extract milk from scraped coconut & to peel plenty of small onions. This recipe needs both small onions & coconut milk.

Ingredients: 

200 gm baby onions

3 green chilies

12 flakes garlic

2 sprigs curry leaves

3 tsp fenugreek seeds

1 tomato

1 lime size ball of tamarind

½ cup thick coconut milk

1 cup thin coconut milk

1½ tbsp all purpose curry powder ( Masala chili powder)

½ cup oil

salt to taste.

Method: Fry sliced garlic and fenugreek in oil. When pale brown add chopped onions, slit green chilies and curry leaves. When nicely fried add chopped tomatoes & fry until dry. Pour squeezed and strained tamarind juice, salt, curry powder and thin coconut milk. Mix well and simmer on gentle flame for 10 to 15 minutes till the gravy thickens. Add thick milk and mix well. Cook for 5 minutes and remove. Serve with steamed rice, idiappam or puttu.

Vendhaya Kuzhambu

All purpose curry powder (the backbone of Srilankan Jaffna style cooking)

This masala is a must in Srilankan Jaffna Tamil household. Even now it is a practice of parents to send this masala to their children living abroad. Many Srilankan stores in countries like Great Britain, US, Canada & most & European countries regularly stock this masala. 

Ingredients: 

½ kg dania

¾ kg red chilies

75 gm pepper

75 gm cumin seeds

50 gm saunf

handful of curry leaves

2 tbsp methi seeds 

3 tbsp rice

4 sprigs curry leaves

Method: Dry roast dania. Two minutes later, add the red chilies. Roast for 2 minutes. Do this process in two to three batches. Spread on a sheet of paper. Roast other ingredients one by one. Mix into chilies. Cool and powder in a mill. Use this masala powder to vegetable gravies, fish, chicken & mutton gravies & vegetable curries.

Note: If you don’t want the masala to be spicy use ¾ kg dania & ½ kg chilies.

Srilankan Cuisine

Srilankan cooking is one of the most delicious cuisines. There are mainly the Jaffna Tamil cuisine & Sinhalese cuisine. Both cuisines are unique in their own way. 

The cooking methods & ingredients have a lot of influence from the Dutch, British & Kerala. As a major spice producing country the spices play a vital role in Srilankan cooking. Srilankans mostly follow a 4 meal pattern. Our breakfast begins at 7:30 am & by 8:30 our breakfast table is cleared. We usually have Idappam, puttu, sandwich or upma for breakfast followed by a banana or a slice of papaya. Often mom makes uluthankali with gingelly oil & jaggery. On Sundays most houses they make aappam (hoppers). During mango season we have 3 mangoes a day after each meal. Whenever jack fruits are in season it will replace the other fruits. Apart from these fruits we have custard apple & pineapples throughout the year. Our pineapples are so delicious & huge in size. There are a number of Sinhalese dishes made out of pineapple. I love the “Acharu” made by them. It used to be our daily snack while going back home from school. Spiciness, sweetness & sourness it has all. Our lunch time begins at 12 noon & closed by 1 pm. The staple diet of Srilanka is steamed rice which is normally served with fish, chicken or any other meat gravy, a salad, two to three vegetables & fish or chicken fry, rasam or sodhi (coconut milk gravy). We usually have curd as a dessert after meals with honey or sugar. 

When I came here in 1969 I was wondering how it is possible to have rice with sambar, a rasam & one vegetable. Later though I got used to it still I make 2 curries at least or a curry & a salad. Evening tea time is 4 pm with a snack for sure. Srilanka is very famous for its well known bakeries. At around 3:30 pm many bakeries send their salesmen in tricycle with many sweet & savoury baked goodies. They bring lovely chicken buns, fish buns, fish sandwich cakes, hot breads & sweet buns. Bakers of those days never used any chemicals to preserve their cakes & breads. No bread improvers used & the freshly baked breads aroma used to be so tempting. The evening snack may be 2 slices of bread with butter & jam, a fish bun or a sweet bun. Many a time mom made cakes & kept for our snack. At times she made vadas. 

Jaffna Tamil people used to make a snack with ripened Palmyra fruit (panaga paniaram). It can be kept for few days & had. We finish our evening meal with a cup of tea. Exactly at 8 pm we can sit at the dinning for our dinner. Our dinner menu used to be mainly idiappam & puttu. We never get fed up with idiappam & puttu. No oil no tempering & both are healthy steamed foods. Idiappam is usually had with egg sodhi & sambal. Puttu is had with sambal & vendhaya kuzhambu. Mostly we have puttu with fruits especially the mupazham (banana, mango & jack fruit). All the three fruits go very well with puttu & still I love that combination. 

On the whole every cuisine all over the world concerns about a balanced diet & Srilankan food is a good one among them. I still follow at least 50% of Srilankan food habits. I take this opportunity to give my followers a few delicious Srilankan dishes every now & then. Feel free to ask any queries. Try them out & enjoy.

Tangy Green Mango Salad Srilankan Style

It was the first day of the latest Intensive Icing and Cake Decoration Course at mom's place. Her helping hand to cook for the day called in sick. So mom had to juggle with lunch preparation as well for 9 of us along with preparing for the class. She called me before I left from home and asked me to help prepare the salad alone :-)

When I got there, she had a mango ready and I hate cutting raw mangoes :-) She told me all the ingredients. Got working on it and finished within a few minutes. I am not a big fan of raw mangoes but this turned out really tasty. Unfortunately, we did not click any pictures.

Here is the recipe to the Tangy Green Mango Salad. It is a salad popular among the Srilankan Tamil people. Amma says that It used to be in their menu during mango season. Needless to say it is once again a recipe from her mom's kitchen. Hmmm nostalgic memories.

The students relished it and therefore Amma wanted me to share the recipe here as well.

Ingredients: 

1 large raw mango, 2” piece tender ginger, ½ onion, 2 green chilies, ½ cup scraped coconut, salt to taste

Method: Peel the mango & chop fine. Chop the onion, ginger & green chilies & add to the mango. Mix in coconut & salt. Mix well & serve with rice & curry.

Srilankan Style Christmas Rich Cake

This post is by Mrs.Shyamala Sivaraman

Today, I would like to share one of my heirloom recipes as I call it which was passed down to me by my mother (this has been a treasured recipe for decades now). She was an expert at baking the Traditional Christmas Rich Cake. (Srilankan Style). This is truly a recipe to be treasured and I owe to my Amma today, without whom I wouldn’t be who I am.

I also thank KP Balakumar of Home Bakers Guild, An online forum exclusively for Home Bakers, for having given me an opportunity to get nostalgic and pen down my background with a recipe. To view, please click the link the below.

https://www.facebook.com/groups/homebakersguild/745850262123810/?notif_t=group_comment_reply

Ingredients for soaked fruits:

400 gm green raisins, 300 gm black raisins, 300 gm sultanas, 300 gm black currants, 300 gm dates, 400 gm pumpkin preserve, 200 gm glazed cherries, 100 gm ginger preserve, 100 gm candied peel, 200 gm cashew nuts, 1 cup mixed fruit jam, 2 cups caramelized sugar syrup, ½ cup bees honey, 2 tbsp rose water, 1 cup rum, 1 tbsp rose essence, 1 tbsp almond essence, 1 tbsp vanilla essence, 3 tbsp cake spice powder.

Method to soak the fruits:

Pick & clean all the variety of raisins etc. Wash & dry under fan. Stone the dates. Wash & dry under the fan. Chop all the fruits & mix with the rest of the ingredients except cashew nuts. Soak for 2- 3 months. The taste, colour & texture improve with the number of days the fruits are soaked. Mix the chopped nuts before adding to the cake mixture.

Ingredients for the cake spice powder:
¼ cup cardamoms, 1/8 cup cloves, ¼ cup cinnamon pieces, ½ a nutmeg, 1 tbsp mace.

Method for the cake spice powder:
Dry roast all the spices separately except the nutmeg. Grate the nutmeg & grind all together to a smooth powder. Sieve & store in bottle. Use as required.

To prepare the trays:

Line 13”/9” or 12”/8” trays with 4 layers of paper & with 1 layer of buttered butter paper.

Ingredients for the cake:
225 gm butter, ½ tsp salt, 350 gm powdered sugar, 225 gm semolina, 12 yolks of eggs, 6 whites of eggs stiffly beaten, 2¼ kg soaked fruits, essences & cake spice powder as per requirement, 2 tbsp cocoa powder.

Method to prepare the cake:
Roast the semolina lightly. Cool & mix with butter & keep aside. Separate the whites of eggs & beat all the whites with salt until very stiff. Beat the yolks & the powdered sugar together to a thick paste. Mix in the semolina & butter mixture & beat well. Add the fruits & add more essences & spice powder as required. Add the beaten egg whites & mix gently with hands. Pour into prepared trays. Bake the cake at 175°c temperature for 45 minutes. Reduce temperature to 160°c & bake for 10 more minutes until the cake is firm.

Ingredients to drench the cake:
1 cup sugar syrup, ½ cup rum

Method to wrap & store the cake:
Bake the cake & cool. Make syrup & cool. Add rum to the cooled syrup. Mix well & drench the cake all over. Cut into pieces, drench syrup on all sides & wrap in butter paper. This can be stored for more than 6 months. In cool climates can be stored for a year. Usually when we make wedding cake with this recipe the couple, store the cake for their 1st anniversary.

Fruits soaked.

Soaked fruits after 3 months

Cakes filled into trays

Cakes baked & ready to be drenched in syrup

Cakes sliced & wrapped

Cakes wrapped as Bon-Bons

Milk Toffee - An ultimate delicacy

This sweet is a favourite among all my family members and a whole lot of others too who have had a chance to taste this. I tried out this sweet with my moms (a perfect teacher) help at the age of 13. It turned out to be good & the motivation from her was immense. Today as a teacher myself, I hear my students often saying that most mothers dont allow their daughters to venture into the kitchen in fear of them getting the Kitchen messy. But my mom let me cook & ofcourse with her strict instructions. I cherish those moments. I owe 100% to her for what I am today and I miss her too immensely.

This recipe has the unique taste of condensed milk with the aromatic flavour of cardomoms melting into your mouth instantly. This is an all time favourite sweet specially during the Diwali season in our household. Being my first blog, I wanted my first recipe which I tried on my own to be my first contribution for readers. I dedicate this to my guardian angel - My Mother.

Ingredients:



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Ingredients for Milk Toffee



1 tin condensed milk

400 gm sugar

¼ cup water

100 gm butter

3 tbsp chopped cashew nuts

1 tsp vanilla essence

1 tsp cardamom powder

Method:

1. Grease a 11”/7” halwa tray & keep aside

2. Mix water with sugar in a heavy pan & set on moderate heat

3. When sugar dissolves, add condensed milk & stir continuously

4. Add butter a tbsp at a time & continue to stir

5. When the mixture turns thick add nuts, essence & cardamom powder
6. Drop a little mixture into a bowl of water

7. The mixture has to form a ball & when dropped should retain its shape

8. Immediately pour into the tray & spread evenly

9. Cut into squares while still warm

Tip: Sugar syrup for sweets, toffees and candies must be cooked to the right consistency. Overcooked syrup will harden the toffees.



Irresistable Milk Toffee

The above entry goes to Radhika's Tickling palates:Announcing Diwali special sweets and savories