Hotel Style Sambar

Sambar, sambhar, Sambaaru, or Kuzhambu

Ingredients:

• Arhar dal / Toor dal (Thuvaram paruppu) - ½ cup
• Green chili - 3
• Sambar Onion or Small onion - 10 (or a big onion)
• Vegetables like drumstick, potato, eggplant, carrot, radish, beans- 2 cups.
• Tomato - 1
• Tamarind - a betel nut size
• Turmeric powder - ¼ tsp
• Asafetida / perungayam /Hing - 2 pinches
• Jaggery  - ½ tsp
• Red chilies - 4
• Black gram / uluntham paruppu /Urad dal - 1 tsp
• Cumin seeds / Jeerakam - 1 tsp
• Coriander seeds / malli / dhania - 1½ tsp
• Fenugreek seeds (vendhayam) - ½ tsp
• Curry leaves - 3 sprigs
• Grated coconut - 4 tsp
• Edible oil: for frying and tampering
• Salt - to taste

For tampering:

• Mixture of mustard seeds and husked black gram (Urad dal) - 1 tsp
• Curry leaves - a sprig

Method of preparation:

• Take a pressure cooker. Add the dal with 1½ cups of water. Cook for about 3 whistles. Wait for some time. Release the pressure and slightly smash the cooked dal.

• Soak tamarind in a little water for about 15 minutes. Squeeze and obtain its extract.

• Cut onion, tomato and vegetables. Slit the green chilies length-wise.

• Heat a little oil in a pan. Add red chilies, dal, cumin seeds, coriander seeds, fenugreek seeds, curry leaves, grated coconut and fry till it turns light brown. Make a fine smooth paste of the fried ingredients with little water.

• Heat oil in a pan. Add green chilies and onion, fry till onion turns brown.
• Add all the cut vegetables and fry for about 2 minutes. Add tomato, asafetida and turmeric powder. Fry for a minute. Pour enough water so as to fully immerse the vegetables. Cover and cook till the vegetables are cooked.
• When the vegetables are cooked, add tamarind extract, jaggery, salt and the ground paste. Cover with a lid and bring to boil.

• Add the cooked dal and required water. Remove from heat when samabar starts boiling.

• Heat oil in a pan. Add mustard seeds and husked black gram. While spluttering, add curry leaves, remove from heat and add this with sambar.

Tastes good with idli, dosai, ooththappam / oothappam / uthappam, vadai, pattanam pakoda, bonda, pongal and cooked rice.

Onion Rava Dosa

It is a delicious, crispy, easy to prepare, thin pancake called Vengaya ravai thosai in Tamil.
Ravai, rava, rawa, ravva, sooji, ravey or ravam is made from wheat. It is called semolina in English. Husk removed wheat is grinned to form rava. Wheat is ground in a flour mill. Then it is passed through a fine mesh. Finally the flour and rava are separated.

Ingredients:

• Roasted semolina: 1/2 cup
• Rice flour: 1/2 cup
• Maida: ¼ cup (optional)
• Salt to taste
  
  For seasoning:
• Finely chopped onion: 2 tbsp
• Chopped green chili: 3 or 4 as desired
• Mustard(kaduku /rai)
• Cumin (jeera / jeeragam)
• Curry leaves (karipatha / karuveppilai)
• Coriander leaves (dhania patha / kothamalli ilai)
• Edible oil: I tbsp
  

Method of preparation:

• Mix rava, rice flour, maida, salt and water to make a thin batter.
• Heat oil in a pan.
• Add cumin seed, curry leaves, green chili, and onion one after the other.
• Sauté thoroughly.
• Add to the batter.
• Heat griddle / tawa / dosaikkal.
• Spray about ½ tsp of oil.
• Stir the batter and pour a ladleful (ladle is karandi) of it on the hot griddle.
• Tilt the griddle to make the batter flow around.
• Cook on medium flame till crisp on one side.
• Turn the thin pancake upside down with the help of a flat turning device called dosa spatula or dosai karandi.
• Both the sides will become crisp and brown.
• Remove from griddle.
• Repeat for making similar onion dosas from the remaining batter.

Serve hot with chutney, sambar, kuruma / kurma, thuvaiyal and / or potato masala.