GONGURA PACHADI and PULUSU 

​

Contains Garlic

Contains nuts and seeds

Serves: 3 to 4 people

​

Ingredients:

Gongura/Sorrel Leaves - 4 bunches or 300 grams

Salt - As needed

Kashmiri Chilli Powder - 1 tablespoons

Sesame Seeds - 1 tablespoon *

Tamarind - small lemon size *

Oil  -  1/4 cup

​

Methi Powder:

Fenugreek/Methi Seeds - 1/2 tablespoon

Mustard Seeds - 2 tablespoons

Dry red chillies - 5

 

For tempering:

Dry Red Chilli - 3 Nos

Curry leaves - As needed

Garlic - 5 pods

Mustard Seeds - 1 teaspoon

Hing - 1/2 teaspoon

 

Methi Powder Procedure:​​

1. Take a kadai, heat up, simmer and add methi seeds. On medium flame dry roast them, sautéing continuously,  to evenly turn dark brown on all sides. Do not roast them on high flame, as the outer cover burns quick leaving insides raw and bitter. 

2. A wonderful aroma releases out of methi seeds once they are fried. To test, take a few seeds and crush them. Insides should be brown as well and not yellow or white.

3. Add mustard seeds and dry red chillies. Sauté for one min on simmer. You will hear them crackling. Switch off the flame, transfer them to mixie jar. Let them cool down and grind to a fine powder.

4. You can make this as a batch and store it in deep freezer. We can use this for all the pulusu recipes.

 

Gongura Pachadi Procedure:

1. Separate the sorrel leaves from the stems, thoroughly wash and dry them out on a cotton cloth at least for six hours. {This drying process is very important for gongura pachadi or pulusu. Helps cut the slimy texture of the leaves when put on heat}.

2. Add 1/8 cup oil to the pan, once hot add finely chopped sorrel leaves (chopping the leaves, again cuts down the slime and helps in quick frying), half of garlic pods and fry. They should be thoroughly fried till they turn dark brown (do not burn to black, leave them on medium flame and mix once in a while).  We should not see the green, gooey texture in the kadai. The leaves should turn to dry paste with oil oozing out from sides.

3. If you feel the paste is sticking to the walls of kadai, keep adding a tablespoon of oil to the sides, scrape the mixture and sauté.

4. Cool down and pulse it in the mixer once or twice on whip mode. Don't grind it to smooth paste. It should have that stringy, crunchy texture.

5. Heat up a tablespoon oil, fry remaining garlic, switch off stove, add sorrel leaves mixture and methi powder. Mix well. With this step gongura pachadi is ready. Continue steps down below for pulusu recipe. [Do not add methi powder while flame is on, recipe may turn bitter]

​​

Gongura Pulusu:

1. Heat up a tablespoon oil, add mustard, curry leaves, hing and half of prepared pachadi. Add 1.5 cups of water to this and let it come to boil in the kadai. If the sorrel leaves are not sour, add tamarind juice here. If you feel they are too sour, dry roast the sesame seeds and add the powder at this stage.​

2. Add salt and Kashmiri chilli powder as needed.

3. Simmer and let the pulusu boil till oil and floats on top. Switch off and serve with hot rice. 

4. Adding one tablespoon of raw sesame oil for both pachadi and pulusu enhances the taste.

​