17 April 2014

Venpongal

Venpongal is a very common and popular dish served in most of the South Indian restaurant, especially in Tamil Nadu. It is a rice dish, hence very filling to your stomach. In tamil nadu hotels, venpongal with chutney and sambar is irresistable. Also venpongal is a common offering in many temple's in and around tamil nadu. In south tamil nadu, a sambar like side-dish called "gotsu" will be the side-dish for pongal.

Venpongal is rice & dhal cooked and pepped up with some spice powders. The major ingredient to this rice dish, is ghee, which makes it a very rich and tasty dish.

Ingredients:

1. Moong dhal - 1/4 Cup
2. Raw Rice - 1 Cup
3. Water - 4 Cups
4. Pepper seeds - 1 tsp
5. Cumin seeds - 1 tsp
6. Chopped ginger pieces - 1 tsp
7. Cashews - 10 (broken)
8. Hing - 1 tsp
9. Curry leaves - 6
10. To grind : Pepper seeds - 1/2 tsp , Cumin seeds - 1/2 tsp
11. Ghee - 4 to 5 tsp
12. Salt - 1 to 2 tsp
13. Turmeric powder - a pinch



Pre-requisite:

1. Dry roast the moong dhal until it becomes slightly brown & cool.
2. Dry roast the raw rice until it becomes stiff & cool.
3. Grind to a powder and keep ready - Pepper seeds - 1/2 tsp + Cumin seeds - 1/2 tsp.
4. In a teaspoon of ghee, fry the cashews to slight brown and keep ready.

Method:

1. Add into pressure cooker, the fried moong dhal, fried rice, water, pepper seeds, cumin seeds, ginger pieces, hing, curry leaves , tumeric powder & required salt. Keep the cooker open and wait till the water becomes hot and starts to nicely boil, at this juncture, nice aroma of hing and ginger can be felt. At this stage, close the pressure cooker and immediately add weight and keep on medium flame and cook till 4 to 5 whistles and then switch off and remove.



2. Wait for the pressure to completely drop and then open the cooker and mash the pongal mixture very nicely using a ladle (karandi in tamil).



3. Add lavishly ghee (about 3 to 4 tsp) & pepper-cumin powder and mix well. Check for salt and adjust now.


4. When pongal is thoroughly mashed and mixed well, towards the end, add the fried cashew and mix well.



5. Pongal is ready to serve with the ideal combination of coconut chutney or brinjal gotsu.



Tips:

1. To get a very tasty pongal (as we get in hotel), it is important that we should be little lavish with ghee, as it gives the pongal its taste and flavour. So adding extra few spoons at the time of serving makes it even more good.

2. The proportion of dhal:rice:water should roughly be 1/4:1:4 1/2 (2 1/4 cups for rice + 1 3/4 cups for dha, so totally 4 1/2 cups of water). If you're doubtful about water proportion for pongal, it's ok to add little extra water as the pongal should be mashed well. If the water quantity is not enough, the rice will not be cooked well and even with lots of effort to mash, it will not mash well.

3. In case the water quantity is less, which you realise after opening the cooker, then immediately heat up 2 cups of water and add the boiled water little by little and mash the pongal to get the desired consistency.

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