A quickfix Coconut Chutney or Dip, and the dietary mineral Calcium

Need makes you inventive. I think there exist a couple of sayings on this too. So, yesterday I made Cheelas (North Indian savoury pancakes) -a spontaneous idea again! So, I required a real quick fix chutney to accompany it. I had the sweet varieties in stock in the fridge, but I wanted something spicy and salty. Sunny boy didn't really require it, it was more meant for me and hubby. I made it at the very last moment infact. I basically opened the fridge and saw these preserved chillis and just got going, tasted it and was totally surprised with the wonderful taste. The cheela recipes will follow soon- a gluten free version. *grin* :)

Here is the Coconut Chutney:

Ingredients:
1 cup dessicated coconut
150 g plain yoghurt (5 oz or a little more than 1/2 cup)
3 red or green chillies / hot peppers preserved in brine or vinegar* ( reduce amount to taste)
salt to taste
1 pinch sugar
1 tbsp chopped coriander or fresh mint (opional)- I didn't have then handy

Method:
Puree eveyrthing in a deep bowl with a hand stick blender for a few minutes. Serve in a bowl!

*Optinally: add some vinegar to chopped fresh chillies and grind with the coconut.

We were both tremendously pleased and missed nothing after eating it along with our wonderfully tasting cheelas.

Calcium
An unrelated topic to this post is some information I have collected in these posts at Healthy and Tasty on dietary calcium:
How much calcium does a child need?
What affects calcium absorption?
I'm posting these here to have a link to them here at this blog as well.

South Indian chutneys

So that I don't have to search for these tried and tested recipes in my books, I am putting down these here:

Cococnut-Groundnut chutney

Ingridients:
1/4 cup (40 g) groundnuts, roasted and skinned
1 cup (90 g) coconut, grated
and 2 tbsp water
( or
1/2 cup dessicated coconut, grated
soaked in 1 cup water)
1/3 cup yoghurt, beaten
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp sugar (optional)
1-3 green chillies (for only a taste jst add a pinch of red chilli)

Tempering:
1 tbsp oil
1/2 tsp mustard seeds
1/2 tsp split skinned black gram
6 small curry leaves
1 pinch hing (asafoetida)

a handfull of coriander leaves (cilantro), washed and chopped

Method:

• Grind together the ingredients for the chutney with a hand blender. Add salt to taste.

• Het oil in a small pan, let mustard and urad dal splutter, add curry leaves, switch off heat, add hing, stir and add to the chutney along with chopped cilantro
  
• Serve to Indian foods, more typically idlis and dosas. Can be used along with Indian style bread sandwitches with Indian spiced veggys, Pattys or even pakoras just like green chutney.
  

Gun Powder

This is one of the different varieties of dry powders or Podis, as they are called in the south, served with idli, dosa or simply rice. The good thing about it is that it can be made in advance and stored in airtight glass containers for months. Whenever you require it just add a little bit of any oil or even ghee to it to bind the powder. Mix with rice, idlis and dosas, and serve. I have even tried it with toasted bread and potatoes subzi. I discovered this powder in India as a teenager through my mothers South Indian friends and I just love it!
That you can also add peanut to the powder is new to me, which I found in one recipe once. And I think that gives a good flavour too. There are very many different sorts of Podis with lots of variations. Like in some, you also add black pepper or coriander seeds or fresh curry leaves.


This is how I make it:

Ingredients:

1/2 cup Urad daal, skinned
1/2 cup channa (chickpea) daal
1/4 cup sesame seeds
1/2 cup peanuts (optional)
3 dried red chillies, or to taste
1 big pinch hing (asafoetida)
1 1/2 tsp salt, or to taste
oil as per requirement

Other optional additions:
1 tbsp coconut, dessicated
1 tbsp curry leaves, roasted on medium heat
1/2 inch piece jagery,
(or 1 tsp sugar)


Method:

• Roast separately the daals, sesame and peanuts, red chillies, corry leaves one after the other on medium heat until you smell the flavour and let them cool down on a plate
• Grind everything together in a coffee mill or any dry grinder
• Once cooled down completely on a large plate store in an airtight glass jar
  
• Before serving, add a few teaspoons of podi in a small bowl or katori and add about a teaspoon of oil to bind the powder and serve with idlis, dosas, rice etc.
  

Another Gun powder link

Coconut pudding with fruit topping

This recipe is a pure experiment and is still developing. This was my first and very spontaneous trial today with coconut, as I had a strong urge to make something with coconut, not a मिठाई but something to eat wih a spoon.
I had a flavour in my mind. I don't remember from where and from when, but it was too faint for me to be sure of its ingredients and i really had to think hard to figure out what I wanted and how it should taste. But the worst part was that I did not have all the ingredients and I had to improvise.
So, here it is:

Coconut pudding with fruit topping
Mix in the following order in a sauce pan and cook:
1 cup evaporated milk (10% fat)
1 cup sugar
1 can of coconut milk (2-3 cups)
2 tbsp coconut grated (fresh or dessicated)
2-3 cups milk, first add only 2 cups and if required the third one
1 cup durum wheat semolina (Hartweizengries)
Cook while stirring and for one minute after bubbles appear on surface.
If neede add more milk. Then add:
2 tbsp cornflour / starch flour
Cook further till bubbles appear again. Keep stirring.
Pour in a ceramic baking dish. Bake for 15 minutes in a preheated oven at 200 °C (180 °C Convection oven)
Another option could be to use an idli mould and do the same in a pressure cooker.

Garnish: Before putting the dish in the oven, I put a layer of red currents from the freezer, which I had collected from the plants in my garden. I forgot to add powdered sugar at the end.
In my opinion the combination did not go so well. Next time I would rather take dried fruits or cooked apples or something more sweet. These fruits were too sour to go well with coconut pudding. Since I did not have fresh coconut, it made the flavour of coconut too mild. It did not really come as near to the flavour in my mind. If only I knew what it was. My efforts to find something online didn't bring any good results.