Ginger - Tamarind Chutney / Allam - Chintapandu Pachchadi
My mom uses ginger rarely in her kitchen and preparation of Ginger - Tamarind chutney is one of those occassions. My parents are from Coastal Andhra and tamarind chutney is quite popular in that region. There, you sure are going to find a jar of ginger - tamarind chutney in most of the kitchens , any day, any time. This comes under 'Must haves' in my mom's kitchen. She never runs out of this chutney.
As usual, this can be eaten with rice as all other Indian chutneys. If this would have been my sister's blog, she would have recommended this chutney with dosas and upmas. She would eat dosas only, with this chutney, even if you tempt her with hundred other side dishes. This comes in real handy when you have no time to prepare chutneys or during those power cuts which have become so frequent in India.
Ingredients:
Tamarind - 100 g / 3.5 oz
One inch square ginger - 2 pieces
Powdered jaggery - 1/4 cup
Red chillies - 20
Salt - 3/4 tsp
Urad dal (Black gram) - 2 tbsp
Mustard seeds - 1 tsp
Methi (Fenugreek) seeds - A few ( half of 1/4 tsp)
Asafoetida (Hing) - Little (half of 1/4 tsp)
Oil - 1 tbsp
In USA, tamarind (Indian brands) is usually sold in a 200 grams / 7 oz size bar. I have used half of it to make this chutney. Soak this in enough water for an hour or until it softens. Alternatively, you can place this in microwave for 2 minutes to quicken the process. When it is soaked, tamarind would become soft enough to squeeze. Extract a cup of thick tamarind pulp from it and keep aside.
Peel the ginger. I used the same quantity of ginger shown in the picture.
Meanwhile, heat oil in a small pan and add uraddal and mustard seeds. When urad dal starts to turn a little brown, add methi seeds, hing and redchillies. When urad dal and methiseeds turn red, switch off the stove. Let it cool. Grind this cooled mixture with ginger, tamarind pulp, jaggery and salt in a blender to a coarser mixture. Remove the chutney from the blender and store it in a glass / ceramic bowl.
It usually stays fresh even for a month, refrigerated.
This recipe is going to be a part of my contribution to the JFI - Ginger event.
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4 comments:
Hi Suma,chutney is mouthwatering!
I know,I don't like the tamarind we get here,so hard and lot of seeds.Sometimes I get Thai tamarind which are soft and seedless.Thanks for the recipe!:)
Asha,
Thanks.Yeah. I know about the tamarind available here. My mom prepares this chutney just by removing strands and seeds from the soaked tamarind and grinding the whole tamarind in the stone mortar. I adopted the other way and just use the squeezed pulp.
Hi
I think you would have meant 2 red chillies
but it says 20 in the above list..
just thought of sharing that info.
incase if someone followed the ingredients in the same way as mentioned above :)
Thanks
Sadhana
Sadhana,
That was not a mistake. Infact, you need 20 red chillies for this chutney. Just observe the quantity of tamarind and jaggery used in the chutney. This amount of red chillies are needed to combat the sourness and sweetness. I guess I confused you by my picture. Thank you. :-)
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