Instant Bitter Gourd Pickle ~ Kakarakaya Pachchadi

Before moving on to today's recipe, let me tell you the name of the green vegetable that I asked you to guess in my previous post. Capsicum got the most votes and keeping JFI - chillies in view, some even suggested green chillies. Only Suganya and anonymous (I know it is you, Deepthi) mentioned the veggie along with their other choices of guesswork. Lakshmi went with the Chinese one.
The answer is Indian Bitter Gourd / Kakarakaya / Karela. The idea of playing the guessing game occured to me after seeing the picture and when even my husband guessed the veggie as ridgegourd. It didn't look like karela (except when you paid attention to certain pieces) at any angle and to prove that I didn't scrape the ridges, here are the chopped karela in a bowl, which I used to make this pickle.
Here is a recipe for all bitter gourd lovers and diabetics. It is really a simple preparation and tasted good really the next day. So far tested shelf life of this pickle is a week, refrigerated.

You need:

Finely chopped Indian bitter gourd, seeds removed - 1/2 cup

Turmeric powder - 1/4 tsp

Salt - 1&1/2 tsp

Green chillies - 3 or 4 (Can be chopped fine or slit lengthwise)

Juice extracted from two small limes (Or lemons)

Oil - 2 tsp

Mustard seeds - 1 tsp

Asafoetida - Few pinches

Preparing the pickle:

Heat oil in a small pan and add mustard seeds and asafoetida. When mustard seeds start to splutter, turn off the stove. Let the mustard seeds cool.

To a bowl add chopped bittergourd, salt, green chillies, turmeric powder and lemon / lime juice. Add the mustard seed mixture. Mix well and let it sit for a couple of hours before serving.

Post a Comment