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Vada Kootu Curry/ Black Gram Lentil Balls in Spicy Coconut Milk Stew: Thiruvananthapuram special

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This curry is from my hometown Thiruvanthapuram. It is considered to be a non-vegetarian tasting veggie dish for marriage Sadya/feast. Normally kootu curry is made with Chena/ Elephant yam, kaya/ raw banana and some type of lentils, usually chana dal. In this curry no souring agent is used only coconut and green chili and cumin seeds are used. As I mentioned earlier, every curries has regional differences, even vary from home to home.
Vada kootu curry can only be seen in Thiruvanthapuram area, and is made with urad dal/ black gram lentil and coconut milk. First time I tasted it was when one of neighbors made it for us. Following which Amma asked our neighbor to make vada kootu curry in our house, so that she can learn, she obliged my mom’s request and made it again. According to me best description for this dish is that it is black gram/ urad dal balls soaked in perfection with spicy coconut milk, potato stew. I was planning to make it for an unusually long time. The process for making this dish requires soaking of urad dal for 3-4 hours before grinding. Every morning, I would think I have to soak urud dal in water, but as usual I would forget, only to remember in the afternoon. Yesterday I was able to soak them and make this delicious curry. 
While frying the urad dal balls I heard some sneaking and breaking noises from the pan, then I realized that it is from cracking of some urad dal balls, so make sure to flip them more often while frying. 
Vada kootu curry is the only curry that uses garam masala in sadhya menu. In order to make it as authentic as possible, I freshly ground Kerala style garam masala. If you read Raghavan Iyer’s 660 curries, you can see that there are lot of differences in garam masala from every state. It is not like what you get from a packet of gram masala from store shelf. Not only gram masala, but every masala used in Indian cooking is stamp printed to different states individuality. The spiciest being Rajasthan’s garam masala and least one from West Bengal’s. More details will be in other post. In Kerala, garam masala is usually used in non-vegetarian curries, biriyani and few vegetarian curries. Since it is the spice land of India, it has almost all the spices except chili and black pepper corns. If you wish you can add them while making the garam masala.
I cooked potato pieces in a tablespoon of coconut milk and then mixed them into fried onion- ginger garlic- chili- mixture with garam masala, coriander powder and chili powder. Then into this spicy gravy, I added fried urad dal balls and continued cooking for few minutes, so that urad balls are dunked in the spicy mixture and resulting in a thick curry. This curry is good with rice, chapathi and bread. It has spiciness from green chili and red chili powder and sweetness of coconut milk also creaminess of potato. If you have some time, try this, sure it will win your taste buds. 
After having this curry my hubby asked me why all of a sudden you made this curry. Why don’t you make it earlier, it tastes great. I told him, I know, but only right time came today just like a philosopher. Here goes the recipe.



One year ago:  Rava moong dal upma/Semolina Green gram upma

Print recipe from here 

What you need

For Urad dal balls
Uzhunnu parippu / Urad dal/Black gram/Black matpe beans: ½ cup
Black pepper: 1/8 teaspoon
Salt: ½ teaspoon
Water: 3cup+ ¼ cup
Canola oil: 4 cups (for frying)

For sauce
Onion: 1 1/3 cup (Chopped finely)
Potato: 1 ½ cup (Chopped into small cubes)
Ginger: 1 inch piece
Garlic: 3 cloves
Green chili: 1 no (I used Serrano pepper)
Coriander powder: ¼ teaspoon
Turmeric powder: ¼ teaspoon
Garam masala: ¾ teaspoon (recipe given below)
Chili powder: ½ teaspoon
Salt: 3/4 teaspoon (or to taste)
Coconut milk: ½ cup + 1 tablespoon
Curry leaves: 1 sprig
Olive oil: 1 tablespoon (use coconut oil for authentic taste)
Water: 3 cup

For seasoning
Urad dal/ Black gram: 1 teaspoon
Mustard seeds: ½ teaspoon
Red chilies: 2 no (halved into two)
Coconut oil: 1 tablespoon

For garam masala (It yields: 2 tablespoon)

Cinnamon sticks; 2no (2 inches)
Cardamom: 8 no
Cloves; 8 no
Nutmeg: 1/8th of one
Bay leaves; 1 no
Fennel seeds: 1 teaspoon
Caraway seeds: 1 teaspoon
Star anise: 1 no
Mace: 1 teaspoon

How I made

Soak urad dal/black gram in 3 cup water for 3-4 hours. After 3 hours wash and drain them using a colander and grind with whole black pepper, salt and 1/4cup water form a fine paste. Set aside. 

Heat oil in a thick bottom pan when it reaches 365 F. Gradually drop a small golf sized dough into the oil. Cook them until they become light brown it takes about 6 minutes for each batch. Make sure to flip the urad dal balls frequently to prevent cracking. You will be able to cook 5 -6 balls in a batch depending upon your pan. Once they light brown remove them from oil and drain in kitchen tissue to remove excess oil. Continue the process until you finish the entire dough. Set aside. 

In mean time in a sauce pot cook the potato with 2 cup of water and 1 tablespoon of oil until they become soft not mushy. It took about 20 minutes, switch off the flame and set aside. 
Dry roast the ingredients for garam masala for 1 minute or until they release wonderful aroma. Once it cooled grind them into fine powder, it yield about 2 tablespoons. Set aside. 

Heat oil in medium skillet or sauce pot and add onion and green chili and fry them until onion become translucent or it changes color it takes about 6 minutes. To this add ginger garlic paste and fry for another 2 minutes. Then add turmeric, coriander, chili powder, salt and garam masala powder fry for another 2 minutes. To this add cooked potato along with coconut milk water. Bring it to boil and coconut milk and rest of water to form gravy again boil the gravy for 2 minutes. To this add fried urad dal balls and let cook for another minute and add curry leaves and switch off the flame. 

In a small pan heat coconut oil and add mustard seeds, urad dal and halved red chilies once mustard seeds starts spluttering remove from the fire and add to cooked urad dal potato coconut milk gravy.
Enjoy with hot rice, chapathi, bread.

Preparation time: Soaking Dal 3 hours, grinding and frying 35 minutes + 38 minutes
Yield: 4 serving
Verdict: Tasty
Will you make it again: Yes I will

This delicious curry is going to Vegetarian foodie Fridays#31 hosted by Melodie.

My legume love affair: MLLA: 30 hosted by  Priya  originally started by Susan.
 

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Comments

  1. Torviewtoronto says

    delicious healthy curry

  3. divya says

    looks awesome and delicious…

  4. G.Pavani says

    delicious n mouthwatering vada kuttu..

  5. Shanavi says

    awesome dear..yummylicious

  6. Priya (Yallapantula) Mitharwal says

    oh wow, I am soooooooo loving it, I bookmarked it 🙂

  7. Sanyukta Gour(Bayes) says

    lovely curry…so flavorful

  8. kothiyavunu.com says

    Looks utterly yummy..makes me hungry swathi.adipolittoo..:)

  9. kitchen queen says

    tempting and delicious dish.

  10. Gulmohar says

    Love it..Have had only in restaurants..Wish I could try some from your plate 😀

  11. savitha ramesh says

    hmmmm delicious curry swathi…..gr8 job…..

  12. sinfullyspicy says

    Love lentil vadas.Cooking in Coconut milk is new for me but looks very yummy!

  13. Sayantani says

    wish I could have some from your bowl…looks so creamy.

  14. munchcrunchandsuch says

    it looks great..inspite of being from tvm, i did not knw of this..got to make it

  15. Priya says

    Wish to grab that whole bowl, truly irresistible..

  16. Peggy says

    This sounds like a super healthy curry!

  17. Chow and Chatter says

    looks tasty love Kerala

  18. Soumya says

    wow…adipoli curry,never knew about it before…loved it..

  19. PALATABLE says

    Easy to follow recipe and it’s yummy! Thanks for sharing dear..

  20. Pushpa says

    Vada curries are my fav.Looks delicious Swathi.

  21. Chitra says

    New to me.. Looks yummy 🙂

  22. savitha ramesh says

    Hi swathi,chk my vadagam recipe and collect ur award.thanks

  23. aipi says

    That sounds like a distant cousin of kadhi to me..very delicious!

    US Masala

  24. Roshan says

    very creamy and yummy dish….

  25. Joanne says

    I adore anything with coconut milk and this looks especially delicious!

  26. Abhilash Pillai says

    I never knew this was trivandrum special. It looks tasty.

  27. Fathima says

    didn know u were from TVM (my home town as well)… Kootu curry looks awesome… one of my favs… never tried before… you have given elaborate details to prepare! bookmarked!

  28. Adelina says

    an amazing dish and an explanation worth a million $! Love coming here and “stealing” your pictured recipes for my lunches!

  29. Elisabeth says

    Swathi-Such a delicious and beautiful dish. I love the step-by-step photo directions. I would love to make this dish, I just love all the spices you use!

  30. Melodie says

    What a labor of love! This looks and sounds delicious. I love all the spices you used! Thanks for sharing it at Vegetarian Foodie Fridays!

  31. Ellie (Almost Bourdain) says

    Love the lentil balls. I am always on the look out for new ways to cook lentil. Thanks for sharing.

  32. Hari Chandana says

    Lovely and delicious recipe.. thanks for sharing.. 🙂

  33. michelangelo in the kitchen says

    This is absolutely delicious!!! I particularly like the fried lentil balls and coconut of course! This is superbly spiced and cooked to perfection! Thanks for making this delightful dish!

  34. archana says

    Love this ! Thank you for posting such a descriptive pictorial.

  35. Jaisy James says

    adipoli kandittu vayil ninnum vellam varunnu. onnu try cheyyanama

  36. ♥Sugar♥Plum♥Fairy♥ says

    This is sooo delicious Swathi , u have me all hungry now and those cokies are super fantastic babe!
    And those cookies sure look addictive ,they do!

  37. Reeni says

    It is so great to see this curry from your hometown Swathi! Your husband is right to say how delicious it is – I can see that through your preparation! I think he will be asking many times for you to make it again.

  38. Satya says

    I am gonna try that out… thanks for sharing.

  39. Ananda Rajashekar says

    oh that looks so divine and loving the spices there!

  40. Kerala Recipes says

    New to me. Will try it and let you know.

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