Arachuvitta sambar
South Indian sambar recipe with fresh ground spices to make it smell divinely. South Indian sambar smells and tastes amazing when used fresh ground spices
Servings: 4
Ingredients
- ⅓ cup Toor dal
- 1 teaspoon Tamarind gooseberry sized
- 12 Small onions
- 2 Green chilli
- 1 Tomato
- ¼ teaspoon Jaggery
- ½ teaspoon White pumpkin or Vegetable of your choice
- 4 Curry leaves
- 2 tablespoon Coriander leaves chopped
- Salt as you need
TO ROAST AND GRIND
- 1 tablespoon Chana dal - 1 tbsp
- 1 teaspoon Urad dal - 1 tsp
- 5 Red chillies Spice level high
- 2 teaspoon Coriander seeds divided
- ¼ teaspoon Fenugreek seeds
TO TEMPER
- 2 teaspoon Ghee
- ½ teaspoon Mustard
- ¼ Asafoetida
- 1 Sprig Curry leaves
Instructions
Soak Tamarind & Cook dal
- Soak tamarind in ½ cup hot water.
- Pressure cook toor dal with 1 & ¼ cups water for 4 whistles in medium flame.
- I usually pressure cook dal with a small bowl kept in middle with the tamarind + little water along. This makes extracting juice easy. You can choose any method.
Fresh spice powder
- To make fresh sambar powder, heat a teaspoon of ghee or oil in a kadai / pan.
- In order, add fenugreek seeds, chana dal, urad dal, red chilli and 1 teaspoon of coriander seeds.
- Take care not to burn any spices as it will spoil the whole sambar. Everything should be done in medium flame with constant stirring to ensure even roasting.
- Once the dal turns golden, crisp and fragrant, transfer to a plate for cooling down.
- After cooling down, place it in a mixer. Add the remaining 1 teaspoon coriander seeds and grind it to a powder. In between, once wipe down the sides as there might be un ground ingredients stuck to the sides of the wall.
- Keep this powder aside.
- Heat a kadai with ghee and add the tempering items in order.
- After that, add onion, green chillies, curry leaves and saute till onion turns transparent. Lastly add tomatoes, saute for a minute.
- Transfer to a pot in which you are making sambar.
- Add the tamarind extract, turmeric powder to it and after it starts to boil nicely, add the vegetable and salt.
- Let the vegetable get cooked. After that, add cooked dal and bring to boil. Adjust water consistency.
- Lastly add the ground masala powder, jaggery and let it boil for 2 minutes or till the sambar gets thick.
- Finally garnish with remaining curry leaves, coriander leaves and switch off the flame.
Notes
- While adding fresh ground sambar powder, add it in a sprinkled way little by little by stirring as you add in other hand. If you add as such, it will form a lump. Some how I don't like mixing with water and adding.