A delicious gram flour curry cooked with a unique blend of fresh vegetables & flavoured with lovely aromatics such as ginger, green chillies & curry leaves. It is best served with piping hot plain steamed rice.
I have paired the kadhi with crunchy Masala Papad cones, a very popular side dish. Another excellent combination is Sindhi Aloo Tuk.
A healthy assortment of nutritious vegetables such as drumstick, baingan(eggplant), bhindi (lady’s finger), gawar (cluster beans), aloo (potatoes) etc. are sautéed & simmered together in this fragrant & hot curry.
Sindhi Kadhi Chawal, a traditional meal native to the Sindhi community originating in the erstwhile Sindh province of Pakistan, is today popular the world over and makes the perfect Sunday family lunch for many vegetarians.
All my love of food and wide exposure to Indian and global cuisine, from an early age, I do owe entirely to my Mom. While the week was reserved purely for traditional food in my parents’ home, there was never a Sunday where our lunch menu was repeated. Be it South Indian, Gujarati, Parsi, Italian, Continental or Mexican, we were exposed to it all. Likewise, so many warm childhood memories spun around this wholesome, delicious Sunday meal of Sindhi Kadhi as well. You could say, I had the world in my plate.
Today I humbly acknowledge that if my page has featured diverse food from across India, Italy, Burma, Thailand, Tibet, America and now Sindh, it is entirely thanks to her open mind towards food and her trait of warmth & inclusiveness.
Recipe for Sindhi Kadhi Chawal
Ingredients (Serves 4 – 5 persons)
- 1 lemon size ball of tamarind, soaked until soft
- 8 tablespoons gram flour or besan
- 2 teaspoons fenugreek or methi seeds
- 2 teaspoons cumin or jeera seeds
- 8-9 tablespoons oil
- 1 onion, finely chopped
- 2 inch piece ginger, finely chopped
- 4 green chillies, finely chopped
- 12-15 curry leaves or kadipatta
- 5 cups water
- ½ teaspoon red chilli powder or as per your taste
- ¼ tsp turmeric powder or haldi
- 1 tablespoon jaggery
- Salt to taste
Assorted vegetables peeled and cut in 1.5 inch large chunks as follows:
- 100 gms red pumpkin/ bottle gourd (dudhi)
- 2 medium sized carrots, cut into 1 inch cubes
- 2 medium sized potatoes, cut into 4
- 1 medium sized bottle brinjal, cut into 1 inch cubes
- 2 drumsticks, cut into 2 inch pieces
- 10 french beans, cut into 1 inch pieces
- 12-15 cluster beans or gawar
- 10 lady fingers washed, dried & cut into 1 inch pieces
Procedure
- Take a heavy bottom pan and heat the oil. Add the jeera seeds, methi seeds and stir until they splutter.
- Add the finely chopped onion, ginger, green chillies and curry leaves and saute on medium flame until the onion is translucent.
- In the meanwhile, in a separate saucepan, heat 5 cups of water till it comes to a boil.
- Now to your onion chilli mixture, on a low flame, add the gram flour and keep stirring continuously for 4-5 minutes until it turns a beautiful golden brown and the raw smell goes away. This is a very crucial step in your curry, so try not to leave it unattended as it could either over darken or remain semi raw.
- Pour in the boiling water into the golden brown mixture and stir gently till mixed well or use a hand blender to ensure a beautiful smooth texture, so that absolutely no lumps of gram flour remain.
- Add the salt, haldi and chilli powder and mix well for a few minutes.
- Add the chopped vegetables now, those like the drumstick, carrot, potato, bottle gourd would go in first and the others like beans, brinjal and lady fingers after 4-5 minutes.
- Mix well, immersing the vegetables in the simmering curry and cook on a medium flame, covering with a lid partially.
- After all the vegetables have been added and mixed well, check the salt & spice and continue to cook with a lid for about 6-8 minutes until your drumstick and gourd seems fully cooked but not mushy.
- Check each vegetable by turn so that all of them are fully done.
- Add the tamarind water and jaggery and boil for another 5-7 minutes. Switch off the flame.
- Garnish with coriander leaves and keep covered with a lid for 15-20 minutes while you cook your steamed rice.
- The longer it stays, the tastier it gets, as is true with most curries, as your spice flavours get deeper and richer.
- Your tangy, spicy garama garam Sindhi Kadhi is ready to devour with freshly prepared steamed rice
The Culinary Konnoisseur 