Recipe time

Lets have a date with the king of vegetables, Potato, today!

I'm gonna share a few family secrets with all of you. Ready guys?


Chana dal-potato

Ingredients:

Potatoes - 3 (medium sized, cut into big cubes)
Onions - 2 (big, chopped fine)
Tomatoes - 3 (medium sized, chopped fine)
Green chillies - 3 (slit vertically)
Ginger-garlic paste - 1 tsp
Cloves - 3
Bayleaf - 1
Dalchini (cinnamon) - 2 (1" pieces)
Jeera (cumin seeds) - 1/2 tsp
Salt - to taste
Turmeric - 1/4 tsp
Chilli powder - to taste
Oil - 1/4 cup


Method:

Soal chana dal in sufficient water for about an hour. Cook chana dal and potatoes in the pressure cooker, and switch if off after two whistles.

Heat oil in a kadai (pan) and add jeera (cumin seeds) to it. Add dalichini, cloves, bayleaf, and green chillies. Then add onions and ginger-garlic paste to it. When onions turn brown, add turmeric powder, chilli powder. and tomatoes.

Keep the kadai covered for 5 minutes (or till the tomatoes are soft and the oil starts leaving the sides of the pan). Now add the precooked dal and potato mixture to the gravy. Cook for another 5 minutes.

Remove from fire once done, and add chopped coriander, if you like, for an appealing look. Serve the curry hot, with roti or rice.

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Potato curry, with a dash of lime juice:
(Authentic andhra way)

Ingredients:

Potatoes - 3-4 (big)
Lime juice - 2/3 tbsp
Oil - 1/4 cup
Chana dal - 1 tsp
Urad dal - 1 tsp
Jeera (cumin seeds) - 1 tsp
Rai (mustard seeds) - 1/2 tsp
Green chillies - 4 (chopped into 1" pieces)
curry leaves - a bunch
salt - to taste
Turmeric powder - 1/4 tsp
Chilli powder - 1/2 tsp

Method:

Pressure cook potatoes. Cool, peel, and mash them and keep aside. In a kadai (pan), heat oil, add chana dal. After it is fried a little, add urad dal, jeera, rai, green chillies and curry leaves to the oil.

Now, add the potato mash to the seasoning, and put salt, turmeric and chilli powder to it. Cook it on low flame for 5 mts or till potato has a semi-fried look.

Remove from the fire, and leave it to cool for 10 minutes. Add lime juice and serve with rice.

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Potato fry

The usual way of frying potatoes is by peeling them, cutting them either vertically (French Fries style) or into small cubes and deep frying them in a pan full of oil.

Here is an alternative way - perhaps a little low calorie too!

Ingredients:

Potatoes - 3-4 (depending on the size)
Jeera (Cumin seeds) - 1/2 tsp
Curry leaves - a few
Oil - 2-3 tbsp
Salt - to taste
Turmeric powder - a pinch
Chilli powder - 1 tsp or according to taste

Method:

Pressure cook the potatoes, cool and peel them. Cut them into big cubes (say 8-10 pieces per potato). Take a pan, put 2 spoonfuls of oil, let it boil a bit, and add jeera to it.

Add curry leaves (if you like it, you can also add 1 or 2 pods of garlic, crushed). Now add the potato pieces to the pan and let it fry a bit.

Once the pieces turn brown, remove from fire, take them in a bowl, add salt, turmeric and chilli powder.

Cover it and bounce the bowl to mix the ingredients (without using spoon/ spatula). Serve hot with rotis or rice.

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Potato Bhajiya:

Ingredients:

Potatoes - 1 (medium size)
Besan (Yellow gram powder) - 1 cup
Salt - to taste
Turmeric powder - a pinch
Chilli powder or ground pepper - 1 tsp
Water - 1-2 cups
Oil - 3 cups
Cooking soda - a pinch

For stuffing:

Onions (chopped fine) - 2 (medium sized)
Salt - 1 tsp
Lime juice - 2 tbsp
Green chillies - 1 (chopped fine)
Coriander - a small bunch (chopped fine)
Method:

Peel potato, slice it very thin with potato slicer, dip them in salt water and keep aside. Bring oil to boil in a kadai.

Mix besan, salt, turmeric and chilli powder, add one or two spoons of boiling oil to this before mixing water.

Add cooking soda, and water and mix well (ensuring there are no lumps) to make into thin batter (2-3 thread consistency).

Dip each slice of potato and deep fry them in oil. When it is fried properly, remove from fire.

For stuffing, mix chopped onions, chillies, coriander, lime juice, and salt in a bowl.

Take each bhajiya, slit it vertically to make a pouch. Fill one spoon of the stuffing mixture and keep aside.

Serve hot with tomato / mint chutney or tomato sauce.