TOMATO - BRINJAL SAMBAR FOR IDLI AND DOSA

It has been a long time I posted the earlier one. My system crashed due to virus and all data got erased, could not take the backup. I have gone to office and worked from there until the problem is sorted out. So could not visit any of your blogs and missed your delicious dishes but I am sitting up late today and planning to catch up all the missed ones all at once now as the system has been formatted and it is behaving like a brand new system now..

Well, I found some interesting events are going on here…Mahimaa’s 15-minute cooking, Deesha’s South Indies, and EC’s Side dish event…I am sure these events will really be helpful for each and everyone of us and we will get to know variety of tastes…In that case, I think we all are very lucky as we have become a part of this wonderful blogging world, isn’t it?. Blogging is making us a super chef at our home…

Coming to the recipe, most of the weekdays, the breakfast in my home will be mostly either idli or dosa..I rarely go for pongal as it will make me doze off during office hours and avoid fried items like poori, I suppose I had my last poori sometime back one year ago… Making side dish for this regular idli and dosa is really a head breaking task for most of us…Sometime back, Chitra of Ratatouille - Any one can cook has posted a tomato-brinjal-sambhar for idli and dosa. I was very much attracted to this one and I tried it immediately the next day. I am thrilled with the outcome. It has come out wonderful. TH loved this one and was very much pleased. In this short time, I have made this several times. Nowadays, this has become a routine at home. Really, she has done me a favor by posting this one. Thanks Chitra for sharing a wonderful recipe and I am sure you will do more favors to me like this in coming days…

I made slight variations after the trial period is over and I am quite delighted with the outcome.

INGREDIENTS:

TOMATO – 5 medium size

Brinjal – 4 to 5 medium size

Red chilies – 5 to 7

Toor dal – 1 small cup

Mustard seeds – 1 tsp

Urad dal – 1 tsp

Bengal gram – 1/2 tsp

Onion – 1 big size (finely chopped)

Curry leaves and coriander leaves – few

Turmeric powder – 1/2 tsp

Asafoetida – 1/2 tsp

Salt – As required

Oil – 1 tsp

METHOD:

· Pressure cook toor dal and tomato-brinjal-red chilies in two separate bowls for four whistles.

· Grind the tomato-brinjal mixture to a smooth paste once it cools down.

Heat kadai/pan with a tsp of oil and add mustard seeds. When it crackles, add urad dal, bengal gram, and curry leaves and fry for few seconds.

· Then add the finely chopped onion, necessary salt, asafoetida, turmeric powder. When the onions become light brown, add the ground tomato-brinjal mixture. Add water depending upon the consistency. Let it boil for sometime, say for about 3-4 minutes.

· Then add the cooked toor dal and keep it in low flame for another 3 minutes. The original recipe did not call for toor dal but I used it and it added more taste to the sambar. To feed my kid packed with proteins, I preferred to add toor dal.

· Finally, garnish with some coriander leaves and serve hot with idli and dosa. I bet even the brinjal allergic persons will also love this sambar.

This goes to Mahimaas 15-minute cooking and EC’s side dish event.