Cucumber curry, do you have any idea how cucumber would taste in a curry? I was not sure until I tried this cucumber curry recipe. Trust me you won’t taste the cucumber in the curry but, you’re going to get all the goodness of cucumber, isn’t cool? I tried the same recipe with zucchini and pumpkin both were equally good. You may expect the recipes near soon ;-). Meanwhile, you could also try zucchini kootu recipe.
I wanted to share the recipes of rarely used vegetables that are also cheap in cost and rich in vitamins. I thought Cucumber curry would be a good start because We don’t use cucumber often in Indian cooking rather than cucumber raita.
This Cucumber curry is a simple, quick and healthy recipe rich in coconut flavor. Every day we are making the same sambhar with same (brinjal, carrot, beans, drumstick) vegetables, for a change try this cucumber curry. It goes well with plain rice, dosa, idly even with chapati. Sometimes for lunch, I drink this cucumber curry like a soup. It has carbohydrates, protein and vitamins in one dish it could be a one-pot dish for vegetarians and vegans.
Ingredients :
- 1/2 cup toor dhal
- 400-gram cucumber(2), chopped
- 1 medium red onion, chopped
- 1 small tomato, chopped
- 2 garlic cloves
- 5 curry leaves
- 1/4 cup coriander leaves,chopped
- 3 tbsp of oil
- 1/4 tsp of mustard seeds
- 1.5 to 2 tsp of salt
- 4 cups of water
- 1/4 tsp of turmeric powder
- 1/3 to 1/2 tsp of Indian chili powder/paprika
- 50 gram of coconut ground into a paste (remove the outer brown skin of coconut) or 3 to 4 tbsp of store-bought coconut paste
Procedure:
Step 1:
1. Soak the toor dhal for 2 hours in the water
Step 2:
1. In a pressure cooker or medium-size saucepan, heat the oil. When the oil has heated, add the mustard seeds and let the mustard seeds splutter, it will take 5 to 10 seconds.
2. Saute the onion, tomato, curry leaves, and coriander leaves until the onion is soft.
3. Add the chopped cucumber, garlic cloves some salt and saute until the cucumber is tender.
4. Season the veggies with chili powder and turmeric powder and saute for a second.
5. Drain the water and add the soaked toor dal to the pot/pressure cooker add the required water and pressure cook the dahl and veggies until tender and mushy. If you’re using saucepan then, cover the pot with a lid and let the dhal cook on medium heat for 30 to 40 minutes or until dhal is mushy.
6. Once the dhal has become mushy, mash the veggies and dhal and add the ground coconut paste. At this stage adjust the season and simmer the cucumber curry until thickened for 5 to 10 minutes.
Note:
- For thicker version reduce the water level or let the cucumber curry simmer for longer.
- For the saucepan, while the dhal is cooking if the water dries then add extra water.
