Thursday 13 February 2014

Uppina Saaru (Amarnath leaves)

Uppina Saaru (Amarnath leaves cooked with lentils)

Today I was at a Chinese store with a very friend of mine and I found this very healthy green leafy vegetable called Danttina soppu in Kannada in English its called as Amarnath leaves and I decided to make a very comforting  and homely dish. The name "Uppina Saaru"in Kannada literally means " Salty Water". As the name suggests we use basically only  2 ingredients salt and water to prepare this dish, in addition to it and according to the season we keep varying the green leafy vegetable or lentils that goes into it.
I remember my Dad used to ask my mom to prepare this dish after our holidays and eating outside  as this curry will refresh your taste buds
The best combination to go along with this saaru (curry) is Ragi Mudde (Recipe will follow).I made Ragi Mudde and red chutney to go along with this preparation.My husband while enjoying his very homely dinner he told me something which made me very happy,he said my mother would be very proud of me :).

Serving Tip: Serve it with mudde (ragi ball) or with steaming white rice along with red chutney.
   

Ingridients :
Toor dal - 1 cup
Amarnath leaves - 1 big bunch
salt- to taste

Ingridients for the Red Chutney (Khara) :
Dry red chillies or green chillies - 3
Garlic pods - 3
Jeera (cumin seeds) - 1 tbsp
Pepper corns -10
*Tamarind(burnt ) - marble size
Boiled toor dal - 2 tab spoon from the sarru
Uchellu (Niger seeds) - 1 tbsp
Coriander leaves - 10 springs
Salt - to taste

Preparation of uppina saaru:
1. Boil with toor dal with 10 cups of water and salt.
2.When the dal is 3/4th cooked add the leaves and cook untill leaves and dal are completelety cooked.
3. Check for the salt and water.This preparation needs to be more watery.

Preparation of Red chutney (Khara) :
1. Dry roast jeera and  Uchellu.
2. Roast green or red chillies with few drops of oil (the other option is to boil the chillies in saaru along with Toordal and take it out while grinding).
3.*Pierce tamrind to the knife and burn it over the flame in the gas burner.
3.Grind all the ingredients mentioned under Khara using water from saaru.