Easy Fish Curry (Paal Meen Curry/പാല്‍ മീന്‍ കറി) Adapted from Srilankan style

During my forced bachelor-life in Doha, I used to buy my dinner from one of the Srilankan restaurants, mostly ‘idiyappam and palmeen curry’ (ഇടിയപ്പവും പാല്‍ മീന്‍ കറിയും). Hearing the dish name daily from me, my wife thought that ‘palmeen’ is a kind of fish available here (to be frank, I too thought in the same lines, till I found a different variety of fish in the curry) and she asked me once “can’t you try some other fish?” which made me laugh out loudly! On that day I decided to take her to the restaurant and make her eat this favorite dish of mine, once she reaches Doha. Recently we’d been to the place and she tasted this wonderful Srilankan curry. And out of the idea sprout from her taste buds on having the palmeen curry, she tried to make it at home in her own style. As I’m a person who loves to eat less spicy and light colored curries with breakfast items, this became a grand success, adding one more feather to our cooking experiments. I trust this will help you too and you will love its flavor!!

Ingredients:
Fish* – 6 pieces
Coconut milk – 1 ½ cups OR coconut powder – 5 Tb spoon
Green chilli – 1
Tomato – ½
Curry leaves – 12 no. s
Ginger – a small piece
Shallot – 6 cloves
Turmeric powder – ¼ tspoon
Fenugreek – 6 seeds
Oil – 1 Tbspoon
Salt – as needed

 How to:

1. In a mixer jar, take coconut milk (or the coconut powder with 1 ½ cup of water). Put Green chilly, chopped tomato, few curry leaves, ginger, turmeric powder, salt, and 3 cloves shallot. Grind well. (if you like more sour taste in your curry, add tamarind juice or more tomatoes)

2. Pour the above mixture to an earthen pot or a nonstick pan and leave to boil. Once boiled well, put the washed fish pieces and keep the stove in low flame. Cook for 2-3 minutes and switch off.3. In another pan, heat oil and add the fenugreek seeds to spatter. Add the remaining shallots after chopping and sauté till it changes colour. Add the remaining curry leaves and sauté for few seconds. Pour this on top of the above curry.

*Note: We used Cobia fish (മോത). I guess any kind of fishes can be used for this.
 Have a try with the fish in your freezer and let us know! 

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Mathi Mulakittathu (Sardine in hot chilly Gravy)

Mathi mulakittathum Kappa Puzhungiyathum (Sardine in hot chilly Gravy and Boiled Cassava/Tapioca)..  What to say about this? It’s one of the combinations which give a nostalgic feel and really hard to resist the temptation even by just hearing it’s name. And thanks to our new cook that he chose ‘kappa and mathi’ as  dinner menu. I know to many of my readers, this recipe won’t be a news, but to those minority who doesn’t what this luscious dish is all about, please have a try....
The Best combination of this dish is here - Kappa Puzhungiyathu (Boiled Cassava/Tapioca)


Ingredients:

Sardines – 8-10 no’s

Red chilli powder – 1 Tb spoon

Sliced Onion – 1 no. Big

Green chilli – sliced 2 no.s

Tomato – 1 no. Cut into pieces

Cut green leaves – 1 generous pinch

Mashed ginger and garlic – ½ Tb spoon

Thick tamarind juice – ¼ cup

Salt – to taste

Turmeric powder – ½ teaspoon

Fenugreek – 6-8 seeds

Oil – 2 Tb spoon

How to:

1.       Pour oil in a pan and on heating put fenugreek seeds, on spattering, add onion, green chillies, green leaves, ginger and garlic and sauté till softened. Add tomato to this mixture and fry for 2 minutes. Put chilli powder, turmeric powder and salt and mix well. Add tamarind juice (squeezed in water with hands) to this and add ½ cup of water to this. If more piquant gravy is needed ¼ spoon of ground pepper can also be added. Leave this mixture to boil for 5-10 minutes in medium flame.

2.       Clean and cut the sardines. It’s better to put 3 to 4 horizontal lines on both surfaces of the fish with knife so that the fish fully absorbs the spicy taste of the gravy. Put the sardines gently into the above gravy and leave it to cook for 2 minutes in high flame. Take care to stir the mixture very gently. Lower the flame and leave the gravy to be thickened keeping the vessel closed for 5 minutes.

Now enjoy the supremacy of Kerala’s unique taste – particularly the ‘toddy shop’ special dish. Sluurrrpppp.....!!! I bet, it’s mouth-watering.

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