PULI PONGAL

 

 

Puli Pongal is a tangy,tasty breakfast dish from the Tamilnadu cuisine. Puli - Tamil word for tangy and tart flavour. In this dish,broken rice rava is used. Tamarind lends a nice tangy taste to this pongal. Like pongal,consistency of this dish too is gooey. When I prepared this dish,my mom became nostalgic.She recounted her childhood memories of savoring this pongal along with sandigae ( fryums) for nreakfast. My mom explained that, in those days,rice was never purchased from shops as it was harvested and packed in gunny bags and stocked in many households.

After removing the chaff from the grains,it was packed in sacks. The broken grains in the sacks were segregated from the whole grains. The broken grains or rice rava was productively used in preparing many dishes :  puli pongal, rice upma or huli nuchu-  a sour buttermilk based dish prepared in Karnataka. But today,rice rava is easily available in all the shops.    

 

 

 

 

    

INGREDIENTS :

 

RICE RAVA-  1 CUP

WATER-  3 CUPS

TAMARIND- LEMON SIZE

SALT TO TASTE

 

FOR SEASONING :

 

SESAME OIL-   1 TBSP

 MUSTARD- 1 TSP

GRAM DAL- 1 TSP

URAD DAL-1 TSP

ASAFOETIDA- 3/4 TSP

GROUND NUTS- 5 TSP

CURRY LEAVES- 2 SPRIGS

RED CHILLIES- 3 NOS

GREEN CHILLIES- 1

TURMERIC POWDER- 1/2 TSP

 

PROCEDURE :

 

1. Take raw rice in a mixer jar and blend to coarse rava consistency and keep it aside.

 

2. Soak tamarind in warm water and extract syrup.

 

3. In a heavy bottom pan heat sesame oil and splutter mustard seeds. Then add all the ingredients cited above one by one and prepare the seasoning and switch off.

 

4. Now pour the tamarind syrup along with salt over the seasoning and boil till the raw smell evades completely.

 

5.Pour three cups of water over the tamarind syrup and boil in mild heat.

6. Slowly transfer the rice rava and keep stirring in mild heat till the grains get cooked.

7. Switch off the flame and close the pan with a tight lid and keep it aside for 20 minutes.

8. Serve with a dollop of  ghee and enjoy with any kind of crispy snacks.