There was a time Divu used to hate Karela (Bitter Gourd). After tasting Mom's Stuffed Karela, she started loving them. ;-) And when she decided to prepare it herself, she came up with a combination of Mom's and her Grandmom's recipe. Here's how we made Stuffed Karela:
Ingredients:
• Fresh Bitter Gourds (Karela) - 4 to 5
• Finely chopped Red Onion - 1 medium
• Finely Chopped Garlic - 1 TSP
• Finely Chopped Ginger - 1/2 TSP
• Cumin seeds (Jeera) - 1/2 TSP
• Cumiin Seeds Powder - 1 TSP
• Aniseed/ Fennel seed (Saunf) - 1/2 TSP
• Mango powder (Amchoor) - 1/2 TSP
• Turmeric Powder (Haldi) - 1/2 TSP
• Red Chilly powder - 1/2 TSP
• Coriander powder (Dhaniya) - 1/2 TSP
• Salt - to taste
• Asafoetida (Heeng) - for flavor
• Mustard oil - 3-4 TSP
Pre-preparation
Scrape the skin off the Karelas with a knife and keep it aside (make sure you do not peel off the skin). We are going to use the scrapped skin for stuffing, so be careful here.
Mix the scraped skin with salt and keep it for an hour. Rub some salt on the Karelas too and leave it for an hour. The purpose of salt is to reduce the bitterness of the Karela. Skip this step if you like your Karelas to taste bitter.
Preparing the stuffing
Heat 1 TBSP of oil in a pan and saute the chopped onion, garlic, and ginger. Wash the skin of Karelas that we mixed with salt earlier, preferable use a sieve for washing. Rinse the excess water and mix it with the rest of the mixture. Add cumin seeds powder, mango powder, red chilly powder, coriander powder and salt in the mixture. Mix it well on low flame. Keep this mixture aside and let it cool for sometime. We will use it for stuffing.
Preparing Karelas
Wash the Karelas to and on each piece make one longitudinal slit. It will open up the karela from inside, now carefully remove the seeds from it. Stuff the mixture inside the Karelas and make sure that it doesn't come out. You can use a regular sewing thread around the pieces incase karela does not hold the mixture.
Cooking
Heat 2-3 TSP of oil in a non-stick pan. Put some cumin seeds and let them crackle. Put a pinch of Asafoetida and one by one, carefully place Karelas in the pan. Cover the pan and Cook the Karelas on low flame for at least 25-20 mins. In between, keep turning the Karelas to ensure that they get cooked from all sides. The Karelas need to be cooked enough to make their skin soft.
Precautions
Don't overcook Karelas. It will harden and blacken the skin.
Careful with the slit, don’t cut the karela into 2 pieces.
Don’t forget to take off the thread before eating the Karelas.
Ingredients:
• Fresh Bitter Gourds (Karela) - 4 to 5
• Finely chopped Red Onion - 1 medium
• Finely Chopped Garlic - 1 TSP
• Finely Chopped Ginger - 1/2 TSP
• Cumin seeds (Jeera) - 1/2 TSP
• Cumiin Seeds Powder - 1 TSP
• Aniseed/ Fennel seed (Saunf) - 1/2 TSP
• Mango powder (Amchoor) - 1/2 TSP
• Turmeric Powder (Haldi) - 1/2 TSP
• Red Chilly powder - 1/2 TSP
• Coriander powder (Dhaniya) - 1/2 TSP
• Salt - to taste
• Asafoetida (Heeng) - for flavor
• Mustard oil - 3-4 TSP
Pre-preparation
Scrape the skin off the Karelas with a knife and keep it aside (make sure you do not peel off the skin). We are going to use the scrapped skin for stuffing, so be careful here.
Mix the scraped skin with salt and keep it for an hour. Rub some salt on the Karelas too and leave it for an hour. The purpose of salt is to reduce the bitterness of the Karela. Skip this step if you like your Karelas to taste bitter.
Preparing the stuffing
Heat 1 TBSP of oil in a pan and saute the chopped onion, garlic, and ginger. Wash the skin of Karelas that we mixed with salt earlier, preferable use a sieve for washing. Rinse the excess water and mix it with the rest of the mixture. Add cumin seeds powder, mango powder, red chilly powder, coriander powder and salt in the mixture. Mix it well on low flame. Keep this mixture aside and let it cool for sometime. We will use it for stuffing.
Preparing Karelas
Wash the Karelas to and on each piece make one longitudinal slit. It will open up the karela from inside, now carefully remove the seeds from it. Stuff the mixture inside the Karelas and make sure that it doesn't come out. You can use a regular sewing thread around the pieces incase karela does not hold the mixture.
Cooking
Heat 2-3 TSP of oil in a non-stick pan. Put some cumin seeds and let them crackle. Put a pinch of Asafoetida and one by one, carefully place Karelas in the pan. Cover the pan and Cook the Karelas on low flame for at least 25-20 mins. In between, keep turning the Karelas to ensure that they get cooked from all sides. The Karelas need to be cooked enough to make their skin soft.
Precautions
Don't overcook Karelas. It will harden and blacken the skin.
Careful with the slit, don’t cut the karela into 2 pieces.
Don’t forget to take off the thread before eating the Karelas.
I know Karela, i can cook it well but by no means am i going to eat it, Lord have mercy it is an bitter and very much an acquired taste. "We" (mean people of Island of Trinidad & Tobago in the West Indies) have many ways of cooking karela and "we" also use the vine from which they grow, it has many uses. For what you may be thinking....ah ha...I think i will leave that for another time. Perhaps if you remind me another day, right now it is 2:53 am and I must resign to bed as I have to rise in a few pitiful hours to go off to work in this bitter bitter cold, much like you loved karela (haha). Take care and thank you for stopping by, when you get a chance please come on over and sign my guestbook.
ReplyDeleteHave a blessed week....
I am a bit of a Foodie myself ... Hailing from a City like Lucknow originally ...hard not to know ur karelas from ur kareli ( soft specific tendons of meat) if u may!! Not so experienced in everyday punjabi Khana unfortunately , but ur version here sounds exactly how my it's made back home!! u didn't leave a single ingredient out!! Cheers!!At last a complete recipe!!! Gotta give it a try ...missing my home cooked meals in Seattle!! thanx much!!;0)
ReplyDeleteGlad I could be of help, its been sometime i wrote something tryng to get back to writing.
ReplyDelete