Weekend Herb Blogging #107
Kalyn from Kalyn’s Kitchen is the host of this edition of Weekend Herb Blogging, and off I went to the market………
I had a really cool post on Cumin planned for today. It represented quite a bit of work and I should know to leave well enough alone. But I decided to edit it, and the editor ate over half of my post. AAAaaahhhh!So today we have instead - Cucumber Curry. By no means a second-best post. But you will have to wait for the other one - until I am over my sadness and have the motivation to redo the research and writing.
Now, who would have thought of putting cucumber in a curry? Cucumber is a cooling, summer dish, right? Never cooked in the West. Shredded, diced, sliced, peeled or unpeeled. But NEVER cooked.
So today, I want to change your mind about that. Be brave. Try it. It is an amazing surprising dish.
Ingredient Notes
Red Lentils (Masoor Dal)
In this dish, the lentils serve as a thickener for the coconut milk that the cucumber is cooked in, forming a yummy sauce base, and as a flavour addition. They are not really noticeable in the final dish, as they disintegrate into the sauce itself.
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Cucumber
In this recipe, cucumber can be substituted with zucchini, or use a mixture of both. It works just as well
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Curry leaves
Available in Indian food shops and spice shops. Fresh is best, but dried will also work. If you can’t find curry leaves, leave them out. Bay leaves are not a substitute. Bay leaves ground a dish - giving it an earthy flavour. Curry leaves lift a dish, giving it a zing.
Black mustard seeds
Available in Indian food shops and spice shops. If you can’t find them, don’t substitute yellow. Better to leave them out - but do try to find them. You will be glad that you did.
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Recipe Notes
This dish comes from the Nair community from the Kerala region of India. Wikipedia has an entry on the Nair community, and I found this lovely piece on Kerala from jugalbandi.
Tarka (or Tadka)
A Tarka is a ghee or oil based spice mix added to a curry at the end of the cooking. It adds a wondrous taste to the dish, so do not avoid this step. Also, the spices used in a tarka are those that release their flavour in oil rather than liquid, like black mustard seed and curry leaves. Finally, black mustard seeds taste best when popped, a bit like mini popcorn, and the tarka provides a mechanism for this.
Serving Notes
This is great with plain rice or rice cooked with a tspn of turmeric powder (it makes a lovely yellow rice). Add a salad, a dal, Indian pickles and chutneys, and maybe a yogurt dish.
Or just serve with rice and a great salad. Finish with a bowl of fresh fruit and yogurt.
As the dish is quite creamy in colour, you can go wild with visual appeal with chopped green coriander, Italian parsley or slices of green or red chilli.
Olan - Cucumber cooked with Lentils
Source : Adapted from Madhur Jaffrey’s Flavours of India (See Bookshelf for details)
Cuisine: Indian
Prep time: 5 mins
Cooking time: 15 mins
Serves: 2 - 4 people, depending how you use it
ingredients
50 g masoor dal (red lentils)
1.25 cups coconut milk, well stirred
500g cucumber (or cucumber and zucchini), cut crosswise into 2.5cm pieces
2 - 4 fresh green chillies, cut into half lengthwise
salt to taste
for tarka
8 - 10 curry leaves
2 tspn black mustard seeds
1 Tblspn ghee
method
Wash the lentils in several changes of water, or place in a sieve and shake under a running tap until water runs clear.
Pour 1/2 cup of the coconut milk and 1.75 cups water into a medium sized pan. Add the lentils, bring to the boil, cover and simmer for 10 - 15 minutes. The lentils should be almost cooked at this stage.
Add the cucumber, chillies and salt. Cook over low heat for 5 - 10 minutes until the cucumber is tender.
Meanwhile, heat the ghee in a separate pan and add the black mustard seeds and curry leaves. Pop the mustard seeds and then empty the contents of the pan into the lentils and cucumber.
Add the remainder of the coconut milk, stir through and cook on a higher heat for 3 - 5 minutes until the sauce thickens.
Read some more:
Simply Spicy has a lovely Cucumber Dal. “this preparation of moong dal and cucumber is simply irresistible in its taste.”
Other Posts:
18 responses so far ↓
bee // October 31, 2007 at 8:46 am
thanks for the link and wonderful array of dishes. i wanted to e-mail you about something, but couldn’t find your address. could you please contact me at jugalbandee AT gmail DOT com? would appreciate it.
Kevin // October 31, 2007 at 9:46 am
I would never have thought of using cucumber in a curry. Cucumbers are a favorite of mine. I will have to try this to see how the cucumber does in a cooked savoury dish.
VegeYum // October 31, 2007 at 10:06 am
Hi Kevin, it really is delicious. Very coconut-y and flavoursome. If you are nervous, use half cucumber and half zucchini. Let me know how it turns out.
I had a HK Chinese border once, and she was always cooking lettuce, cucumber, things we (in the West) would never usually think of cooking. And you know what? They were delicious. Her lettuce dishes became my favourites.
shivapriya // October 31, 2007 at 1:13 pm
Nice dish and wonderful explanation. I make soup with red lentils and coconut milk. We make dal (toovar) with cucumber.
amberjee // October 31, 2007 at 7:34 pm
aaaargh, my hong kong partner extols the virtues of cooked cucumber and cooked lettuce. I. Still. Can’t. Get. My. Taste. Buds. Around. It. He also eats raw zucchini, so there you go.
I even saw Jamie Oliver cook lettuce in a dish the other day. And Gordon Ramsey as well. The world is catching on. Cucumber soon!
VegeYum // October 31, 2007 at 7:49 pm
Hey Amberjee, welcome back! Yes, even raw zucchini is delicious. He he he…
Sivapriya, your toovar dal with cucumber sounds delicious too.
titus2woman // November 1, 2007 at 1:59 am
This sounds just MARVELLOUS! YUM! Thanks for sharing it! (((((HUGS))))) sandi
willhaynes // November 1, 2007 at 4:44 am
Wow, that I will have to try! I’ve never had cooked cucumber in anything.
arfi // November 1, 2007 at 4:18 pm
I am familiar with cucumber in curry. I think it is because of the historical background of the friendship between India and Indonesia then this dish becomes familiar in Indonesian dish. It brings pretty colour and flavour in the dish, doesn’t it? Lovely picture you took there.
VegeYum // November 1, 2007 at 4:46 pm
Hello arfi, I never knew that it was Indonesian as well! Yes, no doubt through the India - Indonesian connection.
willhaynes, I know - it is quite unusual, isn’t it? Are you brave enough to try it?
kalyn // November 3, 2007 at 12:28 am
Sorry to hear about the computer issues, but this is a great entry! Sounds like an interesting dish and I don’t think I’ve had anything similar to this. (I’m a huge cucumber fan!)
VegeYum // November 3, 2007 at 8:24 am
Sandi, great to have you here.
Kalyn, thanks for your commiserations. I am almost at the stage of being able to redo the post. And do try the curry - it is quite unusual.
Maninas // November 12, 2007 at 1:08 am
I normally have cucumber in stir-fries, a tip which I picked up off my Chinese housemates at university. I must say I absolutely love the flavour! I shall try them in the curry, too.
What is the origin of this dish, I mean where from in India? It sounds like a Southern dish.
Thanks.
VegeYum // November 12, 2007 at 5:51 am
Hi Maninas,
This dish comes from the Nair community in Kerala. Wikipedia has an entry on the Nair community, and I found this lovely piece on Kerala from jugalbandi.
Actually Olan is a dish with little spice in it, just vegetables cooked in a coconut gravy with green chilli, yet still has an amazing aroma and flavour. It can be made with white, red or yellow pumpkin, pumpkin and black eyed beans, various gourds, squashes and melons, potato or zucchini as well. Just how I like it - simple, great.
Let me know how you like the curry. Well done on being brave enough to have tried cooked cucumber.
Maninas // November 20, 2007 at 1:02 am
Just made this!
Unfortunately, it didn’t work very well, I suspect due to the coconut milk I bought which was very thin, and had a funny aftertaste. I considered not making it, but then I decided to give it a go anyway.
I served it with some basmati, through which I stirred a bit of ghee and lemon juice, like you suggested in one of your post. The rice is gorgeous, and it works well with this curry. Actually, the rice saved the meal for me.
I will give it another go with some thicker coconut milk. I love the way the lentils smelled when they were cooking.
VegeYum // November 21, 2007 at 8:30 pm
Hi Maninas, I am so sad that it didn’t turn out the best. I too suspect that the coconut milk was suspect. Hope you try it again.
Love that you liked the rice with ghee and lemon - it is very special, I think.
Simple as Applied to Cucumbers « A Life (Time) of Cooking // November 26, 2007 at 8:06 am
[...] Cool as a Cucumber - A curry to die for [...]
Pravs // May 4, 2008 at 4:46 pm
Thats a nice combination of masoor dal, cucumber and coconut. Thanks for noting and linking my recipe to this post.
Thanks, Prav. Your recipe is great!
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