The Sensuous Sambar
Cooking With Lentils
Today is the beginning of another week.
Let us proceed to the kitchen today, to rustle up something.
Leave your arrogance and your attitude at the door, bring in only humility and love. First, before you lay your hands on anything, murmur a short prayer.
Keep ready four tablespoons of coriander seeds, four blood-red dry Madras chillies with smooth skins, not scaly ones: the scaly ones are not from Madras: half a tablespoon of fenugreek seeds, a small piece of asafoetida and two fistfuls of washed, dried, crushed-in-the-hand curry leaves. Heat oil. Wait till it becomes a clear gold, turn down the flame. Put in the asafoetida first, then, in rapid succession, the coriander seeds. Stir. The fenugreek seeds. Stir. The chillies. Stir. Turn up the flame. What does it smell like? Can you distinctly smell every single spice roasting happily? Yes? Switch off the gas. Put in both fistfuls of curry leaves. They will splutter and mutter at you. No one likes being put into hot oil. But then they get used to it, you know. Gently, gently, gently stir the mixture. Bottom to top, top to bottom. Remove from the oil. Keep them away for some time. Assure them that you will return, soon.
Into a pressure cooker, wash and put in tuvar dal, lentils or split pigeon peas. Pick out the asafoetida from the mixture you have fried, and drop that in, too. Light the stove, keep the cooker on. The minute the cooker begins to show signs of agitation, drop the weight on, and when the weight begins to whistle at you, switch off immediately. It is better not to tolerate things whistling at you in your own kitchen, you understand. The neighbours might have a problem with it.
When you open the cooker again, only the extreme outer circumference of every dal should be cooked. The entire inner one should be hard and uncooked.
Grind the fried spices with a little water. Grind them well. If, when you feel you are done, the coriander looks like small pieces of finger nails, or the skins of the chillies are glaring at you, you need to go back and do it all over again.
To the cooked dal, add the vegetables you have cut beautifully and with precision, as well as the mixture of ground spices. Stir. Don’t leave the kitchen. Calls, messages, summons of any sort, can wait. This, can’t. Keep stirring. Gently, not with murderous intent. If you like more sourness than the tomatoes you put in allow, put in a tablespoonful of tamarind essence.
Peel and cut tiny, purple shallots. Cut ladies finger into finger-length slices.
Into hot coconut oil, put in mustard seeds. Let it splutter till silent. DON’T let them burn. Put in curry leaves, the shallots and the ladies finger. Instantly lower the flame. Stir. Gently. Let them introduce themselves to each other, and get to know one another well. Once they turn triumphantly golden brown, pour in two ladles full of the curry in the cooker, into the pan. It should sizzle happily and fragrantly. Did it? Then, pour this mixture into the cooker. Switch off the flame. Cover immediately. Don’t let the aromas escape. Open only after 10 minutes. Stir. Partially shut the cooker again.
Now you might need to go and have a bath. You wouldn’t want to spend the rest of the day smelling of sambar, would you?
