Amla Pickle (Usirikaya Uragaya)

I bought a quite few amlas (usiri kayalu, Indian Gooseberry) at Toronto and I couldnt resist making a small
batch of pickle with them, following a recipe from Malathi Chandurs cookbook - Vantalu-Pindi Vantalu.
The pickle turned out to be hot, spicy good.

Recipe:
For 15 amlas

15 clean, fresh looking, blemish free amlas (usiri kayalu)

cup peanut oil (batani oil) or (palli oil)
cup of salt and red chilli powder
cup of mustard seeds - roasted & finely powdered (aava pindi)
tsp of asafoetida (inguva)
Preparation:
First wash the amlas and dry them using clean cloth, without any sign of moisture.
Heat up 1 tablespoon of oil in a skillet and add the amlas and saut them till they turn light brown. Remove
and let them cool down to room temperature.
Heat the remaining oil in another pan to a smoking point. Remove it from heat, let it cool down to room
temperature.
Add salt, red chilli powder, mustard powder and asafoetida to the roasted amlas. Mix them all with a clean,
dry spoon. Pour and stir in the heated (now at room temperature) oil. Mix them all together, again with a
clean dry spoon. Cover tightly and let it stew at least for two weeks. The more you wait, the tasty the pickle
becomes and the normal waiting period is one month. I couldnt wait that long.:)
Just before serving, do the popu or tadka. Heat 1 tsp of oil in a pan, fry red chilies, cumin and mustard seeds
until they splutter, then add garlic flakes and remove from the heat. Add it to the pickle, mix thoroughly and
serve with rice and dal.

Amla Pickle (Usiri kaya Uragaya) - spicy and sour like mango pickle and quite tasty in this cold winter
weather.

Recipe Text
Click Here For Making Pav

Ingredients:

Pav 9 Pieces Slab

Tomatoes 300gms

Cauliflower Florets 75gms

Capsicum 1(70gms)

Potatoes 1(75gms)

Green Peas 40gms

Onion 1

Tamarind 10gms

PavBhajiMasala 1tsp

Salt to Taste

Turmeric Powder 1/4tsp

Red Chili Powder 2tsps

Onion 1(Small)

Ginger Small Piece

Garlic 1Clove

Chopped Coriander 3tbsps

Oil 5tsps

Butter 35gms

Butter for Roasting Pav Bread

(Online Conversion utility to convert Gms to Cups & Temperatures etc)

Preparations:
Wash and clean all vegetables. Peel potatoes and grate them. Grate cauliflower florets
in a mixer grinder. Remove the seeds of capsicum and chop it finely. Grate tomatoes
with a V-Slicer or chop them finely with a knife. Peel onion and chop it. Peel the skins of
small onion and garlic. In a mixer grinder grind small onion, garlic and ginger adding
some water to a fine paste. Take tamarind in a microwave safe bowl and add water to it.
Place this bowl in oven and cook on high power for 30 seconds. Cool it and grind it to a
fine paste. In another microwave safe bowl take grated potatoes and grated cauliflower
and add some water. Place this bowl in oven and cover it partially. Cook on high power
for 5 minutes. Stir once with a spoon and again cook on high power for 3 minutes.
When the vegetables are still hot mash them with the back of a spoon. Take these
mashed vegetables into a bowl and keep them aside. Take green peas in a microwave
safe bowl and add some water. Place this bowl in oven and cover it partially. Cook on
high power for 3 minutes. Stir once with a spoon and again cook on high power for 2
minutes. When the vegetables are still hot mash them with the back of a spoon. Take
these mashed vegetables into a bowl and keep them aside. Take chopped capsicum in
a microwave safe bowl and add some water. Place this bowl in oven and cover it
partially. Cook on high power for one and half minutes approximately. Take these
cooked capsicum pieces into a bowl and keep them aside. Now take tomato pieces into
a microwave safe bowl. Place this bowl in oven and cover it partially. Cook on high
power for 3 minutes. Stir once with a spoon and again cook on high power for 2
minutes. When the tomatoes are still hot mash them with a masher till smooth. Take
these mashed tomatoes into a bowl and keep them aside.
Method:
Heat a pan and add oil to it. When the oil is hot add the chopped onions and fry till they
turn crisp. Then add the onion-ginger-garlic paste and fry till dry. Add the cooked
capsicum pieces and fry for few minutes. Then with the help of a masher mash the
mixture in pan. Add the cooked tomatoes and mash again. Now add the cooked green
peas, cooked potatoes and cauliflower mixture. Mix all well and mash well. Add some
water, salt and tamarind paste to the curry and mix well. Cook the curry for some time.

In a plate, mix red chili powder, pavbhaji masala and turmeric

powder. Heat a pan and add butter. Melt the butter. Stir the
melted butter with a spoon and switch off the flame. Add the
mixed spice powder to the melted butter and mix. Add some
chopped coriander leaves to this butter mixture and mix well. Add
this prepared butter based mixture to the curry and mix all well.
Cook for few minutes and the Bhaji (Curry) forPavBhaji will be
ready to be served. Transfer the curry to a serving bowl and
garnish with the remaining chopped coriander leaves.
Take Pav slab and break it into pieces. Cut each piece of Pav horizontally. Do not cut
fullycut three-fouths of the Pav. Similarly cut all the Pavs and keep them aside. Heat
a Tawa. When the Tawa is hot add about a tsp of butter and fry each piece of Pavbread.
Fry till golden and keep it in a serving plate. Similarly fry all the Pav pieces.
While serving take a plate and put three pav pieces in it. In a bowl put some chopped
onions with a lemon wedge on them. In another bowl put some Bhaji. Place these bowls
in the serving plate and serve them hot.
Points to Notice:
Prepare Pav freshly and serve to enjoy the taste.
Chop all the vegetables into small pieces so that it would be easy to mash them while
cooking.
Be liberal in using butter. It is because of this butter only this dish has a special taste.
While cooking the vegetables in microwave oven do not cook mixing all vegetables.
Instead follow the movie and cook them separately. By cooking them separately, we can
have the feel of the vegetable while eating.
Mashing the vegetables when they are being cooked gives the right consistency to the
curry. When the vegetable is hot it mashes easily. When we mash with a masher some
portion of the vegetable gets mashed and some portion remains as it is. The texture is
maintained when we mash them while cooking instead of grinding all the cooked
vegetables and preparing the curry.
While grinding chutney, there will be a difference when ground in a mixer grinder and a
mortar and pestle. Similarly when mashed the vegetables have a different texture to
that of ground vegetables. So use a masher and mash the vegetables while they are
being cooked. Don't be tempted to ground the vegetables and preparing the dish.

When the spices (chili powder, pavbhajimasala and turmeric) are directly added to the
curry, they absorb water from the curry and they taste as COOKED MASALA. When
they are mixed with melted butter and then added to the curry they taste as FRIED
MASALA. There is difference in both the tastes, so use it as fried masala to get better
taste. Once the butter is melted do not forget to switch off the flame before adding the
spices. Otherwise the spices get burned and the taste gets spoiled.
Similarly chopped coriander when added to the hot melted butter gets fried to some
extent and brings a nice flavor.
Fry the Pav bread liberally with butter to get a good taste.
Do not try this recipe when you dont have butter and coriander leaves. They both add
special flavor to this dish.
As cauliflower is available only in the season, Cabbage can be substituted for
cauliflower.

Prepare your Pav and Bhaji watching the video and following the
points discussed here and enjoy the praises of yourAs we are using lot
of butter in this recipe eat in limited quantity. You can enjoy this dish by preparing it any
number of times but in limited quantities ONLY.

family members. Last but not the least - serve them with butter milk in the end to have a
filled stomach. Buttermilk acts as an antidote to the heavy quantities of butter used in
pav-bhaji. It is advisable to feed only 3 pavs to one person. Don't encourage and give
more pavs. They expand after getting into the stomach.

Enjoy !!!!!!!!!!!!!!