I don’t know if this recipe is authentic but I read several and tweaked this to suit my taste.
When I started researching for my 7 course meal at Credo Belgrade I knew I had to use the beautiful pumpkins in season in Serbia. I came upon this beautiful dish from the Dogra community in Jammu called Kaddu ka Ambal. Memories of a dear friend (from the Dogra community) whose life was cut short aeons ago flooded in and I decided that I would recreate this dish in his memory (incidentally he went to Culinary school) and serve it as a soup. It is such a simple recipe with no onions, no ginger, no garlic and very little masala. I love that it has both sweet and savory notes. I don’t know if this recipe is authentic but I read several and tweaked this to suit my taste. Pleased to report it was a hit at my event.
Ingredients:
Pumpkin - 500 grams chopped
Mustard oil - 1 tbsp
Cumin seeds - 1 tsp
Fenugreek seeds - 1 tsp
Dried red chillies - 3-4
Turmeric powder - 1/2 tsp
Kashmiri Chilli powder - 1/2 tsp
Tamarind - 1 tbsp (soaked in water)
Jaggery - 2 tsp Salt - to taste
Method:
Heat mustard oil. Add cumin seeds, fenugreek seeds and dried red chillies. Next add Kashmiri Chilli powder and turmeric powder. Add chopped pumpkin, salt and about 1/2 cup water. Cover and cook till pumpkin is almost done. Next add tamarind extract and jaggery. Cook until pumpkin is done. Adjust seasonings as per taste (sweet/sour/spicy). If you are going to eat this with rotis then serve hot garnished with coriander leaves.
If you would like this as a soup then add more water or stock and purée it to soup consistency. Garnish with pumpkin seeds and coriander leaves. I like to dip the Serbian cornbread called Proja into this - ah deliciousness!!
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