Onion Sambhar - a mundane delicacy!

   
Happy New year folks! Hope your holidays were as fun-filled as mine. Oh yeah, as usual, my friends and I enjoyed lots and lots of home-cooked and restaurant meals with some excellent drinks to wash it all down. And when the time came for resolutions, I made one (among others) that I was sure I could follow : I would not eat out more than twice a month! Which translates to more recipes on this blog, lets hope! Here's to a wonderful, healthy 2013 filled with the warmth and comfort of many home-cooked delicacies.

Step into any Tamil household at lunch-time and the probability is that 50% of the times you will be welcomed with the saliva-producing aroma of vegetables boiling in a delicately spiced and seasoned mix of lentils and tamarind pulp. The Maami of the household is bound to invite you to join in the family's lunch with a very audible threat, or so it sounds "எங்க ஆத்துக்கு வந்துட்டு என்னோடைய ஸ்பெஷல் ஐய்யங்கார் சாம்பார் ருசிக்காம போய்டுவேளா என்ன?" (Would you dare to leave our home without tasting my special Iyengar sambar?). I am sure that only a handful of such Maami's, Paati's and Amma's, who take a fierce pride in their brand of Sambhar-making realise that the dish owes it's origin to the erstwhile Maratha Rulers of Thanjavur. Long story short, when the tart kokum required for the preparation of the staple Marathi amti did not arrive on time for the mid-day meal, Sambhoji, who was the King as well as the chief chef, was told, by the severely shivering sous chef, to make the dish with tamarind acting as a replacement for the kokum. The adventurous cook that he was, Sambhoji went ahead with the idea and thus was born the Sambhar, named after it's apparent inventor (though learned sources say that this style of cooking was already prevalent in the south).

Despite it's West-Indian origins, the Sambhar is perhaps one of the best known examples of South Indian cooking to novices away from the four Dravidian states. History and statistics show that in the early nineties, Vada, Idli, Dosa and Sambhar were the sole flag-bearers of the glorious South-Indian cuisine outside it's indigenous region. Closer home, usually no complete mid-day meal is fit to be called so without one of the many varieties of our interest for the day. Besides, it makes frequent appearances at breakfast and dinner tables accompanying pongal, idli, dosa, upma, oothappam... You get it! And there are as many varieties of Sambhar as there are vegetables, dals and spices. Starting from the basic Onion sambhar weaving its way up more increasingly complex recipes of Drumstick Sambhar, Spinach Sambhar, Naattu-Karikaay Sambhar (prepared on Makara Sankranthi with a colourful medley of local produce), Arachu-Vitta Sambhar (with freshly ground aromatic masala paste) and so on. Like Rasam, the Sambhar also owes its distinct flavor to a unique mix of several spices that are roasted and ground into a powder. The Sambhar powder varies from house-to-house, region-to-region and state-to-state, with the Malayalis adding coconut, the Kannadigas with their jaggery, and the Telugus spicing it up with a typical extra helping of red-chillies, again giving rise to a limitless combination of flavors.

Being an ardent enemy of boiled vegetables, it was only recently that I got to start enjoying the unique flavor that each vegetable imparts to the Sambhar : the tomato with an extra kick of sourness, the spinach with it's fresh green taste, the coconut with it's creamy texture and even the slight sweetness due to the jaggery, accentuated by the otherwise spicy mix. Nevertheless, my favorite was and will always remain the plain Onion Sambhar with just the right texture of the slightly caramelized onions, not too chewy, not too soggy. The preferences may change with some people lunging at a cauldron of Sambhar where the onion is barely cooked to others craving for the version where there are no clear lines of distinction between the dal, the liquid and the onions. The recipe below will cater to all the tastes, provided you cook the onions to the desired degree on the raw-to-soggy scale. I have used a home-made mix of Sambhar Powder that my friend Deepu specially procured from a veteran Iyengar Maami , but since not everyone has access to the same, feel free to use one of the many brands available commercially - Sakthi Masala or Aachi's Masala would be my recommendation.

ONION SAMBHAR (Serves 6)

Set-up Time : 20 minutes
Experiment Run-Time : 30 Minutes

The Shopping List

          Set 1: Liquid Base

          Tamarind : 1 Tbsp paste mixed well with a cup of water

          Toor Dal (Red Gram/Split Pigeon Peas) : 1.5 Cups
          (Pressure cooked with 4 cups of water, a pinch of turmeric
          powder and salt for 5 whistles)

          Tomato : 1 large, pressure cooked, whole, with the Toor Dal

          Set 2: Chop-Chop
          Onions :2 medium, cut lengthwise - medium thick strands 
          Green Chilies : 4-6, slit lengthwise  

          Set 3: The Flavorings
          Sambhar Powder of your choice : 2-3 Tbsp
          Asafoetida : 1/4 tsp
          Mustard seeds : 1 tsp
          Red Chilies : 3, broken
          Curry Leaves : a strand or two
          Fenugreek seeds : 1/8 tsp           
          Vadagam* : 2 marble-sized pieces
          Vegetable Oil : Sufficient to sauté the above
          Coriander Leaves : one fistful
          Salt : Adjust according to taste

Seasonings : Red chilies, Curry leaves, Mustard seeds and the indispensable Vadagam (top right)

* Vadagams are handy, ready to use seasoning balls made from a sun-dried mix of fried onions and other condiments. In the days of yore, all the paatis, athais, maamis and ammas of the household used to make these and other sun-dried delicacies by the tons during the summer months. Vadagams sure as hell add a unique flavor to dishes like Sambhar, Spinach and other Tamil-gravy recipes. If you do not have them in your pantry, don't even plan to take a casual walk to the nearest Indian store and buy them unless you are in a region with an overwhelming majority of Tamil aunties. (This is one item that all my friends must bring back for me when they fly home to Chennai)

Methodology

1. Choose a wide enough kadai that would surely accommodate around two to three litres of Sambhar. If your dal and tomato are already cooked, you are just half an hour away from sitting down to a meal of piping hot Sambhar with rice or anything else you may choose to have it with.

2. Heat the oil in the kadai and add the asafoetida and mustard seeds followed by the fenugreek seeds, red chilies, crushed pieces of Vadagam and curry leaves. If this is your first time with Vadagam, beware, do not step into the magical clasps of it's aroma - you will be entrapped in a blissful trance that can possibly only end when a pungent odor arises from the burnt remains in the kadai.

3. Once the tempting aroma fills the kitchen, add the ingredients of set 2 and continue sautéing until you attain the desired degree of onion texture, as discussed previously. When the onions are nearing their perfect state, tip in the cooked tomato from Set 1 and mash it up as you sauté the mixture.

4. I am probably deviating from tradition in this step, but this is where I pour the the tamarind water into the sautéd onion mixture. I like it when the onions are further cooked in the boiling tamarind water. Traditionalists may add the cooked dal at this stage instead of the tamarind water but my experiments have yielded better results when I follow the unorthodox version.

5. When the tamarind water starts boiling, pour in the pressure cooked dal. Some people prefer to mash the dal before they add it to the Sambhar, but once again, I prefer to have them well-cooked but whole. Now wait patiently until the entire mixture boils up.

6. Finally, when you can see the dal dancing up and down in the simmering liquid, sprinkle the Sambhar powder evenly over the entire surface, and stir it into the rest of the mixture. Let it simmer for some more time before you add the salt and mix that in too. Transfer to a serving bowl and garnish with a bunch of freshly chopped coriander leaves.

This Sambhar goes very well with rice, pongal, dosas, oothappam and the kind. For idlies, my mother  makes a different version, with globules of ghee floating around a much thinner, clearer liquid. Will post that some  time down the year. A simple but satisfying meal for a cold winter day would be some steaming white rice, onion Sambhar and a couple of roaster or fried appalam/pappad. Unlike Rasam, Sambhar tends to aquire an "unsambhar'ish" flavor if refrigerated, or so I feel. Hence, I prefer to make it in small quantities so that there are no leftovers. But if you feel that the flavor enhances the taste of the dish, by all means, go ahead and make it by the gallon, so that you may enjoy it throughout the week.