Melon Cucumber Spread and A Book Review
It has been long since I invested in a good cook book in recent times. Although I have been collecting cook books from my college days and have more than 200 plus of them crying out for space in my shelf. I find it difficult to connect with those books and most of them are mere hard copies I hardly refer to for my cooking.
Recently I came across a cook book ‘Cooking At Home With Pedatha’ written by the wonderful duo Jigyasa Giri and Pratibha Jain. The book instantly caught my attention with the elegant cover and the subtle colors giving it an aesthetic look. The simple grandma’s recipes with useful tips and perfect pictures to match up with easily connects with the readers at the first sight.
The book has some authentic recipes from South India shared by Smt. Subhadra Krishna Rau Parigi who was fondly called as Pedatha, a great host and a versatile cook. It brings forth the simple and traditional ways of cooking traditional Andhra vegetarian meals.
The book has categorized the Andhra meals into spreads or chutneys, spicy powders, rice recipes, curries, crispies and sweets. You can find some very easy and scrumptious recipes for spreads using common vegetables such as carrots, brinjal, cucumber and gourd etc. Most of the recipes retain the authenticity of grandmas cooking. I found my Sanbhar tasting delightful after I used the exact proportion mentioned for the Sambhar powder in the book.
One another quick and easy recipe I found in the book is to soak the mustard seeds in water and grind along with green chillies and fresh coriander leaves. Mix the same with yogurt and eat it with hot plain rice. And you have a scrumptious treat ready in a go!
While flipping through the pages I felt my grandma is with me giving instructions for exact measurements and some special tips to make my cooking an unforgettable experience. My MIL incidentally belongs to the same place where Dr. V.V Giri former president of India (Pedatha is his oldest off spring) lived and has been dishing out delicious vegetarian Andra meals for her family for long. She was excited to see some of the rare and authentic recipes in the book which her grandmother used to make ages back! She asked me to try the melon cucumber spread from the book.
Ingredients;
(As in Cooking at home with Pedatha)
- Melon cucumber 1 large
- Thick tamarind pulp 2 tbsp
- Salt to taste
The 1st tempering
- Split black gram (husked) 1 tbsp
- Mustard seeds 2 tsps
- Red chillies 5-6
- Green chillies 3-4
- Coriander leaves ¼ cup, chopped
- Asafoetida powder 1 tsp.
The 2nd Tempering
- Mustard seeds 1/4 tsp.
- Asafoetida powder 1/4 tsp.
melon cucumber and tamarind pulp…
Method; Peel the vegetable and dice it into cubes. Heat 2 tsps oil in a wok and add the gram, as it turns golden, pop the mustard. Take off from the flame add red chillies and the remaining ingredients.
Grind this tempering along with the tamarind pulp, salt and the diced veggies into a coarse paste and transfer into a clean bowl.
Heat rest of the oil and pop the mustard seeds, add asafoetida and temper the ground chutney again.
I followed the recipe which is on page 6 and got this delightful chutney. The only change I made is to grind the chutney in the end. We love this healthy and tangy Melon Cucumber spread with our chapattis and bread sandwiches .
I like to make dishes which are easy to cook, retains the nutritional value of the food and include loads of veggies and various grains in it. The cook book is for sure to keep if you are looking for some authentic recipes which are simple and healthy to add to your daily meals.
Notes;
- You can avoid grinding and serve the spread as it is as shown in the book.
- Melon cucumber is called Dossa kai in Tamil.
- Can try the same recipe with other veggies as well. Carrots, radish, cucumber and brinjal will make a scrumptious spread.
This looks yummy, and I love the tamarind pulp in it! I’d never thought of doing a melon spread, but yours looks great! Thanks for sharing dear!
I’ll bet this is so delicious with almost anything: as a spread or as chutney with simply cooked meat or fish. The flavors are intriguing! The book does sound just wonderful!
@Jamie, thanks gorgeous lady!
yumm ! this is something different….the book sounds interesting
Nice delicious looking spread…healthy too
What an interesting spread! I love the ingredients and the flavor must be fantastic! I can only imagine how many things you could use it on…great post!
This sounds so good, nice on a hot day, and so healthy too! Can’t beat it! 😀
O that looks really good and I can image it would work well with a lot of different flavors. I had never actually heard of melon cucumbers. Don’t think I’ve ever seen anything like it here.
The cookbook sounds very interesting.
And so sweet of you to make this spread for your MIL. It sounds very refreshing and delicious.
wow, i’ve never heard of melon cucumber before! what an interesting dip. i tried tamarind the other day b/c someone told me its great for the digestive track. hahaha :).
Feel like finishing that wonderful bowl of fabulous chutney, simply inviting..
lovely spread !
Nice recipe with melon and nice post…
Absolutely adoring the spread.
Thanks Sangeeta for sharing YOUR experience of ‘Cooking with Pedatha’. Melon Cucumber Chutney is sure a great hit with most, for its sheer versatility. Can be used with Rice, Rotis, breads or with Idlis and Dosas. Looking forward to seeing more posts about recipes you try from the book.
This sounds soo delicious. I would love you use it to grill my fish. Thanks for sharing.
OH,I would love to find this book and cook from it…sounds nice 😀 And the spread is so interesting, too.
This spread looks delicious and love all of these flavors! The cookbook sounds wonderful as well and I like that it is sectioned off in a way that someone not as familiar with these dishes could still follow.
Great review 🙂
This looks like a wonderful spread. The spices together with tamarind is a perfect match! Thanks for sharing the book review.
nice spread sanjeetha for the first time i am doing this thanks for sharing
@Latha, hope you like it..it really taste delicious with dosas and Idlies!
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