A Vegetarian Indian Thali

Blogging Marathon# 40: Week 4/ Day 3

Theme: Bookmarked recipes from BM# 39

Dish: Indian Thali

So for the last day of the marathon, I created a thali with some of the recipes that I bookmarked from last month’s mega marathon. Indian thali usually consists of a Bread, Rice dish, a dry curry, a gravy curry, chutney and something sweet to end the meal.

Most of the dishes in this thali are from the North Eastern states of India. To be honest, I had no idea about the eating habits or the popular dishes from any of the North Eastern states. Thanks to the research that all of the marathoners have done last month, I know a lot more about these cuisines now. I also wanted to make this black rice pudding from Nagaland for dessert, but I made this thali for myself and I wasn’t motivated enough to make a dessert and also I was tooooo full after eating this meal. buuurp!!

Dishes in the Thali:

• Sattu Ka Paratha
• Manipuri Khichdi
• Kulath ki Dal

Panch Phoron Tharkari

Mosdeng Serma

Hmarcha Rawt

Sattu Ka Paratha from Bihar: This is a traditional paratha made in Bihar and Jharkand. I made litti using the sattu flour I bought and wanted to try something else using the same. When I saw these parathas with sattu flour stuffing on Valli’s & Sara’s blogs I knew what to do with my leftover sattu. I actually made these parathas twice in the past couple of weeks — they are easy to make and the spices used in the stuffing makes them very tasty.

Recipe from Valli & Saras blogs:

Manipuri Khichdi: Khichdi is one of our family favorite dish. I make it very often when I’m running out of time or ingredients. This Manipuri khichsi is made with toor dal instead of moong dal and also has more spices added to it than my regular version. I made some changes in the way of cooking the dish — check out Valli’s recipe here to see how to make it the traditional way.

Recipe adapted from Valli:

Kulath ki Dal from Uttarakand: Horsegram is a completely new ingredient for me. I bought it just before April’s Mega marathon in the hopes of using it in one of the dishes, but I didn’t use it for any of the dishes. But luckily I found quite a few interesting recipes using it and here I am with the very first dish I made with Horsegram.

This dal is from Uttarakand and it is a very simple and earthy dish which is very mildly spiced. Using rice flour makes the dish thick and creamy.

Panch Phoron Tharkari (Mixed Vegetable Curry with Panch Phoron): This was one of the most popular dishes that was posted for North eastern states — Arunachal Pradesh, Tripura, Bengal etc. Panch phoron is a mix of 5 seeds — mustard, fennel, nigella (onion), fenugreek and cumin. The addition of panch phoron to tempering gives any dish a lot of flavor.

This is a very simple semi dry curry that can be made with any combination of mixed vegetables. I used sweet potato, eggplant and regular potato. Traditionally pumpkin is used in this curry, but butternut squash or any other winter squash can be used instead. This curry goes well with rice or roti.

Mosdeng Serma from Tripura: This was one of the simplest tomato chutney recipes I have ever made, with very few ingredients; tomatoes, onions, garlic and chilies. We can taste all of the ingredients in the chutney which are otherwise weighed down by tamarind and the tempering that are usually added in South Indian style chutneys. This chutney can be eaten with rice, roti or even as a sandwich spread.

Hmarcha Rawt — Roasted Green Chili Chutney from Mizoram: I actually wanted to make this chutney for Mizoram, but changed my mind and made this simple steamed veggie dish. This is a very spicy chutney made with roasted green chilies. Use milder green chilies for a milder chutney. My husband liked it a lot, but I was huffing and puffing after a few bites.

Lets check out what my fellow marathoners have cooked today for BM# 40.