Meeting a Farmer & Moolik

I’ve been on and off on the blog for a while now ...a self imposed break... to realign my approach towards choosing foods. It all started one Saturday morning with a visit to the local farmer’s & organic market. What started as a thought has now become a weekend ritual to visit these markets, interact with the local growers and buy produce that is chemical free and locally grown.

In pursuit of this I have been able to interact with farmers and taste a whole variety of farm fresh produce and foods in various places in India and here in Texas. It’s been a healthy and refreshing change from a plastic bag loaded with chemically induced produce from the regular grocery stores. The one-on-one interaction with the famers is what has made this experience unique.

As an initiative to promote organic farming and the local produce A Bon Vivant Chow Chronicles has decided to go organic and local with all produce and ingredients - wherever possible- used for recipes mentioned here. Any exceptions from this will be mentioned. The earth tones of the Chow Chronicles are in alignment to promote earth friendly farming and local farmers.

My journey started in Mangalore, India. In search of local produce, I had to travel just 5 miles from the city to meet a local farmer who has been growing coconuts and jackfruits for 30 years and has been selling produce to my grandmother’s family. With no fertilizers and just manure, his simple farming was the closest I could get to organic, in the region. Mangalore has bloomed into a city from the small town it was half a decade ago. With high rises on every street, bustling traffic, malls and a huge growing population, I was overcome with mixed feelings seeing a town so close to my heart change so rapidly.

At the farm, I got to know about two different varieties of jackfruit- a harder milder variety and a softer sweeter one. On tasting a sample of each, I decided to buy the softer sweeter variety. After a short walk through this farm of 200 coconut trees and 15 huge jackfruit trees, I was treated to a cup of coffee made with jaggery.

Though a little too sweet for my taste buds, it had this strong earthy flavor to it that got me curious to know how it was prepared. That’s when I came to know that the farmer used for fresh cane juice for this recipe of home-made jaggery. Prepared without any additives or chemicals, it had this outstanding rich unrefined texture and color to it. To go with the coffee I was also offered pieces of crushed jaggery with coconut as a snack. You could say I had a double- double of jaggery! In all my purchase didn’t stop just at the jackfruit; I also purchased a small bag of the home-made jaggery and a few coconuts.

Once I got home, I knew just exactly I wanted to do using the jackfruit and the jaggery. My grandmother (on my mother’s side) is an awesome cook. She has been the inspiration behind my love for Konkani cuisine. In spite of the tiredness from frequent bouts of wheezing, she was eager to make some “Moolik” (fried jackfruit dumplings with coconut and jaggery) for me as much as I was eager to eat them. Though there may be many different recipes to this Moolik, this is my favorite more so because this has a special ingredient – my grandmother’s love- and it has been something I’ve looked forward to in summers ever since I was little.

At the end of a fun vacation in Mangalore, I was sad to leave and amongst all the other things I wished and hoped for is that this small farm remains intact without being engulfed into the realms of concrete world around it.

Now for the recipe......

Moolik

Ingredients

2 cups Jackfruit (pulp) de-seeded and chopped (Caution: Jackfruit as a whole has a tough exterior and a sticky interior. Oil hands before cutting the fruit to prevent the gum from sticking to your hands and get remove the pulp from the sheath)

½ cup Rice, soaked over night

1 cup Coconut, freshly grated

1 cup Jaggery, crushed

2 teaspoons Cardamom, crushed

½ teaspoon Sea Salt

Water

Oil

Method

Drain excess water from rice. Grind rice, jackfruit, jaggery, cardamom and coconut into a coarse thick semi-dry batter. Avoid adding water in excess to prevent batter from turning watery. Make sure the rice is coarse/grainy and not completely ground.

Add salt, mix well.

Heat oil till warm and add in spoonfuls of batter, one at a time, into the oil. Cook on medium-low flame till golden brown.

Drain off excess oil using absorbent paper. Serve warm.

Indian Ivy Gourd Sautéed with Garlic

Indian Ivy Gourd (Tendli or Tendley in Konkani) is an integral part of the Konkani cuisine. It is widely cooked on occasions when the food is “Saatwik” (Vegetarian food completely devoid of any onion and garlic). However, this vegetable hasn’t been restricted to just that and is cooked with onions and garlic on a day to day basis in most households.

Traditionally, stir fry recipes are termed as “Upkari”. The vegetable is cut lengthwise or in rounds/cubes (depending upon the vegetable) and sautéed in oil with roasted red chilies, salt, mustard seeds and coconut. Second in line come the recipes known as “Talasani” or “Thalasan” where the basic ingredients are oil, roasted red chilies and salt. For Talasani a fourth ingredient – garlic or in some cases mustard seeds- is added again depending on the vegetable used and the household’s palette.

“Tendley Talasani” as the name implies is Ivy gourd cooked with the base ingredients along with garlic. The Ivy gourd is flattened out using a pestle, smeared with salt and allowed to sit for a while before it is actually cooked (The pestle is used just to mash the gourd enough so that it flattens and not squish it into a mass). This is done to ensure that salt is evenly distributed. Cutting off the ends for this recipe is purely optional and not mandatory. That said, I never cut off the ends of the gourd for this recipe and have not experienced any difference in taste with and without the ends.

Ingredients

3 cups unripe Ivy Gourd (The gourd must be not ripe and red. Only green ones are to be used for this recipe)

1½ tablespoons Oil (Any vegetable or canola oil. Olive oil is strong and masks the flavor of the recipe.)

3-4 roasted Red Chilies

1 cup finely diced Garlic

Salt to taste

Method

1. Wash Ivy gourd and pat dry with a soft cloth.

2. Using a pestle flatten each gourd without breaking it apart, on a chopping board. When all gourds are flattened, add a teaspoon of salt and mix thoroughly and set aside for 10 minutes.

3. Heat oil in a skillet, add red chilies and garlic. Sauté well till garlic turns completely brown. This may take anywhere between 5-6 minutes.

4. Squeeze dry the gourd to strain all water and add it into the sautéed garlic. Make sure you turn the flame to low to avoid any splash. It’s best to throw in a handful of squeeze dried gourd at a time.

5. Mix well. Cook on medium-low flame, uncovered for 12-15 mins or till completely done. Stir occasionally to toss or turn any uncooked gourds.

6. Cooking is done when the Ivy gourds turn brown. Serve hot with dal and rice.

The reason I like this recipe is the aroma of sautéed garlic. To sauté the garlic completely I use finely diced garlic though the original recipe calls for halved garlic or partly mashed garlic. This is something I learnt from my Mom. I also use garlic in a larger quantity than what is generally used. The amount of oil used for the recipe varies and is purely a personal preference. I favor using less oil and increasing the cooking time to ensure that Ivy Gourd is evenly cooked and well done. I also go easy on the salt. So the only time I add salt is in Step 2. That said, additional salt can be added 5 minutes after the gourds are sautéed in the skillet. The time limit is to ensure that salt does not soften the gourds before sautéing.