Thakkalli Mor Kozhambu ~ South Indian style kadhi with tomatoes ~ Buttermilk tomato curry ~ With Stepwise pictures

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Ever wondered what the color choices you make, say about you ?  I never gave it a thought until I came across this fun test.  The test  asks you to first choose colors that you prefer the most, then the second time around, the colors you least prefer. When you are done, it gives you an analysis of your personality. Cool huh? and in my case the analysis in the end was pretty spot on too :-) Who knew our color choices revealed so much about our personality. It is something I am going to keep in mind for sure....:-)

Talking about colors and hues, here is a mor kozhambu that has a very unique hue to it.  As I mentioned earlier, mor kozhambu or buttermilk curry  can be described best as a soupy kind of curry that is served on a bed of plain steamed rice with a stir fry style curry on the side. For those of you familiar with the Gujarati Kadhi this is the south Indian cousin of kadhi :-)  It always fascinates me how many variations are available even in traditional recipes and how each small change makes a marked difference to the dish.

This variation of mor kozhambu is something that I learned from R's athai (aunt) when she was visiting us. It is one of the few variations of mor kozhambu that I make regularly. Tomato lends a nice flavor and a lovely color to the kozhambu. It also enhances the taste quite a bit, making this one of my favorite version of this kozhambu :)



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Ingredients and Method to make Mor Kozhambu with tomato
1 large tomato cut fine (approx 2 cups of cut tomatoes)
1/8 tsp turmeric powder (haldi/manjal podi)
1/8 tsp sugar (shakkar)

3 Thai or Indian green chilies (or to taste)
2 dry red chilies (or to taste)
1/2 tsp cumin seeds (jeera)
3/4 tsp raw rice (chawal/pachai arisi)
4 tbsp fresh or frozen grated coconut (nariyal/thengai)( if frozen thaw to room temperature)

1 1/2 cups of yogurt (curds/dahi/thayir) mixed with 1 1/2 cups of water or 3 cups of buttermilk

Seasoning
3 tsp coconut oil
1 tsp mustard seeds (rai/kadagu)
1/2 tsp fenugreek seeds (methi dana/ mendiyam)
1 to 2 tsp dried curry leaves or 5 to 6 fresh curry leaves broken into small bits

salt to taste
handful cilantro (coriander leaves) cut fine

Cook the tomato with turmeric powder and sugar and a little water until it turns completely soft and mushy. Keep the cooked tomato aside to cool to room temperature. When cool, grind tomatoes along with green chilies, dry red chilies, cumin seeds, rice and coconut to a fine paste adding water as required to move the blades of the blender/ spice grinder.

Whisk together yogurt and water until smooth or use the blender to blend them together. If using buttermilk you can skip this step.
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Heat the ground mixture stirring continuously. When it heats thoroughly, add buttermilk to it and mix well, lower the heat and heat the mixture until it begins to froth. Remove from heat and allow to cool. When the curry is slightly warm or at room temperature add salt to taste and mix well.

 Heat oil in a small pan, add mustard seeds to it, when seeds begin to splutter add fenugreek seeds and stir for a few seconds until it begins to darken very slightly. Then quickly add curry leaves, stir once or twice and pour the entire seasoning on the buttermilk curry.

Garnish with finely chopped cilantro and serve on a bed of hot rice with any curry of choice on the side or to go with some rice noodles (sevai) .

Notes
After the salt is added, buttermilk curry cannot be heated all the way through because it will split, at best it can be made warm so it is recommended to serve this with steaming hot rice after it has cooled or when it is served warm .