Skip to main content

The Desi Lima


I live next to the biggest grocery store in Mumbai. And because "Hypercity" has pretty much every hard to find exotic ingredient you can buy in India, I rarely venture elsewhere. Except I was out shopping and landed up in Food Bazaar last weekend. What a shock it was! There was this whole section of stuff I never thought you could buy - Tamilian style chillies dried in yogurt, idli podi, garlic chutney powder, dried lemon pickle and lots of other stuff I can't name.

And then, the vegetable section was another shocker. I found green wheat, folks! Another excellent addition to my salads was ragi sprouts, something I never knew existed. But my proudest buy that day was a pack of green lima beans. I love beans and this is one kind I have never tasted before, fresh or dried. Clearly, I was in awe of my shopping.

Except my cook had one look at my fresh lima beans and told me bluntly that it's something I could have bought very easily if I'd been looking at the grocery shelves more carefully. She then proceeded to tell me not to bother with a recipe as this is something she makes at home all the time. And off she went to make her very desi lima bean masala. Here's her very delicious recipe if you find some green lima beans wherever you are.

Peel and coarsely chop a large onion, then grind to a paste. Blanch, peel and puree two tomatoes. In a pan, heat a tbsp of ghee. Add 1/2 tsp cumin seeds and wait for them to splutter. Add the onion paste and stir fry on a medium heat until the onions are lightly browned, very fragrant and the ghee starts to separate. Add 1/2 tsp turmeric and after a few seconds, add the tomato puree. Stir fry until the mixture is almost dry, then add green lima beans (i had about a cup of those), salt and 1/4 tsp red chilli powder. Add enough water to cover the beans, bring to a boil and let simmer until the beans are tender. It takes about 20-30 minutes this way, but you can always speed up the process with a pressure cooker.

Comments

Siri said…
I love lima beans especially the fresh ones..very desi curry as you said..;)

Siri
CurryLeaf said…
I agree with your cook :D.but the curry is surely desi and new to me.Never tried them this way.
Yes! these are indeed available in the dried form quite easily (called vaal). I'm yet to understand the difference betweeen lima and fava beans though..
This is awesome and mouthwatering. Do visit my blog when time permits.http://shanthisthaligai.blogspot.com/
Linhy said…
Looks good!! become my follower!

Popular posts from this blog

I've found my perfect cookie

It's a bite sized cookie, with flavors of a pie, shape of a croissant and a pretty, pretty name. It's Rugelach. I first heard of this cookie when it became the baking pick for Tuesdays with Dorrie a couple of months back. The looks, the concept - everything was fascinating. And I've dreamed of making this cookie ever since. I ditched hundreds of recipes floating around and went straight to the master. It's Dorie Greenspan's recipe that I used, and ain't I glad I got it so perfect the very first time. So what's rugelach? It's cream-cheese pastry dough, rolled then cut into wedges, spread with jam and sugar and fillings of choice, rolled into crescents and baked. First the dough. Dorie did it in her processor, but I just went and did it by hand. Put 100 gms cream cheese and 100 gms butter out of the fridge until they were soft but still cold. Added both to a cup of plain flour (I omitted the salt because I use salted butter). Rubbed the flour and but

Aloo Paranthas

In all these years of blogging, I've somehow never managed to talk about aloo paranthas, the potato stuffed flatbread that's a standard breakfast in North India. Possibly because they are such a staple in our home, I found there wouldn't be enough interest in the recipe. But I've also realised over time that my mom's recipe is unique, using a combination of flavours and spices that make these paranthas delicious. But that's not the only reason for this post. I also wanted to tell you about a super cool party and some ways we found to make aloo paranthas even better and believe it or not, healthier. The party in question was hosted by Rushina at her cooking studio a few months back. For a while now, Rushina has been talking about the merits of cling film, parchment and something called cooking foil made by Asahi Kasei. Because we won't believe that you can really cook without oil but using science, she invited a bunch of us over for a potluck lunch.

Mystery Fruit

This only happened a few times every year, just when the rainy season kicked in. A street hawker will come by, straw basket on head. He will yell "kaul chapni" and I will run out to buy a bundle of these. Stuck together like flowers, they looked like a bouquet. Every hole contains a little fruit. You break out the package, peel the tiny fruit that pops out and eat it. Done slowly, it can take you an hour to eat an head. Or did, when I was about 12 years old. That was the last time I saw this fruit. I've never seen it again, didn't even know what it was called or where it came from. Three weeks back, Vikram Doctor wrote about a store in Khar that sells Sindhi foods. He described this fruit and I knew it came from my vivid childhood memories. And finally, I knew we were talking about lotus fruit. Now talk about coincidences. Last weekend, I was passing by a lane in Bandra and for the first time in many, many years I saw the straw basket filled with my mytery fru