The Mysterious Aroma- South Indian Style

Going on the lines of favourite ingredients, here is another one. This is not a vegetable as such, but there is almost no cooking possible without it. It is one ingredient i simply can't survive without. But its a tricky one. If you overdo it even a little, that's it. Your entire cooking is a waste. If you add it in the correct quantity, your recipe is a clear winner. The funny thing about this ingredient although people don't realise, is that it is 80% to do only with its aroma. The actual taste is only secondary or sometimes even tertiary. It is almost never considered as a main or key ingredient, but it makes the difference between a brilliant dish and a good dish. We mostly don't realise all these specialities while cooking with it, but blindly add it as one of the other ingredients. This mystery ingredient is... Garlic, the master flavour enhancer.

This recipe is a dedication to my long time love for garlic. It is a mouth- watering South Indian dish, one of the very few which use it as the main ingredient. The Garlic Rasam.

Ingredients:
For grinding into a paste:
12 cloves of garlic,
a small lime size tamarind ball,
3 tsp of coriander seed,
3 tsp of toor dal,
2 dried red chillies,
2 tsp of black pepper.

For boiling:
8 cloves of garlic,
a pinch of turmeric,
few curry leaves,
salt to taste.

For garnishing:
2 tsp of ghee,
1 dried red chilli,
chopped coriander leaves,
2 tsp mustard seeds.

Method:

                      
First soak all the ingredients to be ground into a paste in about, 1/4 cup of water.  Let it soak for at least 10-15 minutes.
In the mean time, add the garlic, turmeric powder, curry leaves and salt to 2 cups(aprx) of water and bring to a boil. By this time the ingredients soaked in water would become more soft and read to be ground. So filter the water and grind the ingredients to quite a thick paste. When the turmeric and water mix comes to a boil, and this paste and mix well. On top add the chopped coriander leaves and let it boil. After some time you will see that the coriander leaves come together, and it starts to boil up. That brings us almost to the end.

                      
But no recipe is complete without garnishing. So, now in a small pan, heat the ghee and add mustard seeds and dried chilli. Let it splutter and add it on top of the rasam. You can also use oil instead of ghee, but the ghee adds a great deal to the aroma. Nobody would complain about that!!!!

So, whats next? Just grab a plate of rice, and relax in the light aromatic splendour of the crowning glory of Indian cooking, garlic...