Entry for RCI-Bengal And VoW Bitter Gourd.

This blogging things are really funny sometimes . Not funny as we cook and publish something , the funny things happens even before we start cooking . With lovely blog events going on around & searching appropriate recipe to be a part of that is little amusing for me lately :D .

I tried searching for some Bengali recipe until I get very convincing recipe that made me feel sure that it’s a sure shot Bengali not any modified version when I check the header part of that post I found that it is of Sandeepa herself ( For whose event I was searching for that recipe :D ) :O.

And recently when I tried to see if something very different than usual I can find to cook with bitter gourd the results I got was even more funny than previous case. As what I see those were the posts of food bloggers participating in VoW-bittergourd . I literally had fun seeing this and I laughed out loud alone in home , and that was another height of fun for me and afterwards feeling that I was laughing alone in the home that time it sounded even more funny to me….…

Well , that day I did really a nice favor to Google by browsing for almost 1 hour more with different search keywords to just see who is listed where :O .

Someday if you are getting bored looking at just the programming screen with green and orange colors of errors and keywords of programming language , try it to entertain yourself . Fun guaranteed 100 % , ha ha ha.

Just Imagine , that you are searching for some recipe with little perfection and up to your liking , you are trying to search it on Google first, then may be on blogsearch of google and then may be by images and finally you are landing on your own blog post which you posted far ago :O . I mean what more funny than this can be ,he he he .

But a serious thought about it that it is really a good thing that we have achieved a milestone for something at least where we are famous in virtual cooking world for our recipes. Isn’t it feels satisfactory?

I believe all food bloggers would like this. So funny and yet satisfactory what else one want from life… life is all about having fun in the things we do and feel immensely satisfied by our hard work and achievements , isn’t it ? Then you all buddies around be happy coz your life is having this good quality and no matter how new blogger you are you can achieve this one day . Slow and steady always wins : )

Now without taking much time here is the Dal with Bitter gourd , as they call it Tetor Dal in Bengal region of India. I have adapted the recipe from Sandeepa’s blog. With little modifications here is my recipe to it. Easy to make and not bitter at all.So if you don't love bitter gourd it would be a good recipe to include in your menu to get benefits of eating bitter gourd.

Tetor Dal Ingredients:
1 cup Mung Dal (Split green gram without skin) .
1 cup chopped bottle gourd
½ cup chopped bitter gourd.
1 tsp mustard seeds ,
1 tsp ginger paste,
1 tsp Ghee,
Pinch of asafoetida ,
½ tsp turmeric powder
2 tsp cooking oil.

Method :

Cook Mung dal until it is soft and mushy. Keep it aside , roughly shred and cut bitter gourd in to medium cube like pieces and peel and cut bottle gourd in long pieces. Check out Sandeepa’s post for the way it should be cut in for this dish mostly.

In a Kadhai or non stick pan take oil and fry the bitter gourd pieces till they are slightly crispy. Remove it and in the same oil add mustard seeds and asafoetida powder then add bottle gourd pieces along with ginger paste. Cook it for a while, it will not take much for bottle gourd to get half cooked . Then Add turmeric powder and mashed boiled moong dal too it. Along with 2-3 cups of water . Let this cook on medium heat till it gets little thick consistency and mix thoroughly. Next add fried bitter gourd to it and cook for another 2-3 mins. Finally add 1 tsp of ghee to it mix well and turn off the heat . Adding ghee to it gives it a nice fragrance, and it’s the traditional way to cook it with ghee only. I have just changed it to suit my taste.

This dal turn out to be not bitter at all ( I guess it's due to ghee added in it was tasting heavenly very good), just slight bitterness you will feel when you really get the bitter gourd piece to eat. As this was my first attempt with it, I cooked it along with aloo-bhindi to serve with roti and rice . Next time onwards I don’t think that I will need to prepare any other veg main course dish to make my meal perfect. Both of us really liked it. Goes well with rice or roti too.

This goes to as my entry to RCI-Bengal as well as to VoW-Bittergourd too : ) .

My other bitter gourd post is on its way to appear soon , Stay tuned to both the blogs as I have each day full with posts now. You have still 5 full days left to send your entries for RCI-Bengal , Dosa mela & VoW-Bitter gourd .

Also our ever enthusiastic Jai and Bee are hosting WHB this week , you can send in your entry by Sunday 3 p.m. to them . So keep on sharing your love by cooking to all of us :) .

And if you haven't checked it yet, Check out my Mystery masala of Arusuvai here .