Halsinkayi Rassa ..A Heirloom Recipe For 6th Blog Anniversary | Vegan | Step Wise

Hello all!

21st May marks the anniversary day of my blog and today happens to be the 6th blog anniversary. Time does fly..looking back, there are so many memories associated with my blog..right from the day I started with my first post Maavinkaayi Chutney, to my recent last post on Vegan Galauti Kebab.

Yeah, I know that the kebab post was almost 2months back. Past two months were frantically busy during which I packed, moved into a new city and got settled. But today being a special day, I decided to post without any procrastination.

There’s a whole backlog of recipes that I need to share and this is just one of them. It’s a heirloom recipe straight from the Karnataka kitchen and not many are aware of this preparation, so in a way it’s a kind of lost recipe that I’m sharing. I had tried it many years back, to be precise during the initial months of marriage. MIL taught me over the phone how to prepare this dish. She mentioned that it is DH’s and elder BIL’s favourite as it’s a very spicy preparation. Yes, I’m posting a spicy preparation to celebrate the 6th anniversary and not a sweet.

When MIL narrated me the recipe, I was surprised to hear that such few ingredients were used to prepare the recipe. I made it as per her instructions but some how did not enjoy it, I found it more bitter than spicy. I guess, I had added more fenugreek seeds than required, making the preparation go bitter.

When a few months back, DH said that they are plucking out Jackfruits from his office tree and he is getting a one home. The first recipe that came to DH’s mind was the Halasinkayi Rassa or Jackfruit Curry as my MIL was with us that time. I had a first hand experience to make the curry under her able guidance this time and I did excel. The curry was fabulous and it’s difficult to believe that such a delectable curry can be prepared using minimal ingredients. An added advantage was that the Jackfruit was extremely fresh and tender.

The curry tastes best when served with hot steamed rice with filtered oil on top. It also tastes best when it’s very spicy else it tastes quite bland. It’s a very low oil preparation as it uses most minimal oil. The curry has a fragrance coming from the turmeric, spice from the chillies and mildly sour because of tamarind.

Halasinkayi Rassa or Jackfruit Curry from the Cuisines of Karnataka

Preparation Time: 1hour | Cooking Time: 45mins | Serves: 4-5 | Difficulty Level: Moderate

Ingredients ( Recipe Source: MIL)

4 cups very finely chopped Jackfruit

1tsp fenugreek seeds/ methidana

22-23 red chillies ( I used medium spicy variety)

2-3 large pinches, strong aroma heeng/asafoetida

2-3tbsp tamarind paste

1tsp turmeric powder

salt to taste

1-2tsp oil

filtered peanut oil for serving

Method

Remove the external hard green layer of Jackfruit and then chop it finely. Remove the hard crust on the seeds, if there. Wash thoroughly.

Boil it in 2-3 cups of water, turmeric and cook till tender.

In a pan take 1 tea spoon oil and fry the fenugreek seeds till golden in colour on a low flame preventing them from burning, remove and fry the asafoetida crystals.

Cool and grind fenugreek seeds and asafoetida to a fine powder using pestle and mortar.

 

In the remaining oil sauté the red chillies on low flame till crisp. Cool and grind to a fine powder.

  

In a pan take the cooked jackfruit along with the water in which it was boiled. Add the ground spices to it, salt to taste and tamarind paste. Add about 2-3 cups more of water and bring it to a boil, simmer and cook for 15-20mins or till done.

Notes:

The curry doesn’t have lots of gravy and that’s why the jackfruit needs to be cut very small as it comes together to form a cohesive mass else it will look quite a disintegrated.

The fenugreek seeds should be fried carefully else they would add bitterness, similarly the proportion of seeds to be added must be based on the amount of jackfruit used.

Filtered peanut oil on the rice adds more flavour, do try.

The quantity of red chillies should be adjusted based on the variety used.