Matar Kurma ( Green Peas Curry)

A nice blend of tomato puree, green chillies, ginger garlic paste, caramelized onion, with aromatic spices like cloves, cinnamon, cardamom, sesame seeds and fennel seeds along with the great green peas with their bursting nutritional value, makes this Indian dish even more delicious. It can be enjoyed with Indian bread (Naan/roti) or with any kind of rice.

Whenever I want to make green peas curry, I go with the traditional Maharashtrian style preparation called Matarachi Usal. I love it. The grounded coconut makes it special. Although this time I was going through one of the recipe books, and that's when I decided to make this yummy matar kurma, which has a combination of tomato puree and peas.

The ingredients I used:

Desi Ghee/ clarified butter- 4 tbsp

Green Peas: about 1 Lbs

Tomatoes: 3

Green chillies- 3

Ginger: grated about 2 tsp

Garlic: Finely chopped/ or you can use the paste, I used 2 cloves

Onion: 1 medium sized white onion finely chopped, you can use any onion you have on hand.

Spices:

Cloves: 2-3

Cinnamon: 1 stick

Cardamom: 2-3

Sesame seeds- 1 tbsp. Toast the seeds and grind them to turn them in a powdered form and keep it aside.

Fennel Seeds: 1 tbsp

Coriander powder: 1 tbsp

Cumin powder: 1tbsp

Salt to taste,

Coriander/ cilantro chopped for garnishing.

Step 1:

Blanching the tomatoes:

I started with blanching the tomatoes for couple of minutes, and gave them a bath in icy cold water later. The process of blanching is explained here. After blanching I peeled the tomatoes off and made a puree in a blender.

Step 2:

Caramelizing Onions:

On a medium flame, I tossed finely chopped onion in about 1 tbsp of butter. The process of caramelizing onions is explained here.

Step3:

In a large pan add the remaining butter. In a moment, add the good old spices. Roast them for a minute or two. Add the caramelized onion and the green peas. Saute everything together for 3-4 minutes more. Then add the tomato puree and mix everything well.

Step 4:

Add water as much as you want. It's your choice, adding more water will make it great combination with rice, because it will have a thinner gravy, or just keep the water content low and it will turn in to a nice thick gravy, which will go very well with the Indian bread. Make sure that the everything should come to a boil before you switch off the flame.

Step 5:

Add salt as per your taste and serve it with chopped coriander/ cilantro.

You can garnish the kurma with a dash of cream as well.

I am sending this entry to announcing cooking with seeds - Peas event hosted by Priya's Easy N Tasty Recipes. 

I am also sending this to  Sweet Heat challenge hosted by Food and Football and Baby.

Enjoy!!!