September 07, 2011

Avarakkai Poduthuval

I spent a lot of time finding the correct terms for what I was cooking. Thanks to Google and a lot of South Indian food blogs, I finally got this:


Long beans- Avarakkai, Payaru
Fried with coconut- Poduthuval/Thoran (Malayalam), Poriyal (Tamil)




So, this is basically a simply fry of green beans and coconut. Usually eaten with rice and dhal/sambhar.


In about 4 table spoons of vegetable oil, add 2 tsps of mustard seeds. Once they start sputtering, add 6 curry leaves and then add 1tsp grated garlic and 1tsp grated ginger. Stir well and add 1 finely chopped medium sized onion. Next add the masalas- 1 tsp of haldi, 1 tsp of chili powder and 1 1/2 tsp of salt.




Once this is fried well, add about 200g of chopped up green beans. Cover the pan and stir every 2 minutes or so (keep the fire low to avoid burning). After roughly 10 minutes, when the beans are almost fully cooked, add 1 cup of grated coconut. Keep the lid off and stir continuously till fully dry and cooked. And it's done!




Note: I didn't add green chili because my brother has an aversion to food with chili/pepper: But that's only if he sees it. I could have actually added it, it would have camouflaged well.
Most recipes have urad dhal in the fry. Add about 2 tsps to the oil along with the mustard seeds.




07.09.11 (little later on in the day) 
Note: After all that research, I am quite upset to learn, from a reader who put it really politely that I got the terms wrong. :( Avarakkai is a tamil name given to broad beans which is kind of flat and finger sized and not the beans I've used here. Utter fail! Let me know if you know the right word for the beans I've used. 

4 comments:

Geetanjali said...

Aren't they called french beans? btw nice blog! :)

Archestra said...

hey! i dont know the tamil name(being a tamilian)for the normally available french-beans you've used here... nor does my granny or my great granny! :D we simply call it beans.

Manisha said...

It's called "Huralikai" :)

Tanisha Christo said...

Well, the beans I used are haricot beans, not french beans.

Thanks Manisha. :)

Well, whatever the name, I'm sure any long green beans will work in this recipe.