Keerai Kadaiyal

Malabar Spinach: This variety Indian Palak is extremely slimy after cooking, so pls do not over cook. Avoid using electric hand mixer or mixie/ blender to mash up. Read more on this topic here.

Wash and soak Split red gram for 15 minutes. Pressure cook with water up to 2 whistles and keep aside. Separate the leaves and tender stalks from the spinach, discarding thick ones. Chop them very finely, wash and keep aside. Soak tamarind in water and extract the pulp. Now heat 2 tsp of oil in a pan, add chopped onion, tomato, green chili and garlic. Saute for few minutes or till the tomato gets cooked. This could take 10 minutes over low medium flame. Now add the finely chopped leaves and saute until it wilts. Since its finely chopped takes only few minutes. Add tamarind extract, cooked dal, salt and asafoetida. Simmer the whole content for 5 minutes and switch off. Traditionally this will be mashed in a clay pot using wooden masher (mathu), all I had was the mathu, so simultaneously stirred and partially mashed by placing them in a wide bowl. Now heat a tsp of ghee splutter mustard, cumin seeds, curry leaves, split black gram and red chili, add this to the mashed dal and serve hot with rice.