Some North Karnataka Recipes

I have been stagnating badly for over a year now. No new posts. No communication with friends. No one even visits my blog. A new post afte ra long time. A tribute to Gulbarga district after a long time.
Karel Chutney (also called Gural podi) is a specialty in north Karnataka recipes especially in lingayat recipes. The chutney made with black til seeds is also very yummy. Far as I know the Black til we get in Gulbarga is not really til. It is a longer version.
Ingredients:
200 grams gural seeds, 4 medium size garlic bulbs, 1teaspoon cumin powder, 2 table spoons red chilli powder, 1 table spoon salt.
Process:
Clean and peel garlic cloves. Roast gural seeds in a shallow pan on low fire till they start making cracking noise and giving roasted smell.Mix all the ingredients and subject to grinding in a mixer grinder.Typically Served With:
The gural chutney along with curd tastes good with jowar roti, sajji roti, crisp jowar rotis and chapattis.
SHENGA CHUTNEY
Shenga chutney is something that goes well with any meal and can be stored for a long time. So on days when you don’t want to cook a variety, having this ready adds variety to any meal. Ofcourse not to mention the protein that one gets via the peanuts!
Ingredients:
200 g Rosted peanuts, 4 medium size garlic bulbs, 1teaspoon cumin powder, 2 table spoons red chilli powder, 1 table spoon salt, 1 tea spoon sugar.
Process:
Clean and peel garlic cloves.Mix all the ingredients and pound in the pounding device to obtain a sticky peanut chutney. You could also grind in the grinder which gives powdery form of chutney. In order to get slightly sticky form grind the mixture at low speed for short time of few seconds several times. Tips and Tricks:
For those of you in the US, you can get the salted roasted peanuts (planters) and use it to make peanut chutney in a grinder. It is extremely effective and easy .Typically Served With:
This chutney tasts good with chapattis, rotti, katak rotti, sajji rotti etc

Yengai – Stuffed Eggplant OR BADNIKKAI PALYA(served on Amavasya days with Jawari Roti - and puran poli - called holige hereunder or boli in tamil)
Ingredients:Cumin(Jeera) powder, Cooking Oil, fresh curry leaves, Dhania powder, Dry grated coconut, roasted, Sesame seeds, roasted ground peanuts, Asofoteda, Turmeric, Masale khara, Gural pudi, 4-6 Eggplants (small), Onions, Garlic, Jaggery, Tamarind paste, Cumin seeds, mustard seeds, cilantro.
Process:
For yengai, mix the following – jeera, dhania, dry coconut(grated), ground roasted peanuts, roasted sesame seeds, asofoteda, turmeric, some masale khara (chilly powder will do) or ground green chillies, gural powder (the black seeds powder).Stuff the eggplants with the above mixture and keep aside.Cut onions lengthwise and into three parts width wise (longer pieces). In a vessel, add oil, fresh curry leaves, mustard seeds, Cumin seeds (after mustard seeds crackle), hing and garlic pieces – cut or crushed in a paste.When the garlic pieces turn golden brown, put the onions.When the onions are transparent, put the remaining masala from above. Add some tamarind water, jaggery and salt to taste.Put the eggplants in there and cook on low heat.Garnish with cilantro.Tips:
Key is to pour quite a lot of oil.
You can also bake the above in an oven instead of cooking on low heat.
Typically Served With:
Chapatis, Rotti, Sajji Rotti, Katak Rotti, Holige, Bellad Byaali, Kadabu, Rice.
Mirchi Bhajji is another speciality of Gulbarga. For all the Gulbargiites out there, if you just say Mirchi bhajji from GUG canteen – the look on their faces is priceless!
Ingredients:
long green chillies that are not too spicy, cumin powder, salt, asapotida(hing), turmeric powder, besan (gram) flour, soda (sodium bi carbonate), veg oil.
Process:
Take about 12 chillies. Make longitudinal slit in the chillies. Mix jeera powder, hing and salt and stuff the mixture in the slits and keep aside. Take 2 cups besan flour. Add little cumin powder, salt, turmeric powder and 1 spoon baking soda to it. Mix and add water to make the batter – it should not be very thick or thin and have the consistency of idli batter. Keep oil for heating in a kadai, on low fire. Dip the stuffed chilli in the besan batter to cover it completely and fry in hot oil on low fire till golden brown. Typically Served With:
Serve hot with tomato sauce or coconut chutney or tamarind chutney though in GUG we had it with with a powder of cumin seeds and salt.