Sorakaya (Bottle Guard) Chalakura

Those who like sour taste  will certainly like this recipe. You can make it with fresh curd also. But if you like sour taste and you dont have sour curd, then add little tamarind extract. Though we make it mainly with bottle guard, you can try with cucumber, spinach and amaranthus also.

Ingredients:

- small bottle guard
- 1 big tomato
-2 chilies
-small piece of ginger
-1 cup sour curd
-1 tbsp roasted bengal gram powder/besan
- 1/4 tsp coriander powder (opt)
- 2-5 garlic cloves (opt)
-salt
-turmeric powder
-water
-coriander leaves (opt)

Tempering(Tarka):

 -oil 1tsp

-red chilly 1(optional)

-split urad dal 1/4tsp

-mustard seeds 1/8 tsp

-jeera 1/8 tsp

-pinch of hing (optional)

-curry leaf 2

Procedure:

-peal the bottle guard and cut into medium size pieces.
-finely chop the tomato, ginger and chilies.
- in a sauce pan/pressure pan take oil for tarka and heat it. Now add all the tarka ingredients and fry till urad dal turns into golden brown colour.
-add chili, tomato, ginger and bottle guard pieces, salt , pinch of turmeric, garlic, coriander powder and one cup of water and cook for 3 whistles .
-when its time to remove the whistle, turn on the flame and keep the pan again.
-in a bowl beat the curd without water and mix the besan flour thoroughly.
-now pour this curd into the pan and mix it. This consistency must be more than semi-solid so that after bowling it turns to semi-solid.
So add water as required and cook on low flame with covered lid, occasional stirring.
-when it looks the besan cooked (approx 5 min), remove the lid , if necessary add more water and cook on high flame till the bubbles come. Turn off the flame and add finely chopped coriander leaves.
- enjoy it either with rice or chapathi.

Tips:

-try with besan flour as well as roasted bengal gram (RB) flour. Both gives you different taste. But with RB flour the recipe wont turn to semi-solid. It looks like rasam.
-if you dont have sour curd, add 1/4 tsp tamarind extract along with the vegs.
-try with different vegs.
-if you are using south Indian/yellow cucumber then add fresh curd as the cucumber itself is sour.