Thiruvadirai Kali & Kootu

Thiruvadirai falls in the month of Marghazhi and is auspicious for Lord Shiva. Thiruvadirai kali and kootu (thaalagam) are traditional dishes prepared on this day. My mom's recipe below.

Ingredients:
Vegetables - potatoes, sweet potatoes, carrots, beans, mochakottai, pumpkin, seppankizhangu, parangikkai (yellow squash)
Tamarind, red chilli powder, asafoetida powder, curry leaves.
To fry: Channa dal, coriander seeds, dried red chillies.

Add salt and turmeric and steam the vegetables in a pressure cooker. Fry the frying ingredients and powder. After spluttering the mustard seeds in oil, add a small quantity of tamarind water, red chilli powder to taste. Add the steamed vegetables to this and stir for sometime. Finally, add powder from previous step and asafoetida powder. Sprinkle curry leaves and mix.


Ingredients:
Broken raw rice, jaggery, ghee, elaichi powder

Heat the broken raw rice, add milk and water and cook the rice. Add jaggery (1.5 to 1 ratio with rice) to boiling water and stir until it melts and thickens. Remove rice from cooker and add it to the jaggery and stir. Add elaichi powder and ghee if needed. Serve with ghee.

Shrikand.

k's mom taught me this recipe.

Ingredients:

1 cup full fat yoghurt (I have also tried this dish with low fat yoghurt, that works too)
1/2 cup sugar
cardamom powder - 1 spoon
kesari (kumkuma poo), pista and almonds crushed

Recipe:

Add the yoghurt to a thin muslin cloth, tie a sturdy thread around it and hang it such that the water from the yoghurt can drip down into a vessel. I usually tie it on a knob from my kitchen shelf. This process takes about 1/2-1 hour.

Take the yummy fatty yoghurt on the top of the cloth, add sugar to it and mix it until it looks smooth and creamy (without lumps).

Add cardamom powder, mix well and top off with the other spices. Refrigerate before serving.