Vathal Khozhambu and Paruppu Usli

It was a lazy, relaxed saturday and the Arien was in a mood to cook. Now, for a really looong time, I have been wanting to prepare two of my favorite dishes but because I have no idea how to prepare them - it has been forever in my wishlist. And now suddenly, it looked like I might actually get my wish fulfilled. I immediately took this opportunity of coaxing the Arien to help me prepare those dishes.

The first action item on my list was to find the proper recipe. Naturally, I searched for the recipe online. After rejecting quite a few recipes b'cos they did not seem like the recipe that my mum used, I finally found a recipe that according to me was pretty good, at: http://iyercooks.blogspot.com/

The second action item involved hunting for the necessary ingredients. I coaxed the Arien to accompany me on my grocery shopping b'cos he can rapidly lose interest in a plan if he is not involved in every aspect. We opted to include either sundakkavathal or manathakkali for the Kozhambu. I remembered that periamma used to include black channa in the Khozhambu which made it very tasty. So, that was def going to be part of my Khozhambu. For the paruppu usli curry, it was usually prepared with Kothavaranga (cluster beans) but the Arien wanted to opt for beans instead. That was fine with me.

As soon as I walked into the store, I picked out Vadam, Rose milk essence, and started looking around for some other interesting stuff forgetting tht I was here for my vathal(s). Thats how I shop and most folks get very upset with my shopping behavior.. the Arien is used to it, by now.

After slogging away in the kitchen for almost 2 hours, Vathal Khozhambu and Paruppu Usli curry was finally ready for our consumption. By then, we were terribly hungry. Well, it did not taste like any other khozhambu I had had - it had its very own unique taste. The best part was that we both liked it inspite of the fact that it was not our best attempt. The Arien said that after a few more attempts, we will actually get it just right and I can actually invite my junta for a critical eval. That is high praise coming from the Arien and so I stopped and did my bing dance :D