Non Veg Masala powder / Magic Masala Powder

This masala powder is copyrighted to my mom-in-law. Its a trademarked masala with spices added to it. There will be a subtle difference in the aroma and taste when compared to the ordinary chilli-corriander masala. We use this masala for cooking all the dishes in our house. My husband has coined a term for this masala as the "Magic Masala".He happened to carry this masala for his onsite trips and we had told him to add this to any of his culinary experiments.Thus our cooking secret was exposed to my husband who now claims that cooking is not a big thing as long as this magic masala is there !! We add this to our sambar's too. From now on my posts will have this magic masala in all its ingredients list. For those who feel this is not feasible, use the regular chilli-corriander powder with Garam masala, tough the dish may not turn out like the one you see in the pictures or in taste.


Ingredients:
Dry Chilli - 500 gms
Dhaniya / Corriander Seeds - 500 gms
Cumin seeds - 50 gms
Fenugeek / vendayam - 50 gms
Mustard Seeds - 50 gms
Pepper - 50 gms
Saunf / Sombu - 25 gms
Turmeric stick - 50 gms


Preparation:

Heat a kadai or thick bottom pan, add ingredients one by one except dry chilli and corriander seeds. Dry fry till you get the aroma of each spice. Don't add all of them together as it may not fry uniformly.Keep stirring when frying. Cool and ground all the ingredients together from a mill shop. You can keep the dry chilli and corriander seeds in the sun to dry up. Now the masala for non veg dishes is ready. Once grinded, stack it up in air tight containers and use it as you please!

Sambar with coconut and grounded spices / Aratchivitta Sambar

The method of cooking will be the same as the normal sambar except for  few spices to be grounded together. This type of sambar is my husband's and brother's favorite one and my mother is an expert in cooking this kind.This type of sambar will by default be on my mother's list during all the festival's where we as family come dining together. An accomplaint to this is tomato pachidi or cucumber pachadi.

Ingredients for 2 persons:

Tuvar Dhal : 3/4 cup

Drumstick : 1 big (other choices of vegetables may be white / red pumpkin, broad beans/Hyacinth/Avarrakai , Ladies finger / okra)

Tomato : 1 big

Onion : 1/2 if big

Chilli-corriander powder or sambar powder - 1 - 1&1/2 tsp

Tamarind - the size of a lemon

salt to taste

Grind together : 

Channa Dhal/split chick peas/Kadaalai Paruppu : 1 tsp

Corriander seeds : 2 tsp

Peppercorns : 6-7

Dry Red Chillies : 3-4 with the seeds or 6-7 without the seeds 

Cumin Seeds : little

Urad Dhal : 1/4 tsp

Fenugreek : 1/4 tsp

Asafoetida / Hing : a pinch

Cocount slices : as desired (its optional)

Cooking Oil : 1 tbsp

For tempering:

Mutard : 1/2 tsp

Fenugreek : 1/4 tsp

Asafoetida / Hing : a pinch

Long Dry red chilli : 1

Curry Leaves, Corriander - as desired

Cooking Oil : 1 tbsp

Preparation :

Cook the dhal and keep aside. Cut the onions and tomatoes finely. Cut the drumstick as per the length desired. Grind together all the ingredients under the header Grind together along with water.In a cooker add drumstick, onion, tomatoes, water as desired with the chilli and corriander powder. Bring it to boil and pressure cook for one whistle and remove from heat. Keep the cooker under running water to open up quickly. Make tamarind to a fine paste by adding water. Open the cooker, add the tamarind paste and let it boil for 5 minutes. Now add the cooked and mashed dhal with as much as water desired. Once the sambar starts boiling add the grounded paste and stir for few seconds. Add Salt as desired.