Andhra Banana Flower
Arati Puvvu
Speaking of Gourmet Indian Ingredients, this one has knocked it out of the park! ☄️The Banana Flower is beautiful to hold, tricky to prepare and tastes like hundred heavens.
This was the first time I took the time to prepare this beautiful flower in my kitchen. I looked for inspiration in books and online, and naturally gravitated to my favourite South Indian Cuisine – Andhra 🌶🌶🌶! It’s an insanely flavourful recipe with sourness from tamarind, zingy spiciness from mustard paste and soft powdered spices that render flavours and aromas doing great justice to this power flower.
Hope you will give this simple yet incredible ingredient a chance and please know that this preparation of the Banana Flower is better than any I’ve tasted in 42 years of my life!
Ingredients
2 Banana Flowers
1/2 cup fresh tamarind pulp
1 tbsp mustard paste (mustard seeds ground with a little water)
2 green chilis chopped
1 tsp grated ginger
1 tsp mustard seeds
1 tsp cumin seeds
1 pinch hing – asofetida
1 tsp chana dal
1 tsp urad dal
1 dried red chili broken into pieces
6-7 curry leaves
1 tsp turmeric powder
1 tsp red chili powder
Chopped coriander
Salt
Directions
Prepping the Banana Flower
* Take 1 tsp of yogurt, 1/4 tsp turmeric powder and mixed 4 cups of water. Mix well.
* Remove the maroon colored petals to see the yellow-tipped florets.
* Take each floret and gently remove the tough bulbous stamen. While removing the stamen, you will find a petal (calyx) almost transparent. Remove and discard both of them.
* Repeat steps 2 and 3 until it becomes difficult for you to remove any more petals and you are left with a tender white stalk. Finely chop the stalk and add it to the remaining florets.
* Finely chop the florets and add it to the previously prepared yogurt-water solution. Let sit for 5 minutes. Then wash the florets 3-4 times to eliminate the bitter taste.
Cooking the Banana florets
* Take the washed florets and add water.
* Add salt and turmeric. Cook in the microwave covered for 5 minutes. Alternatively, you can pressure cook this for 2-3 whistles.
Cooking the curry
* Extract the paste from the soaked tamarind and keep aside. Grind the mustard seeds in a mortar and keep aside.
* Heat a skillet or kadhai on medium flame and add oil. To the hot oil add cumin seeds, musatrd seeds, chana dal, urad dal, dry red chilli and fry them until the mustard seeds splutter.
