Thursday, March 21, 2013

Very Quick and Easy Chole Recipe


This is my quickest chole recipe yet. I use just one vessel which is my pressure cooker for the whole cooking process. And it all comes together in around 30 minutes! It is slightly like the Punjabi way of making chole or rajma, where all the indgredients are put into the pressure cooker with the ghee and just simply cooked for some number of whistles. I make a slight variation as in frying the veggies slightly in the pressure cooker itself and then adding the soaked chana and pressure cooking everything together (If you are not comfortable about using just your pressure cooker for the tadka part, you could do it in a sauce pan, taking care not to fry as much as we usually do. Then simply add the half-done tadka along with the chana in pressure cooker before cooking. 
I find this way of making very easy, quick and double as flavor-full because of cooking everything together in a closed way (pressure cooking). I urge you to try this quick method!


Total Cooking Time: 30 minutes (does not include time for soaking chana)

Ingredients

2 cups of white chana/white chickpeas
1 large onion (or 2 medium)
1 large tomato (or 2 medium)
1 Tbsp of ginger paste
1 Tbsp of garlic paste
4 or 5 green chillies
1 Tsp cumin seeds2 Tbsp of oil
1 Tbsp of curd
Some coriander leaves for seasoning
Ground spices:
1 Tsp of turmeric powder
1 Tsp of Red chilly powder
2 Tsp of Garam masala
1 Tsp of coriander powder  
Salt to taste 

Steps
  • Soak the chana in some salted warm water for at least 6 hours
  • Finely chop onions, tomatoes and green chillies
  • In your pressure cooker itself, add the oil and saute cumin seeds. Then add the onions and once they caramelize slightly (not much, since we are going to pressure cook everything with the Chana anyway), add the ginger-garlic paste and green chillies
  • Once the raw smell is gone from the above, add the tomatoes and all the ground spices and saute till the tomatoes are slightly tender
  • Add the soaked chana (straining out the water used for soaking first), then add sufficient water so that it comes to about 2 inches above the level of the chana. 
  • Add 1 Tsp of ghee. Stir this in well. Close the cooker with weight. Pressure cook on medium high till about 6 - 7 whistles
  • After opening, add about 1 Tbsp of curd and the coriander leaves, stir and let boil for about 2 minutes
 The chole are now ready to serve! Serve this hot with some rotis, pooris or even rice and sabzi. Its superbly homely and a real comfort food!


3 comments:

  1. Interesting recipe!. This food is really great when winter is coming and I think I will try this later. I wish I can cook it perfect but I'm sure my son will like this recipe. Thank you for sharing this recipe.

    best stir fry recipe

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  2. No Problem! As an option, you could even substitute white chickpeas with kidney beans! Have a good day and happy cooking always..

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