There are some books that just travel all over the world with you. Even if the book belongs to someone else :D.

Well, I am talking about ‘The Vegetarian Menu Cookbook‘ which was a wedding gift to my sister in law. I have borrowed it from her multiple times. The last time I borrowed it, I sneaked it with me when I came to US :D. This book is not available in the market to purchase. To me, it is more like Meenakshi Ammal’s classic book -Samaithu Paar. You don’t hog the book for beautiful pictures, for there are hardly any. The recipes and the recipe combinations are the attraction.

I always refer to this book when I am short of lunch/dinner ideas or when we have guests coming over. It gives me a good idea to put a menu together which is a good start. I have been planning to explore more of this book for a long time now. Probably this year’s Cooking from Cookbook event will be a trigger for that :-).

Coming to the recipe here, its a simple pachadi made with ginger. She recommends serving this with coconut rice as a part of a bigger menu. I make only the rice and the pachadi from that menu, but I have made it multiple times.

Enjoy the recipe as it goes to the Cooking from Cookbook Challenge. Please check out this page for more details about the event. 

Wash and clean 1″ piece of ginger and grind it with 2 green chillies (or per taste), salt as needed and 2 tablespoon coconut. If you need it, add a spoon or two of curd instead of water to make the paste. Once you have the paste, add 1 cup curd and pulse the mixer once or twice to get the curd well beaten. Do not grind, just pulse once or twice.

Chop one tomato finely and add it to the pachadi(I didn’t take a picture of this). This step is optional. Heat one teaspoon oil in a small pan and add 1/2 teaspoon mustard seeds and some curry leaves. Once the mustard splutters, add it to the pachadi. Refrigerate it until the time of serving.

Recipe source : Cooking 4 all seasons

Heat 2 teaspoons oil and roast 2-3 tablespoon raw peanuts and some cashews (I didn’t have cashews with me). Take out the peanuts and set aside. In the same pan, add 1 teaspoon mustard seeds, a good pinch of asafoetida, 5-6 curry leaves, 4-5 red or green chillies. Once the mustard pops out, add 1 teaspoon chana dal.

Tip in 2 teaspoons of urad dal. Fry until the dals are slightly golden in color. Add one cup of grated coconut and saute until it turns light brown. Mix in the salt in the salt. Turn off the heat.

Add 1 cup cooked and cooled rice. Carefully mix everything until everything is uniform. Sprinkle the roasted peanuts and cashews on top. Serve with ginger pachadi.