White Vatana / Peas Bendi

Vatana Bendi is a very traditional and authentic curry from North Karnataka. Extremely simple and pungent comfort food which opens up your taste buds. The ingredients used are very few and easily available at home. This ideally goes with rice and Tambli (another traditional curry, recipe in my next blog).

Ingredients:

1 cup dry white vatana/peas (soaked overnight)
5-6 dry red chillies
1 tsp coriander seeds
pebble size tamarind
Salt to taste

For Tempering:
1 tsp oil (preferable coconut oil)
5-6 garlic cloves

Method:

Pressure cook the soaked peas for 2 whistles and keep aside. In a small pan, heat ½ tsp oil and fry red chillies and coriander seed till the seeds turns brownish. Grind the roasted red chillies, coriander seeds and tamarind coarsely and add 1 tbsp cooked peas to the mixture. Then again grind this to a smooth fine paste. Add this grounded paste to the remaining cooked peas and mix well. Add water to adjust the consistency of curry and salt to taste. Bring it to a boil. Heat oil for tempering and add garlic cloves. Fry till the garlic changes its colour. Pour this tempering on the prepared curry. Serve hot with rice.

Tips:

1. Tempering can be done with any vegetable oil, however coconut oil is used traditionally.
2. You can make Bendi using any other dried beans/whole pluses (e.g. whole masoor, broad beans, rajma etc.) and follow the same method. The soaking time may vary as per the grains.

In the above picture the red curry is Vatana Bendi and the green curry is Palak Tambli served with rice.

Recipe for accompanying curry 'Tambli' in my next blog.