Bitter Gourd/ Bitter Melon
So my parents got some vegetables from the market and didn't know what they were.
A swift google of "knobbly green vegetable" followed by an image search got the answer: bitter gourd or bitter melon*.
That still left the question of what to do with them**. We hit the books and pieced together a variant on bitter gourd curry.
--
3 bitter gourds
1 chopped onion
several chopped tomatoes
salt
a pinch of turmeric
1 chopped chili
1 teaspoon ground coriander
1 teaspoon mustard seeds
2 tablespoons oil
Cut the gourd into rounds. Heat the oil, add the mustard seeds and chili. When the mustard seeds pop add the onion and cook until it starts to go transparent.
Next add tomatoes, turmeric, and coriander and cook for a bit. Then add the bitter gourd and salt and saute for five minutes. Cover for maybe half an hour, then cook for the last five minutes with the lid off.
--
I may have got it wrong as I wasn't taking notes and Dad kind of mixed and matched from two recipes.
This was pretty good. The bitter gourd is VERY bitter, but has almost no aftertaste. You just get a hit of bitterness and it's gone if you then eat something else.
* Which we inevitably mis-said as "bitter lemon" a slightly out-of-fashion mixer drink.
** My initial suggestion was add eyes and legs to make a tiny dinosaur, but apparently no.
A swift google of "knobbly green vegetable" followed by an image search got the answer: bitter gourd or bitter melon*.
That still left the question of what to do with them**. We hit the books and pieced together a variant on bitter gourd curry.
--
3 bitter gourds
1 chopped onion
several chopped tomatoes
salt
a pinch of turmeric
1 chopped chili
1 teaspoon ground coriander
1 teaspoon mustard seeds
2 tablespoons oil
Cut the gourd into rounds. Heat the oil, add the mustard seeds and chili. When the mustard seeds pop add the onion and cook until it starts to go transparent.
Next add tomatoes, turmeric, and coriander and cook for a bit. Then add the bitter gourd and salt and saute for five minutes. Cover for maybe half an hour, then cook for the last five minutes with the lid off.
--
I may have got it wrong as I wasn't taking notes and Dad kind of mixed and matched from two recipes.
This was pretty good. The bitter gourd is VERY bitter, but has almost no aftertaste. You just get a hit of bitterness and it's gone if you then eat something else.
* Which we inevitably mis-said as "bitter lemon" a slightly out-of-fashion mixer drink.
** My initial suggestion was add eyes and legs to make a tiny dinosaur, but apparently no.
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