Tuesday, 12 December 2017

Cabbage Thoran | Cabbage With Grated Coconut | Eating This Makes Your Hair Grow

Well, that was what Amma always told me about cabbage. I hated vegetables. Vegetables and curd. Gawd, yuck. Mother has this story about her trying to smuggle in a little curd into me with a ball of rice and me puking it out even as a baby. Both Amma and Mother tried to make me eat cabbage when i was a kid saying that it would grow my hair. This could be from the guilty feeling they had from once tonsuring me when my head was a ball of curls. The new hair that came was straight as a stick and Amma was distraught. She used to love my curls, apparently.

But yeah, when i developed a liking for cooking, i started liking handling these things -too. To make biriyani, it was necessary to marinate chicken in curd. Inji told me that  it was called wet marination. And then you have these vegetarian friends. So yes, now i like handling vegetables and also eat some. Amma is dead or else i could have told her that i had started eating cabbage. It hasn't helped the hair much, though.

So cabbage thoran - these things in which grated coconut is added are called thoran in Malayalam - i found the recipe from Mishmash, again. Seriously i have no idea what i would have done if not for her blog. Please come back and please drag Inji along with you. I feel sad whenever anyone stops writing. It's unusual. I always wish bad things to other people. So. 

Cabbage thoran - cabbage side dish with grated coconut from Kerala | Reusable with attribution


1 cup of cabbage chopped into small pieces. I chop and then put it in water till the time i finish grating coconut. I strongly believe that's called cleaning cabbage. Also, in the actual recipe, they use 2 cups of cabbage. With me cooking that amount is always a problem because 

a) Not enough people to eat
b) No fridge (yet)

So i dared to cut down the amount of cabbage and keep the other ingredients the same. It tasted just as great as the best cabbage thorans i've had. You see, i hate vegetables but have an advantage in that i am capable of identifying great cooking even in vegetarian dishes. Yaay!

Grated coconut 1/4 cup
To this add, 

1 shallot chopped
1 clove of garlic chopped
1/4 tsp cumin seeds
3/4 green chillies chopped
1/4 tsp turmeric powder
1/2 tsp salt

These are to be crushed using hands or mortar and pestle or just pulse them once in the mixie. 

Heat oil in a pan and splutter 1/4 tsp mustard seeds
Then 1/4 tsp urad dal (white lentil)
Then put in two dried red chillies

 Be careful with the flame or you'll end up burning them. 

Add cabbage and you'll hear the 'sheee...' sound. It's fun. 

Add 1/2 tsp salt [It depends on how much salt you added to your coconut so be careful there.]
Cover and cook in medium heat for one minute.
Open the lid, add the coconut mixture, mix and cover and cook for 1 minute.
Open the lid, cook till cabbage is cooked. 

You might want to check the salt at this point and make reparations. 

Add curry leaves and mix. It's done. 

I almost always forget to add curry leaves in the end. This happens with me in dishes where curry leaves are to be added in the end and not sauted in the beginning. 

If i am in the mood to eat, i have it with rice, dal, pappadam (papad) and achar (pickle) and it's heavenly. Yes.

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