Amma makes inji curry and stores it in the refrigerator for weeks. She never restricts dishes to festivals, and makes them as she pleases, when she wants. The inji curry in the pictures here are made by her to send back with me during my last trip to Kottayam. It’s super easy to make Inji Curry so I hope the lack of step by step pictures doesn’t deter you. Will try to update if and when I make this myself. Here’s a list of Onam Sadya Recipes, just for you. Pulissery and Cabbage Thoran go really well with this Inji Curry.

Inji Curry / Puli Inji Recipe

Preparation time: 10 minutes Cooking time: 20 minutes Makes ~ 2 cups of Inji Curry Ingredients: 1 cup of peeled and chopped fresh ginger 1/2 cup of thick tamarind juice (soak and squeeze juice of a lemon-ball sized ball of tamarind in 1/2 cup warm water) 1 tsp of red chilli powder (adjust to taste) 2 of green chillies 1/4 tsp of kaayam / asafoetida 2-3 tbsp of grated or powdered jaggery (adjust to taste) 1/4 cup of oil 1/4 tsp of mustard seeds 1/4 tsp of fenugreek seeds Salt to taste A few curry leaves
Instructions:

  1. Heat the oil in a pan and fry the ginger until dark golden brown. It should be just short of burning but do not burn it, that would ruin the flavour completely. Before removing the fried ginger, throw in the green chillies, fry for a few seconds, and drain along with the ginger. Set aside to cool.
  2. Once the ginger cools down, grind well and aside.
  3. From the oil used to fry ginger, remove all except 3 tbsp oil. Heat it and add the mustard seeds. When they pop, add the fenugreek seeds. They will brown quickly so as soon as they do, throw in the curry leaves. Fry for a bit.
  4. Next, add the ground ginger, asafoetida, red chilly powder, jaggery, tamarind, and salt. Mix well and simmer for about 10-12 mins until the oil starts to separate. If you’ve added too much water, this may take longer.
  5. Remove from fire, cool, and store in a dry bottle in the refrigerator. We usually keep it for around a month, so you can too, provided you always remember to use a dry spoon to take some. Notes: – you can follow the same recipe for maa inji (mango ginger) too. It tastes equally, if not more, delicious – you can adjust the sweetness level according to your personal taste. This quantity results in a perfect balance that suits us – the spice level with these quantities tend to be on the slightly higher side so lower it if you have lesser tolerance – the picture was taken of refrigerated Inji Curry. When you make it fresh, it will be a bit ‘looser’ than this – even if you hate ginger, give this one a shot. Trust me on this 🙂 I know it’s a bit early to post an onam recipe but I was going through some of the pictures and when I saw this, I was reminded of amma bottling it up for me and me keeping it for weeks and weeks, eating a little at a time, fearing it will be over soon. Made me smile, so felt I should share it with you immediately! PS: This year I will be in Kottayam for Onam. Wheeee! 😀