Hello traveller,

Do you see those dancing elephants I mentioned?  Let me know 🐘

And I have another of Chandy's tasty surprises for you (below the song).

I really hope you enjoy,

Kat

Lemon rice

This dish is known as ‘chitranna’ in South India and is another one of my family favourites. My parents used to make it for my school lunch and my friends would always look on rather jealously as they ate their soggy cheese sandwiches. This is also perfect summer picnic food and is a great way to use up old rice in the fridge. You can add any vegetables you like – beans and peas are the most common but I’ve experimented and found that edamame beans work very well. As with all my family’s recipes, the proportions involve a bit of guesswork and are only approximate because we’ve been making them for so long that we don’t really know exactly how much of everything goes into them! So please adjust for your own taste! And be warned, if you don’t wash the containers out as soon as you’re done they’ll be permanently stained a delightful shade of yellow from the turmeric!

Ingredients

1 1/2 cups of rice

1 cup of boiled vegetables

Juice of 1-2 lemons to taste

1 tbsp chopped coriander

Salt to taste

For the tempering

2 tbsp vegetable or sunflower oil

½ tsp cumin seeds

½ tsp mustard seeds

1/2  tsp turmeric

Green chilli

A few curry leaves (optional)

½ tsp uncooked channa dal

1 medium sized diced potato (optional)

Method

Cook the rice and set aside. If you have leftover rice, you can use that. Heat the oil on a high heat in a frying pan or wok and add the cumin and mustard seeds. When the mustard seeds start spurting, turn the heat down to low/medium, adjusting the heat to make sure you don’t burn the seeds. Next add the uncooked channa dhal until it turns light brown, followed by the curry leaves and the green chilli. The channa dhal should go crunchy and will give the rice a nutty taste.

At this stage you can add the diced potato and sautée it until cooked. Add the turmeric and roast a little before turning off. Leave it to cool down. Finally reheat the cooked rice, add the spice mixture, the lemon, vegetables, coriander, and salt, and mix everything together!

Hope you enjoy,

Chandy