Beans Paruppu Usili

The most authentic tambrahm food will be the paruppu usili.There could be no marriage or any function without a paruppu usili.It is basically a combination of toor dal and gram dal cooked and crumbled over the vegetables.The most common one is beans paruppu usili.You can also make paruppu usili with kothavarangai (cluster beans),avaraikai(Lima beans),cabbage,small onions and vazhapoo.

There are two ways of cooking this paruppu usili.Either you can steam the coarsely ground dal mixture and crumble it over the cooked vegetables or you can add the ground mixture to the vegetable and sauté it with oil on low flame by stirring at intervals to ensure it is cooked evenly and you get a crumble texture.I used the second method in this post although both methods yield a good result.But when you steam the dal using the first method then make sure you crumble it properly before adding it to the vegetables,otherwise it won't give a nice finely crumbled texture and might yield big chunks of dal here and there.Beans paruppu usili tastes great with mor kuzhambhu,rasam or vathakhuzhambu .Without much explanation further lets get to the recipe.

Preparation time:30 mins

Serves:3

Ingredients:

Finely chopped beans-250 gms

Toor dal-5 tbsp

Gram dal-3 tbsp

Red chillies-3( might increase or decrease according to your taste)

Turmeric powder-1/2 tsp

Salt-to taste

Hing-1 tsp

Oil-3 tbsp

To temper:

Mustard -1 tsp

Jeera-1/2 tsp

Curry leaves-few

Red chillies-1 

Procedure:

1.Soak Toor dal and gram dal along with red chillies for a minimum of 30 minutes.Then grind it to a coarse paste after draining all the soaked water.This step is very important if you add water or grind it very finely you won't get the beans paruppu usili correctly.Add salt(only for dal mixture),hing and turmeric powder to this ground mixture.

2.In a non-stick wok ,add a tbsp of oil and add the tempering ingredients.after the mustard seeds splutter add the beans,hing and salt(only for beans).

3.Add required water for the beans to get cooked and close the pan with lid.Once all the water is absorbed and the beans are cooked add the ground dal mixture and mix well.

4.Keep the flame low and add the remaining 2 tbsp of oil and keep stirring at intervals so that the dal gets cooked evenly.With the help of the ladle you can crumble the dal mixture evenly across the beans as well.

5.After about 8-10 minutes ,the dal gets cooked as it will change its color and will form a crumbled texture which is the right time to switch off the flame.Transfer to a bowl and serve hot with rasam or morkuzhambhu or vathakhuzhambu and rice.

Tips:

* If you wish to go by first method then after grinding the dal,steam it in an idly cooker and once it's warm crumble it using hand and mix it with the cooked beans.

* There is no need to sauté if you steam the dal as it gets cooked while steaming.

* If you follow the second method like how I did, then you can add few more spoons of oil for best results if you are not calorie conscious.

I value your comments,if you like this recipe feel free to drop a comment in the comment box below.Your comments motivate me to do more.Thanks for your support!