Diabetic Recipe - Pavakkai Kulambu
Posted on: 14/Dec/2018 11:12:18 AM
Bitter gourd (Paavakkai in Tamil) is a recommended vegetable for diabetic patients. The vegetable helps in regulating your body’s blood sugar level by making your insulin levels active. And as the insulin level gets normalized, your body’s sugar content will get used and changed to fat. This also helps in eventual weight loss.
Studies state that bitter gourd is rich in anti-diabetic properties of which Charantin is a notable content that promotes lowering of blood glucose. The Polypeptide-p present in bitter gourd is a substance like insulin which is proven to control diabetes. So, with that said, why should there be more reasons to intake bitter gourd regularly in your diet?
Here we have Paavaikkai Thengai Kulambu which is going to taste too good with all the bitterness of the vegetable, sour taste of tamarind, and exclusive coconut flavor. Let’s get into the recipe now.
Ingredients required
- Bitter gourd – 2 Nos.
- Shallots or small onions – 15-20 Nos.
- Tomato – 1 (large)
- Coconut – ½ cup (shredded)
- Red chilli – 4 Nos.
- Mustard seeds – ¼ tbsp
- Fenugreek seeds – ¼ tbsp
- Tamarind – of gooseberry size
- Turmeric powder – ¼ spoon
- Red chilli powder – ½ spoon
- Coriander powder – 1 spoon
- Garlic pods – 4-5
- Curry leaves – 2 strings
- Oil – as required
- Salt – as required
Cooking method
- In a pan, add oil for frying. Once it gets hot, add the shallots and sauté them till they turn brown.
- Add garlic and red chilli and sauté them all
- Toss curry leaves and shredded coconut at last, give it a stir and switch off the stove.
- Now, your content for grinding is ready. Get it ground into a fine paste as it gets cooled down
- Get the bitter gourd chopped into round pieces. Fry them in a pan until it turns soft.
- Soak Tamarind in water for about 15 minutes. Extract water out of it.
- To the tamarind water, add chilli powder and coriander powder, and the fried bitter gourd and cook altogether for about 5-8 minutes
- Take a pan and add required amount of oil. Sputter the mustard seeds and curry leaves. Then add turmeric powder and fenugreek powder.
- Add chopped tomatoes to this. As the tomatoes get cooked well, pour the gourd mixture.
- As this arrives at a boil, add the onion ground paste
- Add required amount of salt and let it get boiled.
- Switch off the stove once it comes to a boil, and your pavakkai kulambu is ready!
- This can be served with cooked rice or even idli/dhosa. Its aromatic flavor of coconut will make it a nice combo along with tiffin items as well. This is a very healthy dish for diabetic patients. Not just for the diabetics, it will be good for all of us including kids at home.
