Pea Chutney
If I tell you there is one member in my
family who thinks I am the best cook in the world but will not hesitate to
place a bowl of fresh and tender green “peas in
the pod” above everything I cook or will ever cook, who will you think it would
be?
If you overhear me admonishing someone
severely for polishing a few pounds of peas in one sitting, leaving a carpet of
shells and strings around the seat, who would you imagine to be at the
receiving end?
If someone in the house gleefully admires Anne
Geddes’ photos and greetings cards with babies in pea pods and has a poster of
a pea fairy posted on their PC, would you not think it is one of my girls?
If you see me mercilessly teasing someone
about the girl of their dreams, at times crossing the fine line between vivaciousness
and viciousness, who is that wretch you would be feeling for?
That “who” my dears, is my husband. And the green peapod is the “woe” between us
pati and patni…
Yes, don’t be shocked.
My husband of 29 years, who I was betrothed
to for 11 long lunar logs and who had been my beau for 5 years prior to that,
is a passionate pea-phile.
So, how much does he love peas?
Suffice to say that he is prepared to
abandon a scrumptious meal I have cooked with a lot of TLC, at the mere prospect
of settling down to popping peas.
His best buddies talk of his travels far
and wide, from farm to farm in search of fresh peas. His mother has rarely been
able to cook with peas until frozen peas became available, for the peas never
made it past him.
Tosacno’s, the best (and most expensive) grocers
in Melbourne, recognise him as the man who has a nose keener than a truffle pig
when it comes to fresh peas.
How else would he know to visit their store
on the very day they have the season’s best stock coming in? How else would they be
in business if he didn’t decide he needed to buy more, going back everyday until the stocks
last?
He confesses his dream job would be
“mutter-gushti” – literally “watching pea farms” – but then, methinks the gentleman chooseth
to ignore the figurative.
How do I tolerate this aberration, you may
ask?
Well, do I mind?
Whether he fills up on peas or shells, it’s
no skin off my back. If anything, it saves me effort to cook.
But I unfortunately, I am equally perceptive
to peas. Like the princess in disguise who got poked by a petite pea from under
twenty thick mattresses, my husband’s obsession with peas piques me.
Not because I am green-eyed.
But because I don’t quite know what to do
with bags and more bags of half-eaten peas that I have to dig out of the
recesses of the fridge, abandoned as he has moved on in life to a fresh lot; because I
am afraid I can’t make another batch of pea shell soup; because I can’t come up
with any more recipes for peas (even done the burfi and the halwa; because I am
afraid I have now resorted to a pea pogrom by resorting to making things like peas
chutney…
Pea Chutney
Ingredients
1 cup shelled green peas
¼ cup desiccated coconut/roasted peanuts/
toasted sesame seeds (optional)
½ cup fresh coriander
½ tsp grated ginger
1-2 green chillies (or more)
¼ tsp cumin powder
1 tbsp lemon juice
½ tsp urad dal
A pinch of hing
1 tsp oil
Salt to taste
Method
Add oil to a hot pan and brown the urad
dal. Lightly sauté the peas, green chillies and ginger. Cool slightly and then
transfer to a blender. Add the coriander, peanuts/sesame seeds/ desiccated
coconut, cumin powder. Grind into a textured paste, adding a little water if
required. Transfer the chutney into a bowl and mix in the salt according to taste
and the lemon juice.
This chutney goes well with idlis, dosas
and other snacks, or happily spreads between sliced bread.
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