Thippili Rasam / Long Pepper Rasam

Thipli or Thippili is a rare flowering vine called Long Pepper. The root of this plant is called Kanda Thipli and the dried fruit of the plant is called Arisi Thipli (shown in the pictures below). This plant is known for its medicinal properties and is used commonly in Ayurvedic medicine. Thippili is known to aid in digestion, stomach-ache, and in generating overall well-being. WebMD lists a lot more medicinal uses!

Therefore, Kanda Thippili Rasam is brewed at home when someone is feeling under the weather, or when a lot of unhealthy food has been consumed, or just to boost the nutrition of the meals. Both kanda thippili and arisi thippili are also essential ingredients in deepavali marundhu - a special concoction of medicinal ingredients that aid digestion, heartburn etc.

My mom brought some kanda thippili and arisi thippili from India and has been brewing this rasam every two weeks.

Although Thippili is medicinal, the rasam does not taste like medicine! Thippili has a unique flavor and aroma that makes the rasam tasty and unique.

Kanda Thippili and Arisi Thippli; And Frothy Rasam!

Garlic Rasam

The Garlic suffers from a prejudice that my family (actually my entire community) holds - or, used to hold against it. The aversion is mostly because of its unfortunate pungent smell. But, having come to know of its wonderful medicinal properties, my ancestors seemed to have relented their prejudices at some point, albeit only a tiny bit. Garlic rasam is one such a rare exception - I don’t think there’s any other dish in my community that has garlic as the star ingredient (or an ingredient at all). This warm soup is prepared by cooking garlic cloves in a spicy tamarind juice. It is especially prepared on days when people are nursing a cold or a minor ailment.

I can count the few number of times when my mother prepared garlic rasam. But, it has been featured in the kitchen, nonetheless. So, here is the recipe.

Ingredients:

1. 6-7 cloves of garlic (was that a sharp intake of breath I heard?)
2. a small lime-sized ball of tamarind (approximately 1 inch in diameter)
3. 2-3 dry red chillies
4. ¾ teaspoon of black pepper-corns
5. 2 teaspoons of coriander seeds
6. 1 teaspoon of bengal gram dhal / kadala paruppu
7. 1 teaspoon of cumin seeds
8. 1 teaspoon of mustard seeds
9. few curry leaves
10. ¼ teaspoon of asafoetida
11. 1 teaspoon of ghee
12. 2 teaspoons of oil (olive oil / vegetable oil)
13. 1 teaspoon of salt
14. ½ teaspoon of rasam powder (optional)

Preparation:

1. Extract tamarind juice. Soak the tamarind in hot water for 10 minutes. Squish and squeeze out all the juices. Drain the pulp. Repeat the process for a second time with lukewarm water. Drain the pulp and discard. Add 2-3 cups of water to the extracted tamarind juice.
2. Slightly crush the garlic cloves (I do this, because I believe all the lovely juices come out and infuse better), and fry them for a couple of minutes in a teaspoon of oil. Do not let the garlic brown.
3. Add the slightly fried garlic cloves, salt, and a little bit of rasam powder into the tamarind juice (plus water) and boil on medium heat.
4. As the above heats, roast pepper-corns, coriander seeds, red chillies, and bengal gram dhal in a teaspoon of oil. Roast till the spices release their aroma and the bengal gram dhal begins to turn slightly brown. Do not burn or over-roast. Grind this to a paste with a spoon or two of water. Add this paste to the the garlic+tamarind mix that is heating. And continue to boil.
5. Dry roast the cumin seeds and a few curry leaves (2-3) for a couple of minutes. Grind this to a powder.
6. When the raw scent of tamarind leaves the boiling rasam and the garlic is cooked, add the above cumin powder to the rasam and continue to heat on low-medium heat until the rasam begins to bubble around the edges. Remove rasam from heat.
7. Splutter mustard seeds in a teaspoon of ghee. Add some asafoetida to it and add it to the prepared rasam.

Garlic rasam is ready to be served. It is had as a spicy soup or is mixed with steamed rice. This is also supposed to relieve digestive issues, thanks to the garlic, cumin, and pepper. Cooked garlic doesn’t taste or smell as pungent, so rest assured of that doubt. Seasoned cooks believe garlic tastes sweet when it is roasted or cooked for a long time. I haven’t really tasted the sweetness, but I like cooked/boiled garlic. Obviously, it is a frowned-upon eccentricity of mine that my family chooses to ignore.

Deepavali Marundhu

As most of the world probably knows, Deepavali is a high-calorific festival (well, most Indian festivals are). Deepavali is extra special because until a couple of decades back it involved making buckets (literally) upon buckets of sweets and savories. So understandably, our stomach, which is not used to such a pleasurable assault of sugar and fat-laden food, goes through a pretty rough time! Therefore, our great-grandmothers devised a digestive remedy that improves digestion and neutralizes some of the negative impacts of the binging. This remedy is prepared as an integral part of the deepavali celebrations, and is handed out all through the week. “Marundhu” literally means medicine in Tamil. It involves a lot of exotic spices and ingredients which are mostly found only in India. They are extensively used in Ayurvedic medicines. These days, stores sell the medicinal powder spice-mix, making our lives infinitely more easier. Yet, just as a principle, I’m recording the entire procedure and ingredient list. 

My wonderful in-laws, who actively support and participate in much of this blog's activities (although from the background), took the effort to buy all these specialized ingredients in order to present a nice photograph here, so that readers get a visual representation of the rare spices! I'm touched by their gesture and enthusiasm, not to mention the lovely presentation! Thanks a lot to my father-in-law for patiently buying and labeling everything so neatly!

 

Ingredients

1. Omam (dried oregano) - 150 gms
2. Black pepper corns - 50 gms
3. Jeeragam (Cumin seeds) - 50 gms
4. Sukku (dried ginger) - a small quantity - maybe a couple of pieces
5. Sitharathai (I have no idea what the English term for this is, or if even one exists) - a little bit
6. Arisi-thippili (Again, no clue what it is in English) - a little bit
7. Kanda-thippili (Same as above) - a little bit - a couple of pieces.
8. Honey - 1-2 tablespoons
9. Jaggery - Depends on the amount of medicinal powder used (the ratio is usually 1:1)
10. Ghee - 4-5 teaspoons

Preparation

1. All of the spices (1-7 in the ingredient list) are dried in the sun for a day or two (around 12-16 hours)
2. The dried spices are then pounded and ground into a fine powder. The powder is further sifted to make it fine and smooth.
3. As I said, these days, we go to the store and buy this prepared medicinal powder. Assume we are using just 1 cup of this powder. (1 cup of powder results in almost 2 cups of medicine. It is substantial for two people for 10-15 days, with the assumption that one doesn’t consume more than a spoon of it everyday).
4. Dissolve 1 cup of this powder in 1.25 cups of water. Stir finely till there are no lumps. The consistency should be that of a thinned gravy.
5. Heat this on low-medium heat for 10 minutes.
6. Stir 1 cup (or slightly more) of powdered jaggery/brown sugar into this mixture. Keep stirring till the jaggery dissolves.
7. Continue heating this on low-medium heat for about 30-35 minutes or so until the mixture starts getting thick. Keep adding a few teaspoons of ghee and stir as the mixture heats, so that it doesn’t stick to the bottom of the pan. The consistency of the cooled medicine should be anywhere between a jam and a slightly melted chocolate truffle. And remember, the medicine will harden/thicken as it cools. So remove from heat once it starts to thicken. To test, take a bit of it and cool. If you can roll it into a ball with your fingers, it is done. But if you prefer to have it like a jam, you can remove it a little sooner from the heat. Mine is of the latter consistency.
8. Add a tablespoon or two of honey at the very end, after removing from heat. Mix well. Let it cool. Then transfer to a clean, dry container. This medicine can remain at room temperature for a day. Place it in a refrigerator afterward.

You may wonder why a medicine should contain ghee, sugar and honey! Good question. If you try having this concoction without any honey or sugar, you will shoot to the moon, for the spices are incredibly hot! Of course, they are hot in a good way - pepper, oregano, and ginger are extremely good forms of heat. So, you do need the ghee and jaggery and honey to tone it down a bit. Honey is known to be a good anti-bacterial agent as well, and it is known to heal wounds (such as abused stomach lining!). But, the theory is that the spices override the sugar and the fat. Plus, only a couple or so teaspoons are recommended per day. Else, you would need another set of medicines to counteract the effects of this one!

Pepper Kuzhambu

Milagu (black pepper corns) is universally used in all cuisines to add heat to the dishes. Some Americans have been pleasantly surprised to know that black pepper takes an important place in the exotic range of Indian spices. To many westerners, Indian cuisine is synonymous to spiciness, especially the spicy bite of chillies. They never imagine their familiar and rustic pepper-corns playing a vital role in many of our key dishes.

Contrary to the burning heat of chillies, the sharp sting of black pepper is supposed to heal internal wounds. So, it is customary for black pepper to be used in abundance in comfort foods, home-remedies and foods for sore-throat, fever and other ailments.

Milagu Kuzhambu is basically a thick gravy of tamarind pulp, boiled and reduced in freshly ground black-pepper and a few red chillies. Due to the heavy reduction of tamarind, this Kuzhambu stores well in the fridge - and like good wine, the flavors are supposed to seep in and get better over time. This is yet another popular Tamizh side-dish, but I was quite surprised to not find its recipe in Meenakshi ammal’s book. Maybe the book hasn’t been indexed properly or the dish is called by another name that I don’t recognize.

So, here is my mother’s recipe.

Ingredients:

1. 3-4 teaspoons of black peppercorns (I use 3)
2. 1.5 dried red chillies (or more depending on your level of tolerance to heat)
3. 1 teaspoon of toor dal (lentils) / tuvaram paruppu
4. 1 teaspoon of turmeric (turmeric is another antiseptic; good at healing wounds)
5. 2 inch ball of tamarind (or more, if the tamarind isn't tart enough)
6. A small piece of jaggery
7. Salt to taste
8. 3 Tablespoons of sesame oil
9. 1 teaspoon of mustard seeds
10. ¼ teaspoon of hing
11. A few curry leaves (up to 2 strips/sprigs)

Preparation:

1. Heat 1-2 tablespoons of sesame oil in a pan (medium heat)
2. When hot, add the pepper corns and roast for 2 minutes
3. Add thoor dhal and dried red-chillies and continue to roast till the pepper begins to pop. Immediately remove from heat (my mother warns me that the pepper should not be over-roasted)
4. Add the curry leaves to the pan. The leaves release their flavor in the residual heat. Let the ingredients cool.
5. Grind the mixture with a sprinkling of water into a relatively smooth paste (the paste is likely to be a bit coarse)
6. Soak the balls of tamarind in 1.5 cups hot water for about 15 minutes, and extract the rich juice from the tamarind pulp (one basically uses their hands/fingers to squeeze out the juice). Keep adding water to the tamarind until you extract most of the juice.
7. In a saucepan, add the tamarind juice, 2 cups of water, a piece of jaggery, turmeric, salt, and the ground pepper-chill mixture, and heat it over medium-low heat for 15 minutes. Switch over to low heat after the initial raw smell of tamarind dissipates.
8. Heat the kuzhambu for about 40-45 minutes. The resulting kuzhambu should be of the consistency of rich gravy (the kuzhambu continues to thicken as it stays in the fridge)
9. To garnish, splutter some mustard seeds in heated sesame oil. Add a bit of hing and a few curry leaves to the spluttering mustard seeds. Toss it into the kuzhambu to add a burst of fresh aroma of sesame oil, hing and curry leaves.

Pepper kuzhambu is supposed to be spicy, as the tartness of the tamarind demands some spice. Else, the kuzhambu will be bland with just the one-note flavor of tamarind. But if you are apprehensive, you can halve this recipe and add just two teaspoons of pepper. You can also add more jaggery to balance the spice level, as well as to reduce the tartness of the tamarind.

This kuzhambu is ideal with cooked rice (a dollop of ghee on the cooked rice will not hurt at all). It is also a wonderful side-dish for idlis, dosais, and rotis.