Palak Mangodi from my dear guest "Priya"

When the first ever comment hit my blog, I was so excited and happy. I still remember running over to my hubby, showing and telling him "Cccccc I got a comment too!!" hi hi.. Seriously, it felt so nice. And that sweet comment came from none other than Priya of Mharo Rajasthan's Recipes. Since that day, Priya has been a regular visitor to this little space of mine. When I thought of inviting a guest to my blog, I did not have to think twice- It had to be Priya :)

And here she goes ---->

When Gopika requested me to be her guest blogger, I was elated, excited and felt honored and of course felt those butterflies which usually you feel when trying to do something important.

First of all, my hearty congratulations to her on turning one. I enjoy her blog thoroughly, includes everything about it. Her writing style and narration of posts or recipes are superb. I like how she neatly organizes her recipes. And looking at her pictures make me want more and she represents the recipe so well. Keep rocking girl!!!

Moving on to my blog -  It is dedicated to those little unknown recipes of Rajasthan. After marriage when I started looking for more and more Rajasthani recipes (considering that I belong to an Andhra family who grew up in Bihar and never had Rajasthani food in my life), I found very few resources which showcased only few famous recipes. This inspired me to start a blog. Of course, at this point, it is not 'only' Rajasthani, it includes many more varities of cuisines and courses. Keep watching for more Rajasthani and many more recipes in my blog.

I chose to share "Palak Mangodi" recipe with Gopika and her readers. "Mangodi" is a very commonly eaten ingredient in Rajasthan. You may be have noticed that Rajasthani cuisine uses a lot of non-veggie ingredients (and I don't mean meat here, but without vegetables), a lot of dried vegetables, dairy (a major part of the daily diet, whether it be milk or yogurt or buttermilk) and/or some basic stuff like onion, garlic etc. That is due to the climate there. 

Anyways, when Gopika asked me to share a recipe, I wanted to go authentic and hence shared this Rajasthani dish - "Palak Mangodi", which if I need to explain is Mangodi (dried lentil balls) in Spinach Gravy. I have adapted this from a very famous blogger Nisha Madhulika who is another blogger who boasts a great variety of Rajasthni dishes along with many other delicacies.

I also would like to apologize for a crappy picture and the blame goes to not sure whom, but I lost my camera charger (need to hunt it down) and now with camera out of battey, I cannot take any pictures. I am going to take a better picture when I make it again with proper camera. This is from my cell phone, so the quality :(

Ingredients

• Dried Mangodis - 1 cup (you can use any variety, I used urad dal ones as I had them handy in my freezer)
• Palak (Spinach) - 2 cups, no need to chop them as we will be pureeing it
• Tomato - 4 medium ones, roughly chopped
• Green Chili - 2 or 3 per your liking
• Ginger - 1 inch piece
• Garlic - 3-4 cloves
• Besan - 1 tbsp
• Turmeric Powder - 1 tsp
• Red Chili Powder - 1/2 tsp
• Coriander Powder - 1 tsp
• Cumin Powder - 1 tsp
• Garam Masala - 1/2 tsp
• Heeng - a pinch
• Cumin Seeds - 1 tsp
• Salt - per taste
• Sugar - 1 tsp
• Oil - 2 tbsp

Preparation

• Take 1 tbsp oil in  non-stick frying pan and roast mangodis till nice golden brown (you can skip the oil and dry roast them as well). Keep it separate in a bowl.
• Take 1/2 tbsp oil in the same pan and roast besan till nice aroma comes.
• Meanwhile, boil spinach leaves in hot water (about 1 cup) for about 6-8 min with little salt and sugar and grind it after it cools down.
• Grind together tomato, green chili, ginger and garlic to a smooth puree.
• Now, take a non-stick pan and add about 1/2 tbsp oil to it.
• Once hot, add cumin seeds and heeng to it. Once the seeds start popping, add the tomato puree and fry till oil starts separating at the top.
• At this point add besan, all dry masalas and mangodis and cook till mangodis are cooked.
• Now goes the spinach puree, cook for about 2-3 minutes and take it off heat. Add some water at this point if you think it is too thick for your liking.
• Serve this with chapatis, parathas or even hot rice along with a cup of bowl like a traditional Rajasthani thali.