Avrekai is among the favorite veggies in Bangalore/Mysore. They prepare many dishes like the Hichkida Avrekai, Avrekai Hasikhara (Saru), Avrekai mixture and Avrekai roti. Today I am putting up Avrekai Melogra, a lunch side dish. I will put up some of the others in the coming weeks. This dish is a good combination for roti/dal as well with chapathis.

What you need to have:

1. Surthi Beans(Avrekai) – 1 and 1/2 cup(Pealed twice)

Fresh Surthi Beans(Avrekai)

Just being pealed

What you do with what you have:

1. Just cut open the main peal of Surthi Beans and peal out the beans and is shown in image 2.

2. Soak pealed beans in water for about an hour and peal its thin peal and is shown in image 3.

Surthi Beans pealed for the second time

3. Cook it in cooker as usual and bring it to boil adding required quantity of water and salt. Cook for about 20-30 minutes adding a little salt and till soft – something like the image below.

Steamed Surthi Beans

Ingredients of Wet Masala:

1.Blackgram Dal  – 1 Teaspoon

2. Bengalgram Dal – 1 Teaspoon

3. Coriander seeds – 2 Teaspoons

4. Cumin seeds – 1/2  Teaspoon

5. Poppy seeds – 3/4 Teaspoon

6. Pepper corns – 5-6

7. Cinnamon piece – 1″

8.  Turmeric powder – 1 Teaspoon

9. Red chillies – 3

10. Fresh grated coconut – 3 Teaspoons

11. Bilimbi – 2-3

Ingredients of Wet Masala

4. Place a spatula with 2-3 teaspoons of cooking oil in it on medium flame. When heated fry all the ingredients one by one in it and lastly add grated coconut as well and switch off the flame. Fried ingredients are as shown in the image below.

Fried ingredients of Wet Masala

5. Grind fried ingredients of the masala in the mixer adding water in steps to a medium fine consistency.

6. Transfer the ground masala to a broad based bowl and add cooked Avrekai from step 3 to it. Add required quantity of salt and water to it to bring it to the required consistency. (A little salt has been added while cooking Avrekai)

Masala being cooked with Avrekai

Ingredients of Seasoning:

1. Mustard seeds – 1 Teaspoon

2. Cumin seeds – 1/2 Teaspoon

3. Asafoetida powder – 1/2 Teaspoon

4. Curry leaves – A few strands

Ingredients of Seasoning

7. Place a spatula with 2-3 teaspoons of cooking oil in it. When heated add mustard seeds to it. When it sputters add cumin seeds, asafoetida powder and curry leaves one after the other. Season it to the dish. Ready to serve Avrekai Melogra is shown in the image below.

Ready to serve Avrekai Melogra

Serve hot with Chapathi.

Avrekai Melogra with Chapathi

How long it takes: 60 minutes

Number of servings: 4-5