Ganesh Chaturthi Thali
Happy Ganesh Chaturthi everyone!! In our home, while we celebrate a lot of Indian festivals, Ganesh Chaturthi holds an extra special place!! Every year, we look forward to this festival and celebrate it with earnest and devotion. We also normally host a party at our place inviting our friends and family over to join in the celebrations but this year we have had to skip due to the need to social distance. However, that did not mean that we welcomed the chief guest into our house with any less fervor :-)
This weekend our Ganesh Chaturthi Thali is an amalgamation of both Andhra and Odisha cuisines, to represent both of our cultural roots. Since we offer all the food in this thali to Ganpati Bappa, this meal has no meat, onions or garlic. Also, we didn’t taste any of these dishes before we made the offering to Bappa and yes that means there was no adjusting of the salt, sugar or spices while cooking the meal!! I am glad to report that this year there were no mishaps and everything ended up tasty (phew)!!
Since we did give you an insight into some Odia Thali dishes already, let’s start this time with the Andhra dishes. As always, I have provided links to the recipes that come closest to the way we have cooked them.
Undrallu - I don’t think we can talk about an Andhra Ganesh Chaturthi Thali without starting with Undrallu. These rice and dal steamed balls are a must for this festival, not to mention they are an absolute favorite with our daughter. I think the main reason she looks forward to this festival is to gobble these up!!
Pulihora (Tamarind Rice) - My favorite festival dish, this always brings back fond memories of all the festivals back home when Amma would make this just for me. No one and I mean no one can make Pulihora like Amma does!! But I still try this dish every year with a hope that some day I can match her taste. I think I am maybe 70% there.
Garelu - This is a simpler version of Medu Vada that is made in Andhra. It goes really well with Allam Pachadi (ginger chutney). I realized that I missed adding the pachadi to the picture below but this is an excellent condiment to both Undrallu and Garelu.
Masala Vada - I love eating Masala Vada as a combination with Pullihora so I always include this into the festival meal. This is a no-onion version, so I spike up the green chillies to still keep it interesting and tasty.
Tomato Palak Pappu - With so many items included into the meal, we always add a simple nutritious dal into the menu that you can mix with plain rice and ghee.
Let’s now delve into the Odia dishes in this Thali.
Manda Pitha - These rice flour, coconut and jaggery delicacies are the Odia version of the modak. The real challenge to these is to keep the outer rice flour covering just the right thickness. Too thick and there is not enough of the sweet coconut filling. Too thin and they will break apart when you steam them. I don’t think I have perfected this recipe just as yet but I managed to get enough right to get them into a picture so I would call it a success :-)
Kakara Pitha - In Odia cuisine I have come across a few hidden gems that have really amazed me with their taste and this dish is one of them. Suji Halwa as the outside layer, coconut and jaggery as the inside filling and finally deep-fried, making this dish takes time and patience but the end result is so totally worth it!
Dahi Baigano - This eggplant and yogurt dish gets it’s distinctive Odia taste by the addition of pancha phutana or the five spice mix of mustard, fennel, nigella seeds, cumin and fenugreek.
MItha Khechidi - Since we have started this blog, a lot of people have recommended dishes to us that we should try out. Some of the most enthusiastic recommendations have come from Maa (my mother-in-law) and this is one of her recipes. While I was making this for the first time, Vikram told me it came out quite authentic and it went very well with the Pineapple Khatta.
Pineapple Khatta - I’ll be honest, when Maa suggested this recipe I agreed to try it out since I am a big fan of Odia Khatta (sweet and sour) dishes, but I wasn’t sure I could pull this one off. But the pancha phutana spice combination came to the rescue once again to make this dish edible. I have no idea if the dish tasted authentic but it definitely tasted good!!
Aloo Bhindi Bhaja - Finally, repeating this dish again from the previous Odia thali post, only difference is that this version has no onion. Have I told you guys that I love Okra?
Some people have asked me why we started this Weekend Thali Project. While there are a number of reasons like spending time on a project together, improving our culinary skills and so on, one of the reasons is that I have always struggled to find meal combinations that work together. You can find numerous recipes on the internet but very few websites suggest ways that you can pull an entire meal together. We hope to use this project to discover some winning meal combinations and share them with you. I believe that this Ganesh Chaturthi Thali was a winning combination this year in our home. Hopefully it gave a few of you some inspiration as well.
