Chutney Week: Part 3 , Fruit Chutneys
Sandipa Nitin Tombat: Strawberry Chutney
Ingredients:
200 gms of Sugar
400 ml of Water
400 gms of Strawberries
2/3 Cinnamon Sticks
Method:
Wash and slice the Strawberries into halves.
In a pan boil water and sugar to make syrup. When the syrup is virtually done, put the strawberries, cinnamon sticks and cook for a while till the syrup thickens and one gets a nice deep red colour.
Get if off the fire and let it cool.
Once, it cools store in a clean air-tight glass bottle or jar and refrigerate.
Have it like Chutney or whenever you wish to indulge just take spoons full of the preserve and add fresh cream to it and enjoy a vegetarian dessert made in a jiffy.
Sabena Rajan Winkle: Tart Cherry Chutney
Ingredients:
250 gms tart Cherries, deseeded
¼ tsp Salt
¼ tsp Red Chili powder
1 tsp Oil
½ tsp Mustard seeds
A few Curry leaves or Coriander leaves or Chives (as per availability), finely chopped
Method:
Pulse cherries, salt & red chili powder in a kitchen machine until a smooth paste consistency is reached. Put in a serving bowl.
In a small pan, heat oil and fry mustard seeds until they stop spluttering. Take away from heat and add curry leaves or coriander leaves and mix. The greens will turn a little crisp and dark in colour. Pour over the chutney as garnish and serve.
Natasha Ramarathnam: Strawberry Chutney, something I threw together this winter when there was a glut of strawberries in Bombay, and the fridge had more “squishy squashy nobody-wants-to-eat-them-anymore” strawberries than I could handle.
Ingredients:
1 tsp Jeera/Cumin seeds
1” Ginger
1 Red chili
8-10 Strawberries
1 tsp Red Chili powder
1 tsp Salt
Leaves from 3 sprigs of Mint.
Juice of 1/2 lemon
1 tsp Olive oil
Method:
Roughly pound the jeera. Grate ginger, squeeze the juice and keep the grated pieces aside.Fry red chili, jeera and grated ginger in about olive oil till jeera starts changing colour. Keeping the flame very low, add strawberries cut into quarters.
Add red chili powder, salt, and mint leaves. Cook for a few minutes.Add ginger juice and lemon juice, cover and let it cook for about 5 minutes. Adjust salt, chili, if required.It is NOT sweet at all, but if you want it to be, you can add sugar.
Rashmi Primlani: Roasted Grape Chutney
Ingredients:
About 700 gms Grapes, red or black
1 tbsp Honey
Black Pepper to taste
1 tsp Big Devil Spice
2 Garlic cloves, diced
3 tbsp Fresh Coriander, chopped
1/2 Lime, juiced
1/2 – 1 Jalapeno, diced
Salt, to taste
Method:
Roast the grapes with honey and black pepper for 10 minutes in a 450F degree oven. Puree them in a food processor to a thick and chunky texture.
Add rest of the chutney ingredients and allow flavors to blend for 1 hour.
Adjust salt, pepper, and heat level to your taste.
Rashmi Primlani: Strawberry & Chili Chutney
Ingredients:
1 pint strawberries, rinsed, hulled and halved ( 1 pint =12 large or 24 medium or 36 small strawberries)
Drizzle of Extra Virgin Olive Oil
Drizzle of honey
Sea salt and fresh Black Pepper to taste
1 Serrano pepper
2 Star Anise pods
Aged balsamic vinegar (optional)
Method:
Preheat the oven to 300F degrees and line a baking sheet with heavy aluminum foil or parchment paper.
Toss strawberries with honey, oil, salt, pepper, anise pods, and serrano pepper. Spread on the baking sheet and bake for 20 minutes.
Discard the anise pods. Puree the strawberries with the juices until smooth. Add 1 tsp of aged balsamic vinegar for depth.
Natasha Ramarathnam: Grapes Chutney
Ingredients:
1 cup Grapes quartered(a mixture of all the grapes that for various reasons get left uneaten)
1 medium Onion chopped small
1 tsp Mustard seeds
1 inch Ginger grated
1 1/2 tbsp Vinegar (less if grapes are sour)
1 1/2 tsp Pepper powder
3 tsp Sugar
Salt, to taste
cooking oil
Method:
Heat oil, temper with mustard seeds, and fry onions till they turn transparent.
Add grapes, ginger, vinegar and pepper powder, and cook for about 10 minutes.
Add salt and sugar, stir well, and cook for 2 – 3 minutes till most of the water released by the grapes evaporates.
Natasha Ramarathnam: Pickled watermelon rind, Whenever we have watermelon, I end up throwing out more than half the fruit- the white portion. Tried eating it, but it wasn’t as nice as the red. But thrifty me, wanted to do something with it. Googled a bit for ideas and came up with a combination that I like.
Ingredients:
2 cups Watermelon Rind cut into inch size pieces (the rind is what you get when you peel off the green part and remove most of the red- keeping a little bit on for taste)
3 tbsp Salt
About 2 tablespoons of Sugar
8-10 Pepper Corns
5-6 Cloves
Method:
Take watermelon rind, mix with salt and keep in the fridge for about 6 hours.
Pour the mixture into a heavy bottomed pan, add sugar, pepper corns and cloves and cook on low heat till the water reduces in quantity by 1/3.
Keep in the fridge for at least 24 hours to allow the syrup to seep in.
Natasha Ramarathnam: Apple-mint chutney
Ingredients:
2 green chilies
1 medium apple
Leaves of 10-12 sprigs of Mint
2 tsp vinegar
Salt, to taste.
Method:
Grind in a mixer green chilies, apple, mint leaves, vinegar till it forms an even (but not smooth) mixture. Add salt.
(I didn’t peel the apples because I was too lazy too, but I’m glad I didn’t because it offers those pops of colour.)
Atma Prakash Mishra: Orange Peel Chutney, the recipe was given to me by Cal Srini, I made this during this winters. (Photograph not provided)
Ingredients:
Orange Peels of 1 Orange
1 tsp Urad dal
7-8 Dry red chilies
¼ tbsp Chana dal
½ tsp Hing/Asafoetida
small lemon size Tamarind
10-15 Curry leaves
Mustard seeds (optional)
Salt , to taste
Method:
Peel the skin of orange and cut into pieces.Wash the peels nicely, remove the inner white layer, and roast in a kadhai with oil and keep aside.
In the same oil roast Urad dal, Chana dal, and dry red chilies.
In a grinder, put the roasted items and Hing, Tamarind, Curry leaves and salt, add very small quantity of water and grind to a smooth paste.
I tempered it with some mustard seeds, although the original recipe did not recommend it, and it came out well.
Sandipa Nitin Tombat: Kamrangar Chutney/Star fruit Chutney (Photograph not provided)
Ingredients:
250gms Star Fruit
½ tsp Panch Phoron
1 Dry red chili
Pinch of Salt
Pinch of Turmeric
Sugar/Jaggery as per taste
1 cup Water
Method:
Cut the star fruits horizontally in 1cm pieces. Heat oil in a Kadhai and put the red chili and panch phoron. Add the star fruit pieces once the tempering starts to splutter. Fry it for 2-3 mins. Add a pinch of salt and turmeric and then the water. Once it comes to a boil add sugar or jaggery or both as per the sweetness required. Once it thickens a little and the star fruit has cooked, the chutney is ready. This can be kept in the refrigerator for 3 to 4 days in a glass or ceramic bowl.
Sandipa Nitin Tombat: Anarosher Chutney/Pineapple Chutney (Photograph not provided)
Ingredients:
1/2 Pineapple
¾ Cup Sugar
Pinch of Salt
Pinch of Turmeric
10-12 Raisins
8-10 chopped Cashew nuts.
2 cups water for the sugar syrup
Method:
Grate the pineapple or chop into small pieces.
Boil the water and sugar to make the syrup. The amount of sugar and water is to be adjusted depending upon the sweetness of the pineapple and the consistency required. Then add the pineapple pieces and a pinch of salt and turmeric and let the chutney come to a boil. Add the raisins and let it boil for 5- 6 mins. Then get it off the fire and let it cool. Serve garnished with chopped cashew pieces.