Thursday, April 21, 2011

Soya Palak (Spinach w/ Soy Chunks)

Source:  SpicyWorld

I have been wanting to try out a recipe with soya chunks for a while now.  I bought a packet a few months ago and just haven't had the chance.  You can get Nutrela soya chunks in any Indian store.  It's high in protein and I've seen a lot of recipes where this is used as a meat substitute.


Ingredients
  • 1.5 -2 cups spinach (palak)
  • 1.5 cups soya chunks
  • 1/2 cup yogurt 
  • 2 onions
  • 4-5 green chillies
  • 2-3 tomatoes 
  • 1 tablespoon tomato paste
  • 5-6 mint leaves 
  • Handful coriander leaves
  • 2 cloves garlic
  • 1 inch ginger
  • 1 teaspoon cumin seeds 
  • 1 teaspoon turmeric powder
  • 1 tablespoon coriander powder
  • 1 teaspoon cumin powder
Directions

Prepare Soya Chunks
  1. Soak the soya chunks in hot water for 1 hour. Then squeeze out the water completely.
  2. Marinate them with yogurt, salt, red chili powder and turmeric powder and a little ginger garlic paste for ~2 hours.
Prepare Spinach and Masala
  1. Wash and chop the spinach leaves finely. Chop 1 onion finely.
  2. In a pan heat a little oil and crackle the cumin seeds and add one sliced onion. 
  3. Stir fry and add a little salt and spinach and simmer until the spinach has wilted and cooked.
  4. Grind together one onion, mint, coriander leaves and green chillies.  Add a little water if you need to.  At this point I also added ~half the cooked spinach mixture and ground it together too.
  5. Add the mixture w/ masalas, ginger, garlic, chopped tomatoes, salt and simmer for 6-7 minutes.
  6. Taste and add more spice/ salt if necessary.  I added the tomato paste at this point because I thought it needed more of a tomato-y flavor.
  7. Add the soya chunks and let it cook for a few more minutes.
Kuty's Twist

So this really came out great!  My additions to the original recipe were only because of my own taste preferences.  I added more green chilies, ground the cooked spinach so the gravy would be more smooth, and added more tomatoes.

I also increased the amount of spinach and soya chunks so I would have a lot of leftovers!  This tasted a lot better after 2 days. I think it gave the soya chunks some time to soak in the flavors.


6 comments:

  1. i love this girl! and her culinary skills!

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  2. Vani, this is my favourite recipe yet! I pretty much followed your recipe, except that I didn't marinate the soy chunks for 1 hour...mainly because I started cooking late and didn't feel like staying up:) So I marinated them for around 50 mins and then cooked them a bit longer and goodness it tastes so good!

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  3. Hi there, happened to tumble across ur blog. I loved ur recipe and it out very well! In order to save time I put the soya chunks in boiling water with some salt for 5-7 mins until they are soft and then marinated them. I never imagined the combination can taste so good. Thanks for the recipe!

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  4. Thanks for stopping by Shri! Great time saving tip re: the boiling water. I'll have to try it next time. :)

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  5. Hi.. tried ur recipe came out well...thanks for the recipe

    ReplyDelete

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