Murungai Keerai Paruppu Usili Recipe - Drumstick Leaves & Toor Dal
Murungai Keerai Paruppu Usili Recipe is a crumbly and soft preparation of dal along with the goodness of drumstick leaves. This dish makes a great accompaniment along with rasam and rice for a light weeknight meal.
Usili is a traditional and popular recipe from the state of Tamil Nadu, in which dal or paruppu is steamed cooked along with spices. It is mainly cooked with a variety of vegetables namely, french beans, broad beans, leafy greens etc.
Murungai Keerai Paruppu Usili is a dal crumble made with the fresh Moringa or Drumstick leaves.
Moringa leaves is one of the new superfoods filled with various minerals and vitamins that are essential to the body.The vitamin A, C and B6 in Moringa is beneficial to keep the eyes and bone healthy. Moringa leaves in this particular dish renders a beautiful bitter flavour and crunchiness to the whole dish.
Did You know: The drumstick tree is typically called a powerhouse of minerals as every part of it — leaves, fruits (pods), flowers, barks and seeds — has tremendous medicinal value. Popularly used in many South Indian preparations, fresh pods called drumsticks cooked along with their seeds are a good source of oleic acid, a health-benefiting monounsaturated fat.
Serve Murungai Keerai Paruppu Usili along with Steamed Rice and Tomato Jeera & Paruppu Rasam Recipe for a weekday lunch.
If you like this recipe, here are a few more Drumstick Leaves recipes:
10 M
20 M
30 M
4 Servings
Ingredients
- 1.5 cups Drumstick Leaves (Moringa/Murungai Keerai)
- 1 teaspoon Mustard seeds
- 1 Dry red chilli
- 1/2 teaspoon Asafoetida (hing)
- 3 teaspoons Cooking oil
- Salt , to taste Ingredients to make the Paruppu Usili
- 1 cup Arhar dal (Split Toor Dal)
- 1 teaspoon Fennel seeds (Saunf)
- 2 Dry red chillies
- Salt , as per your taste
How to make Murungai Keerai Paruppu Usili Recipe - Drumstick Leaves & Toor Dal
To begin making the Murungai Keerai Paruppu Usili Recipe, wash and soak toor dal for 30 minutes.
*To make the Paruppu Usili
After 30 minutes drain the water from dal.
Combine the soaked toor dal along with fennel seeds, dried red chillies, and salt in a mixer jar and grind to a coarse mix using a mixer grinder. Transfer to a bowl.
Heat an idli steamer on medium heat, with enough water. Grease the idli mould and keep it ready.
Now make small lemon sized balls of the prepared paruppu usili mixture, and place it in the idli mould.
Cover and steam cook for 10 minutes, until the dal mixture is cooked. (Don't make the ball of dals too tight as the lentils will not steam very well)
In a wide pan, add oil and heat it on medium heat, add the mustard seeds, asafoetida and let it splutter. Add the dried red chillies, and let it crackle.
Add the drumstick leaves, season with salt, mix well, cover and cook for 5 minutes until the drumstick leaves are cooked well.
Meanwhile, remove the steamed toor dal balls, crumble it with your hands so that it resembles the sandy texture.
Once the drumstick leaves are cooked well, add the crumbled toor dal mix to the pan and mix well.
At this stage you can add a teaspoon or two of oil, if the mixture looks too dry.
Saute for 2 minutes, until the dal crumbles are nice and crispy and switch off the heat. It is ready to be served.
Serve Murungai Keerai Paruppu Usili along with Steamed Rice and Tomato Jeera & Paruppu Rasam Recipe for a weeknight dinner.
Nithya Anantham
"I am an experimental cook by chance!" Yeah! Cooking to me has always been a form of stress buster. What started as a stress busting exercise post work, has now evolved to a much full time activity. I try to improvise the traditional recipes with easy to available ingredients at home. Thus, you will come across a lot of fusion in my cooking style. I try to include seasonal organic produce as much as possible in my cooking.
