Ven Pongal

Ven Pongal- Before my marriage, I never thought it will become a mandatory menu at my home. My husband's all time favorite. When my in laws told, "he will not complaint, even if you prepare this all seven days a week" I really did not believe... But now I have to. Ven pongal is a mandatory menu for our Friday dinner. If time permits even vadai will accompany us... Until my marriage i was not a big fan of Ven-pongal, It was just another dish for me. Now being a Pongal lover's wife, had to learn and cook the variations of pongal recipes and slowly I too started loving it.
As This year, his birthday was on Friday,even  Pineapple kesari and Vadai also accompanied us for dinner along with the pongal treat.

There are few more methods to make ven pongal and today i am going to share the one, which is my version. I will later post the other variations too.

Ingredients:

Rice and Moong dal: 2:1 ratio (I used 2/3 cups of rice and 1/3 of dal)
Whole pepper - 1 tea spoon
Cumin seeds - 2 tea spoon
ginger - 1 inch piece (finely chopped)
curry leaves- 2 sprigs
Cashews- few
Ghee - 2 tea spoons
Cooking oil - 3 tea spoons (or you can use ghee instead of oil)
Turmeric - a small pinch (optional)
Salt- as per taste
Water- three times the rice and dal quantity.

Preparation:

1. Wash rice and moong dal and keep aside.
2. Heat oil in a pressure cooker,  and add whole pepper, jeera chopped ginger and curry leaves one by one, and saute for a minute.
3. Then Add the washed moong dal .rice,turmeric powder and fry for a minute or two.
4. Add three times of Rice and Dal quantity of cups (I added three cups), and salt as required.
5. cook it for 3-4 whistles.
6.When the pressure leaves, Fry cashews in another pan with 2 tea spoons of ghee and add it to pongal along with ghee.
7. Mix well and serve hot with Sambar, coconut Chutney and Vadai.

Notes:
1. The measurement of water given in the recipe gives a little dry consistency. As My husband does not like a mashed/watery one, I use this quantity of water. For Mashed consistency, Add 4 times the rice and dal quantity.
2. I prefer less oil and less ghee in my recipes, if you like, add few more tea spoons of ghee or oil.
3.Normally my rice needs 2 times the of water to cook, so for pongal i added 3. You can adjust accordingly.

Linking this recipe to #recipeoftheweek | A Mummy Too