Mambazha Pulisserry ( Sweet and Sour Mango Gravy)

This sweet and sour and mildly spicy curd based ripe mango gravy enriched with coconut paste is a unique Kerala dish, which is an all time favourite of all Keralites. Especially so in our family, where during the months of April, May and June this dish is prepared so very often and yet we never get tired of eating this mouth watering delicacy. In our family, we add a pinch of jaggery to almost all dishes. Thus a sweet dish is always savoured with great enthusiasm. (Our family is known as a Pulacode family, though we hail from Puthucode. Our grandfather's parents migrated to Puthucode from a village by name Pulacode, along with some cousins and hence the name. All Pulacodians like their everyday curries sweetened with little jaggery). Sometime ago our younger son visited a cousin of ours whose family had stayed back in Pulacode during the above said migration. When our son came back, my astute and blessed m-i-l, as was her practice, asked her grandson, "So what did Ammini Athai serve you for lunch?"

"Mambazha Pulissery", he answered and corrected, "no no, Mambazha Payasam"

Then the two had a hearty laugh.

Such is the affinity of Pulacodians towards sweet.

Not only Keralites, but everyone who has tasted my mambazha pulissery has admired the dish. Recently a young Kannadiga girl who tasted the dish said, "this is an all in one dish, it has all the flavours".

Coming to the recipe, this Pulisserry can be prepared with any type of mango, but the small sized mango, which is known as "Adakka manga"(Areca nut mangoes, so called because of their small size) is the right choice for this. During wedding feasts, hundreds of these ripe mangoes are boiled in huge urulis the previous night itself so that they would cool down by morning to be peeled and squeezed. I also pressure cook the mangoes the previous night last thing before going to bed, so that they would be easier to peel in the morning. Finishing part of the cooking the previous night is a system we adopted when I was working and we had to have the lunch and breakfast ready by 8 am in the morning. There were no breakfast cereals back then. Even today, I cook a full fledged breakfast, lunch and dinner every day.

Back to the recipe:

Ingredients:

Ripe mangoes(big): 4
or
Small mangoes : 10
Grated coconut : 1½ cups
Green chillies : 4 or 5
Mildly sour thick curds : 2 cups
Jaggery(optional) : 1 tbsp

Turmeric powder : 1tsp.
Salt :to taste
Curry leaves : 1 sprig
Oil : 1 tbsp.
Mustard seeds: 2tsp.
Fenugreek seeds : 1/tsp
Red chillies : 2 nos.


Method:

Wash and cut the stem off the mangoes. Make a slit on either side of the mangoes, if you are using big mangoes. Pressure cook the mangoes in 2 cups of water. You can also microwave high for 7 minutes. Allow to cool. Peel the skin off. Squeeze the flesh off the mangoes. Keep the seeds. Use the water in which the mangoes were boiled to squeeze any flesh off the skin of the mangoes. Mix the mango pulp with a spoon to make a homogeneous mixture. Add the seeds to the mixture.

Beat the curds to a uniform consistency.

Grind the coconut with green chillies using a spoon of beaten curds to a thick consistency; not very smooth.

Boil the mango pulp for 5 minutes, stirring well. Add turmeric powder, salt and jaggery. Mix the ground coconut with the remaining beaten curds and add to the boiling mango pulp. Allow to boil once and remove from the stove. Garnish with curry leaves.

Heat the oil in pan. Add the mustard seeds. When the mustard seeds start spluttering, add the fenugreek seeds, broken red chillies and curry leaves.
When the red chillies start changing color, remove from the stove and pour over the prepared pulissery.

njoy!

Mambazha pulissery tastes great with rice, dosa, idli, kozhukkattai or chapati.