Mint Rasam (with toor dal)

 I love making rasams and today I was out to do something a bit different from my routine. I got myself a lovely bunch of mint and wanted to include that in this rasam.

Pressure cooked and boiled a handful of toor dal/sambhar dal and once cooled I ground it to a fine paste. Set it aside. In a small deep bottom pan in a tbsp. of ghee, I sauteed a finely chopped onion/a handful of sliced shallots along with a finely chopped garlic or two and a sliced tomato. I let them all merge well and get mushy. To this I added a little bit of turmeric and any rasam powder of your choice-a tbsp or more.

In a separate bowl, in some warm water add a bit of turmeric, fresh mint leaves and tamarind paste and stir well and let the tamarind infuse well along with the leaves and water. Set it aside.

Once the onions and tomato have shrunk well with the rasam spice, add the set aside ground toor dal to the mix. Stir well, add adequate salt to taste.

 To this toor dal mixture now add the set aside mint infused tamarind water and stir very well. Sprinkle in some freshly ground pepper. Taste if the salt and the acidity is perfect. Do a tempering/tadka with a tbsp of mustard seeds that has crackled in a tsp. of ghee.

Garnish with a sprig or two of mint leaves. It should be had nice and warm. Add vadas if you wish to convert it to another dish that is your vadas in rasam (there is already a post on that here on the blog)