Mahanandi

It’s been a while since I bought cherry peppers. I believe it was in Houston about 4 years ago. Last weekend I found them again at a price I like to pay, here in Ohio at a nearby grocery shop called Rulli Brothers. This local Italian grocery shop is old, located in a 60 to 70 year old building. I gathered from reading the local newspaper Vindicator that because of some family financial problems, the brothers closed this shop for several years and recently reopened it for business. I think this also contributed to the whole dilapidated look and feel of the shop.

At first being new to this area, not knowing the history, we were hesitant to try this shop. After a while we came to know that they sell mainly local produce and meat. After seeing how busy the parking lot always was, one fine day, we braved, liked what we saw, now regularly shop at this local grocery. Every week, I would find something interesting to buy at an affordable rate and last weekend I eyed cherry peppers and other varieties of peppers priced at 50 cents per pound. Needless to say I came home as a happy person with lots of peppers.

First I wanted to stuff them with potato filling and dip them in besan batter and deep-fry them in oil like egg pakora. But these past few days it has been very hot here with temperatures touching almost 90° F. The idea of oily food didn’t appeal to me. So I prepared stuffed, roasted cherry peppers.

Recipe:

Ingredients for stuffing
1 cup of roasted chana dal
Half cup of cut dry coconut pieces
Small marble sized tamarind
4 red chillies
1 tsp of cumin seeds
1/4 tsp of salt

Powder them all together in a Sumeet mixie jar or in a food processor. This is your filling.

Preparation:

Wash the cherry peppers and dry them with a towel. Cut the top off and remove the seeds from inside of each pepper. Fill the well in each pepper to the top with the roasted chanadal-coconut powder prepared earlier.

In an iron skillet, take about one tablespoon of oil, when it is hot, gently place the stuffed peppers. Leave space around them so that they will cook evenly. Reduce the heat to medium low and cover the skillet with a lid and leave them like that undisturbed for about 30 to 40 minutes. By the end of cooking, the bottoms will be brown, and the sides and top are cooked in their own moisture.

Even though they are feared as hot ones, they are surprisingly mild and sweet cooked in this way and also because of the filling. No upset stomachs with this recipe, I can guarantee you that.

Stuffed cherry peppers with spinach dal and rice.