Thakkali charu (Tomato Rasam) with cherry tomatoes – comfort at it best

Last week when I went to the market my eyes caught hold of the lovely cherry tomatoes and I couldn’t resist myself in buying them.

Don’t they look pretty. Cherry tomatoes and small shallots are a delight to the eyes. The shallots you see in the picture are actually frozen ones. I rarely get fresh shallots here.

What better way to make use of these lovely tomatoes than to make hot piping thakkali rasam. The weather outside is also lovely. Its drizzling the whole day.

I generally stick to one method of making rasam – the traditional way. But this time I made little modifications, added extra ingredients and I can vouch… this was the tastiest rasam I ever had. It was an amazing lunch and then I lazed into my couch with a lively music and book in hand. My day was made!

Ingredients

Around 10 cherry tomatoes/ 2-3 big tomatoes

6-7 baby shallots (optional)

Small lump of tamarind

½ cup of toor dal

1 ts rasam powder

¾ ts whole peppercorn, ½ ts cumin seed, ¼ ts coriander seed, 3 garlic pods, 2 green chilli – to make fresh rasam powder masala

For tempering

½ ts mustard seed, ½ ts cumin seed, ¼ ts fenugreek seed

Few curry leaves, ¼ ts hing, 1 red chilli, ¼ ts turmeric powder

Preparation

- Take water in a small pan. Add tomatoes and tamarind. Once it reaches boiling point switch off stove and set it aside to cool.

- After its cooled, take the tomatoes out…peel the skin…crush the tomatoes with your hands and extract the puree out of it.

- Extract tamarind and make a tamarind water discarding the fibrous parts of it.

- Cook toor dal in pressure cooker until its soft and mushy.

- Add oil in a stock pot. Once its hot, add mustard seed, cumin seed, fenugreek seed, curry leaves, hing and red chilli. Add chopped shallots and fry until it turns nice brown. Add turmeric powder and fry for a while.

- Add the cooked toor dal to the above. Mix well.

- Now add the tomato puree and tamrind water. Add enough salt.

- Next add the rasam powder and freshly ground rasam masala containing pepper, cumin, coriander seed, garlic and green chilli.

- Add little ghee and mix everything well. Add few cilantro.

- Leave the mixed stock on the pot undisturbed. Wait till it starts to boil and becomes frothy at the top.

- Switch off the stove.

Take it off the stove and enjoy with any curry and papad.