Uttar Pradesh
Dum Aloo
- Duration: 25 minutes
- Serves: 4 people
Authenticity Slice
Traditionally, the dish was cooked in "dum" or steam in a clay pot with its lid sealed with atta dough, over slow burning coals for hours to give it the particular warm, aromatic flavour of the mix of spices. Today, you can do away with the laborious process of the slow coal fire, and the complex mix of spices with a few quick touches, including the use of MTR Garam Masala as the main spice mix, to create a delectable dish, nostalgic of the traditional flavours.
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Trivia Tadka
In 1784 the Nawab of Oudh launched a food for work programme to feed the famine stricken people of his kingdom, and so was built one of the masterpieces of those times, the Lucknow Barra Imambara. The cook engaged to feed the hungry workers, revived a beef dish, which was cooked over a slow fire in a closed claypot overnight and stayed warm for a long time for all to eat. The beef was replaced by turnip in those hard times. When the last Nawab Wajid Ali Shah was banished to Calcutta, after the Mutiny in 1857, he carried the recipe with him but in his adopted land he discovered a new vegetable to replace turnip: the potato. And so was born the Dum Aloo.
Ingredients
- Onions, chopped (1 cup)
- Ginger-garlic paste (2 tsp)
- Green chillis, chopped (1 tsp)
- MTR Coriander (Dhania) Powder (3 tsp)
- MTR Garam Masala (2 tsp)
- Tomato puree (½ cup)
- Imli/tamarind juice (3 tsp)
- MTR Lal Mirch (Chilli) Powder (1 tsp)
- Salt (to taste)
- Sugar (2 tsp)
- Hing/ asafeodita (a pinch)
- Oil (2 tsp)
- Hara dhania, chopped (2 tsp)
- Baby potatoes (aloo), boiled (10-12)
Method
- In a pan, heat oil on a high flame. Add the onions and sauté till golden brown.
- Now, add the ginger-garlic paste and stir till well combined. Add the green chillis, dhania powder and the garam masala. Stir to combine.
- Pour the tomato puree and imli juice. Mix well and add the lal mirch powder. Season with salt and add the sugar.
- Add 1 cup water and bring the mixture to a boil. Lower the flame and let the gravy simmer. Add the hing and cover the pan. Let the gravy simmer for 5 minutes.
- Open the lid and add the potatoes. Mix well and cover the pan. Let the dum aloo simmer for at least 7-8 minutes.
- Remove from heat and garnish with hara dhania.