Chow Chow Chutney

Benguluru Vankaya Pachadi.

Choko or chayote is a gourd vegetable used in daily cooking. Urad dal, red chillies and mustard seeds are fried in little oil till aromatic and ground into fine powder. Chow chow or choko is grated and cooked till soft and ground with other spices into a chutney. This chow chow chutney is tangy and spicy.
Makes: 3 Servings

Ingredients:

Chayote 1
Urad Dal 3/4 tbsp
Whole Red Chillies 2
Tamarind 1 inch sized ball
Mustard Seeds 1/4 tsp
Curry Leaves 6
Salt to taste
Oil 1 1/2 tsp

Method of preparation:

Wash thoroughly, halve and discard the inner seed of chayote.
Grate or chop chayote into small pieces.
Soak tamarind in few tbsps of water for sometime and extract all the juice.

Heat half a tsp of oil in a pan on medium heat, add urad dal, mustard seeds and broken red chiles.
Fry the ingredients for a minute and remove from heat.
Cool and grind the fried ingredients into fine powder.

Heat half a tsp of oil in a pan, add grated chayote, tamarind extract and salt.
Cook covered on medium flame till chayote softens a bit.
Uncover and cool the cooked chayote to room temperature.

Grind the cooked chayote and ground masala powder into paste.
Remove the ground chayote chutney onto a bowl.

Heat half a tsp of oil in a pan, add a pinch of mustard seeds and curry leaves.
When mustard seeds almost stop sputtering, remove and add this to above chayote chutney.
Serve chayote chutney with steamed rice or with dosa.
Notes:Make sure chayote is not overcooked.

Suggestions: If chayote chutney is too spicy, grind it with some more cooked chayote.
Variations: Chayote with Besan, Chayote with Chana Dal.
Other Names: Sayote Chutney, Chocho Chutney, Chow-Chow Chutney.