10 C-O-O-L Cucumber Recipes
As it starts getting hotter and hotter, there is an inexplicable urge to add cucumber to all your food/meals. Or even have chilled cucumber all by itself, sliced and dressed with chaat masala and lemon juice. After all it contains more than 90 per cent water. We present a few recipes to satisfy the kakdi bingeing.
Shoshar Torkari
This light, not very spicy but stunning Bengali dish, by Swarupa Dutt, has cucumbers cooked with potatoes in milk, that's given a light tadka and a "daub of ghee." Says Swarupa: "It is eaten any time of the year, but tastes even better in summer."
Please find the recipe here: Shoshar Torkari
Kheera Raita
Raita is one of the tastiest and coolest ways to have your raw vegetables. And raitas from the cucumber family are the most refreshing, totally completing an Indian meal. Vidhya Pant's Pahadi or Kumaoni-style raita, also gets its taste from the spice tempering.
Please find the recipe here: Kheera Raita
Crunchy Cucumber Dill Salad
Chef Sabyasachi Gorai's salad contains rich-in-anti-oxidants walnuts, olives, feta, fresh, leafy greens and lots of taste. It's ideal for healthy, simple lunch with a side of bread or a soup.
Please find the recipe here: Crunchy Cucumber Dill Salad
Vellarikka Moru Curry
Manjula Nair shows us how to make a traditional Kerala cucumber, yoghurt and coconut-based recipe, from her mother's kitchen. It's spiked with green chillies.
Please find the recipe here: Vellarikka Moru Curry
Smoked Cucumber Buttermilk
Refreshing and savoury, with a hint of asafoetida, Vindhya Karwa's buttermilk incorporates cucumber. It also has a unique smoky punch too as she adds the flavour of burning charcoal to it.
Please find the recipe here: Smoked Cucumber Buttermilk
Desi Cucumber Salad
A cooling Indian-style salad, that can be had as a salad meal or a side dish -- it abounds with flavours and textures and is just the thing for the heat. Some of its interesting ingredients are: Mustard oil, sesame, aamchur (dried mango powder).
Please find the recipe here: Desi Cucumber Salad
Cucumber Mint Cooler
Swasti Aggarwal blends cucumber, lemon, and refreshing mint for healthy drink. It is then lightly sweetened and balanced with a pinch of black salt.
Please find the recipe here: Cucumber Mint Cooler
Dil Pasandi
Here is a salad, courtesy Chef Kadim S Shaikh, with a range of unusual ingredients -- crunchy cucumbers, sweet dates, onions and more. The creamy dressing, made with yoghurt, apple cider vinegar, and honey, adds a tangy-sweet touch, while black sesame seeds bring on a subtle nuttiness.
Please find the recipe here: Dil Pasandi
Green Goddess
Chill with this hydrating and detoxifying drink, by Chef Jerson Fernandes, that advertises the goodness of cucumber, fresh mint, aloe vera, and coconut water. Light, revitalising, and wonderful for hot days-- this drink is your defense against the wildy jumping mercury.
Please find the recipe here: Green Goddess
Cucumber Pachadi
Pachadi, the yoghurt-based South Indian answer to a north Indian raita, although it is often much, much more than that, can be made with a wide range of vegetables and is a critical part of a meal because it provides the cool, healthy salad-like break from spice. Julie Ignatius makes hers with cucumbers and coconut.
Please find the recipe here: Cucumber Pachadi
Cooking + child = riotous fun!
Help! My daughter-in-law is 'hard core' non-veg