Friday, March 16, 2012

Making Ugadi Pachadi at home: Recipes with Video

Telugu New Year Day, also known as Ugadi, is celebrated in a grand style on the first day of the Hindu month Chaitra by Telugu people as it is the first festival of Telugu calendar. Although this festival is celebrated as Ugadi in Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka, it is also celebrated as Gudi Padwa in Maharashtra. No matter what name this festival gets in different regions, it indicates the inception of Vasant Rutu (Spring Season), which is regarded as the first season of the year. Telugu people venerate Ugadi with full faith and devotion. Homes are dusted and cleaned, colorful Rangolis are drawn in front of the homes, and mango leaves are knotted to the doorway of the homes to welcome the New Year. People wake up early in the morning on the festive day; prepare many delicious traditional dishes of this occasion and worship God to desire happiness in the upcoming New Year.
Making Ugadi Pachadi at home: Recipes with Video

Ugadi Pachadi is a significant and delicious traditional recipe prepared on Ugadi festival. Ugadi Pachadi is one sort of sauce or chutney prepared with raw mangoes, neem flowers, tamarind, jaggery, salt and pepper powder. The six different flavors of these six ingredients provide a very unique taste to this Ugadi-special chutney. The six flavors are sourness, bitterness, pungency, sweetness, saltiness and chilli flavor, which all together known as six tastes or Shadhruchulu.

The myriad rich taste of this mouth-watering Pachadi remains and tickles on our tongue for a longer period and leaves a jumble of savors. Each ingredient of the Pachadi stands for different states-of-mind in our life; the tanginess of the tamarind, the sourness of the raw mango, the sweetness of the jaggery, hotness of the chili powder and the bitterness of neem flowers indicate that our life is a mixture of all emotions - be it tranquility, contentedness, happiness, sorrows, disappointment and success - and we have to face each one similarly.
It is a nutritious low-calorie pachadi, where the jaggery, new tamarind, fresh raw mangoes and neem flowers are full of nutrients that purify the system and help in prevention of the disease or illness by acting as prophylactics. Each ingredient used in Ugadi Pachadi has its own scientific explanation for its usage in the recipe. Neem flowers are proven good for skin problems and diabetes, jaggery enhances hemoglobin levels and it is good for combating jaundice, and tamarind & raw mango also have therapeutic values. All in all, a mixture of all these ingredients is good for maintaining good wellbeing.

Do you want to make tasty and delicious South Indian recipe ‘Ugadi Pachadi’ at home yourself? Read on… because a full list of food ingredients needed for the preparation and step by step easy cooking methods are provided here.

Ingredients:
Neem flowers - 1 tablespoon - For Bitterness - Represents sorrow
Finely chopped raw fresh Mango - 1 cup - For Tanginess - Represents excitement
Tamarind - 1 small lime size - For Sourness - Represents Mischieveness
Grated Jaggery - 1 cup - For Sweetness - Represents Happiness
Red chilli powder or Black pepper powder - 1/4 teaspoon - For Spiciness/Hotness - Represents Angriness
Salt - 1/2 teaspoon - For Saltiness - Represents scariness

One can add coconut, bananas, sugarcane pieces and roasted chana dal also.

Method 1
  • First of all, infuse tamarind in water and put aside for 20 minutes. After that, take out a dilute pulp.
  • Add jaggery in it and allow it to melt.
  • Now, add salt, chilli powder and mango pieces, and mix well.
  • Finally, add neem flowers and that’s it.
The rest of the methods need some additional ingredients besides the main 6 ingredients, including:
Oil (preferably gingelly oil) - 1 tablespoon
Mustard seeds: 1/4 teaspoon
Few curry leaves
A pinch of hing/asafetida

Method 2
  • Firstly, soak tamarind in water, put aside for 20 minutes, and then take out a dilute pulp.
  • Now, take a pan, heat oil in it, and add curry leaves, mustard seeds and hing.
  • After crackling of them, add the tamarind pulp and let it boil and lessen in volume.
  • Next, add mango pieces and boil for a while.
  • Add chilli powder and salt and mix well.
  • Now, it’s a time to add jaggery. Stir in for a while until it gets somewhat thick.
  • At last, add the neem flowers after dry roasting of them. And your Ugadi Pachadi is ready.
Method 3
  • Soak tamarind in water for 1/2 hour, and subsequently boil it for 5 minutes.
  • Allow it to cool at room temperature, and then blend it in a mixer to make it smoother.
  • Filter all the fibers by passing it through a strainer or sieve.
  • Add finely chopped mango pieces and jaggery, and boil it one more time till mango pieces tender and jaggery melt into the juice. Now, put the mixture on one side.
  • Take one pan, heat oil in it, and add curry leaves, mustard seeds and hing.
  • After spluttering of them, add neem flowers in it.
  • Now, add chilli powder and salt and cook till light brown.
  • Lastly, mix tamarind paste with this neem flower. And that’s all.
Video of Ugadi Pachadi recipe Method 3 from youtube:

2 comments:

wonderful information, I had come to know about your blog from my friend nandu , hyderabad,i have read atleast 7 posts of yours by now, and let me tell you, your website gives the best and the most interesting information. This is just the kind of information that i had been looking for, i'm already your rss reader now and i would regularly watch out for the new posts, once again hats off to you! Thanks a ton once again, Regards, Ugadi pachadi

Very true that this dish is so mouth watering that the zeal of its taste lasts long, but at the same time the most important fact is that a recipe or dish like Ugadi Pachadi is prepared and consumed only once in whole of one year.

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