Oonu ready: Tomato pickle

I have been blogging since 2007 but I never wrote anything on cooking until recently. And then suddenly I watched Julia and Julie and any food lover would agree this movie really can inspire you. Cooking is something that is sacred to me. Its a passion that binds my family members to me. Thanks to my mom and her meticulous planning and cooking all of us, her kids share this passion today. For the first time in life I don't fear running out of topics or recipes to write. I feel liberated and I hope some of you would enjoy reading me here.

Cooking has often been described as an ordeal, an unbearable one too by most of my friends. Sometimes it makes me feel old fashioned. But thankfully I have my most devoted follower ( my husband) who devours almost anything I cook. So my experiments continue.

I have chosen tomato pickle for the first post. Tomato pickle to me brings back my childhood memories. This was one of mom's delicacies which I could never resist. She used it as a sandwich spread, a dip for savouries and yes a must with rice and rotis.

Tomatoes- 2 kg ( the more the better because once tomatoes are dried they reduce to 1/4th of the original quantity)

Boil water in a vessel and when water reaches boiling point add the washed tomatoes take the vessel from fire and cool the vessel. This procedure is done to peel the skin of tomatoes and hence the utensil should be cooled else the tomatoes will get cooked. Now peel the skin of the tomatoes and chop them into medium sized pieces.

Cook the chopped tomatoes to remove the water content and get a thick paste. This procedure will be disheartening to you because the pieces that topped your vessel will get reduced to a quarter and would finally settle into a smaller quantity.

Hence for preparing in huge quantities take a lot of tomatoes. Perhaps 3kg will reduce to 1kg in the end so you can imagine how much you need to start with.

In the same pan add mustard seeds once they pop add dry chillies and fry them. Into this fried spices add chilly, turmeric and fenugreek powder saute them well.

Add the chopped ginger and garlic to this mixture. Since the garlic and ginger are already fried they need not be sauted for long. Add the tomato puree into it and mix well. Keep stirring till the water content evaporates and you get a thicker paste. Add salt and tamarind and stir for some more time.

Once you reach a consistency, but only after all the water has evaporated, that you want for your spread or pickle, remove from fire and let it cool thoroughly.