Curry Leaf Rice

Curry leaf is a must in any South-Indian dish. These leaves are so aromatic and add a special flavor to every dish. Curry leaf not only acts as a flavoring agent but also has lot of nutritional values. Packed with carbohydrates, fiber, calcium, phosphorous, iron, magnesium, copper, minerals and vitamins like nicotinic acid and vitamin C, vitamin A, vitamin B, vitamin E, antioxidants, plant sterols, amino acids, glycosides and flavonoids, curry leaves help your heart function better, fights infections and can enliven your hair and skin with vitality. 

In Ayurvedic medicine, curry leaves are believed to have several medicinal properties such as anti-diabetic, antioxidant, antimicrobial, anti-inflammatory, anti-carcinogenic and hepato-protective (capability to protect liver from damage) properties. The roots are used for treating body aches and the bark is used for snake bite relief.

Inspite of all these health benefits, we often have a tendency to pick away the leaves from our curries/dishes and miss all those medicinal properties. Now, I am sharing this dish from which we cannot pick the leaves away and get all the benefits.

Ingredients
1 ½ cup rice
salt to taste
To be ground:
1 cup curry leaves
2 tbsp chana dal
2 tbsp sesame seeds
2 tsp cumin seeds
4-5 dry red chili
Tempering :
1/2 tbsp oil
½ tbsp ghee / clarified butter
1 tsp mustard seeds
2 tsp urad dal
2 green chili
6-8 cashew nuts, broken

Method

• Rinse and soak rice in 3 cups of water for 30 minutes. Cook rice. Empty into a wide plate and let it cool.
• Dry roast all the ingredients (under ‘to be ground’) separately. Once they reach room temperature, grind into a fine powder.
• In a small frying pan, heat oil and ghee. Add mustard seeds, after they splutter, add urad dal, cashew nuts, torn red chili, slit green chili, and sauté until light brown.
• Add tempering to the rice along with the ground powder. Add salt and mix well.
• Curry leaves rice is ready to be served.