Carrots for Curry

Don't you like these carrots? I grew, nay, drew them myself, and when I found out I couldn't colour them in Paint for some reason, I altered them to look all beta-carotene-y in an app on my phone. It's a good way to illustrate a blog post when there is no photograph of the actual food. Of course, this has no resemblance to the finished product, but I'm so thrilled I thought of it. It's certainly better than my photography!

A couple of weeks ago, I found myself at my friend's place, feeling low and worked up. She called me over for lunch to divert my attention and I ended up infecting her with my sadness. But this was after lunch, for which she had made the most amazing cauliflower roast (with gram flour and a bit of ground rice to make it crisp), sambar and a beetroot-green gram stir-fry. She said carrot could be used instead of beetroot, and I've tasted similar stuff she's made with greens as well. So the following week I made this stir-fry/curry with carrot at my place. My grandmother would use green gram with raw banana to make a stir-fry. I should make that next.

There are many recipes on the Internet for this. Here's mine:

Carrots, diced: 1 cup

Onion, chopped: 1

Green gram/moong dal, soaked for a while: A big fistful

Green chillies, slit: 2-3

Salt (I used 1/2 tsp)

Oil: 1-2 tsp

To temper: 1/2 tsp each of mustard and cumin; 5-6 curry leaves; 1 broken red chilli

Heat the oil, add the mustard, let it pop, then add the other ingredients. They will splutter right away, so once they do that, add the onions and green chillies and fry them for a couple of minutes. Then add the carrots and the gram, cover and cook till softer. Add the salt and cook a little more. Take it off the heat. Garnish with coriander, if you like.