Moolor Ghonto
This radish preparation is best made with slender, red winter radishes, and goes well with both rice and rooti.
- Cooking time75 mins
- Calories158kcal
Mulo'r ghonto is a dry mishmash of finely julienned radish that celebrates the delicious red winter radish. The recipe uses spices sparingly allowing the radish to shine. The red winter radish is available in the markets of Bengal all of winter and early spring, but it is between mid-November and mid-January that it is the most delicious. Mulo'r ghonto is not worth making with out-of-season radish in our opinion. Serve this with a plain rice and a light dal for lunch. Leftovers also go very well with rooti.
Ingredients
- 500 g moolo (radish; 300 g after peeling)
- 100 g potatoes (3-cm cubes)
- 15 g green peas (shelled)
- 15 g tomato (chopped)
- 15 g grated coconut
- 4 green chillies
- 30 g mustard oil
- 1 dried red chilli
- 1 bay leaf
- 1 cardamom
- 1 cinnamon
- 1 clove
- ½ tsp cumin seeds
- ½ tsp cumin powder
- ¼ tsp turmeric
- 1 pinch red chilli powder
- 5 g ginger paste
- 8 g total salt (in two parts)
- 14 g sugar
- ¼ tsp atta
- ¼ tsp gorom moshla
- 1 tsp ghee
- 6 g coriander leaves (chopped)
Method
- Peel and chop the radish into fine shreds. For 300 g of shredded radish, mix in 6 g salt. Set aside to allow the salt to draw moisture out from the radish.
- Meanwhile, cut potatoes in 3-cm cubes, roughly chop tomatoes, shell peas, and slit the green chillies.
- Heat mustard oil. Temper it with dried red chilli, bay leaf, cardamom, cinnamon, clove and cumin seeds.
- Add potatoes and fry for 2 mins. Add grated coconut and fry until golden. Add tomatoes, and fry again for 2 mins.
- Now add the powdered spices: cumin, turmeric and red chilli. Fry on low heat for 2 mins before adding in the ginger paste.
- Add the peas and 2 green chillies, and sauté again another 2 mins.
- Squeeze the water from the radish and add the shreds to the pan. From this point on, the heat remain low.
- Slow-cook the radish, covered, in its own juices for 15 mins, then add in the sugar. Continue cooking another 15 mins.
- Taste and adjust the salt. We ended up adding 2 g more (remember that we had marinated the radish with salt in the beginning).
- Cook until the radish clumps together and the sugar caramelises slightly.
- Mix in a little atta (flour) to allow the juices to coat the radish. Finish with green chillies, ghee, gorom moshla and chopped coriander leaves.