Vegetarian Potato Curry - /Aloor- dom:/

Vegetarian Potato Curry or 'Alur Dom' as it is known in Bengali society, is a popular vegetarian cuisine. It is spicy but without onion or garlic and also offered to Gods and Goddesses on any 'Puja' or religious festivals. Moreover, in the olden days when widows were not allowed to eat non-vegetarian foods in the conservative Bengali society, this 'Alur Dom' gave them little taste and flavour to their mundane menu.

It is best cooked in winter when the new baby potatoes of the season are available. This serves well with Luchi, Parota or Hinger Kochuri but also goes well with regular steamed rice as another side dish.

Ingredients:

700 g new baby potatoes of the season (notun alu)
1 l water (for boiling potatoes)
50 g peas (blanched)
30 g mustard oil
2 pcs dried red chillies
2 pcs bay leaves
3 pcs cloves
2 pcs cardamom
1 pc cinnamon
½ tsp cumin seeds
¼ tsp hing (asafoetida)
½ tsp turmeric
½ tsp Kashmiri red chilli powder
1 tsp cumin powder
1½ tsp coriander powder
½ tsp amchur (dried mango powder)
¼ tsp black salt
15 g ginger paste
6 g green chilli paste
50 g yoghurt
20 g tomato ketchup or puree or paste
20 g cashew nuts (ground)
½ tsp kasuri methi (dried fenugreek leaves)
45 g total salt
18 g sugar
¼ tsp Bengali gorom moshla (Green Cardamom 2-inch, Clove 5pcs. and Cinnamon 7 pcs. Dry roasted and powdered)
5 g ghee
400 g hot water (for the gravy)

Instructions:

Place the baby potatoes in a saucepan or boiling pot along with 30 g salt and 1 litre water. Boil the potatoes until tender. This should take about 30 minutes. Boiling the potatoes in heavily salted water ensures that they are uniformly seasoned. Besides, it also causes the potatoes to lose water.

Once the potatoes are tender, drain the water and peel them immediately. Coat with 10 g of salt while the potatoes are still hot.

Before you begin make a paste of cumin powder, coriander powder, amchur, black salt, ginger paste, and 25 g water, and keep at the ready.

Heat 30 g mustard oil in a pan. Temper it with dried red chillies, bay leaves, cloves, cardamom, cinnamon, cumin seeds, and Asafoetida. Allow the Asafoetida g to fry for about 10 seconds before adding turmeric powder and Kashmiri red chilli powder. Fry for 20 seconds. We would normally add turmeric and red chilli to the paste we made earlier, but for this dish, frying them directly in oil will lend the gravy a rich red colour. However, dry spices are prone to getting burnt in oil, so be very careful and keep the heat low.

Next, stir in the spice paste. Cook until the smell of raw spices is gone and they have started to release oil. This should take about 5 minutes. Meanwhile, beat the yoghurt until it is lump-free. Add it to the pan, stirring vigorously to prevent it from splitting. Cook off the raw yoghurt for a couple of minutes before stirring in the ketchup.

Now add the boiled and salted potatoes, and fold them in. Sauté them with the spices for about 4 minutes. We’ve chosen not to fry the potatoes before adding them, as boiling them directly in the curry leads to juicier potatoes.

Add the remaining salt (5 g) and all of the sugar to the pan, along with 400 g of hot water. This will form the gravy. Crumble kasuri methi and add that to the pan too. Cover and allow the potatoes to simmer in the curry for about 20 minutes until the gravy has reduced and the potatoes are juicy and tender. Stir regularly so the bottom doesn’t catch.

Once the gravy has reduced, add the ground cashew and blanched peas. Cook for a minute before garnishing with ghee and garam masala. Turn off heat, cover, and allow alu’r dom to rest for 2 minutes before serving.

Recipe courtesy: Bong Eats.

The purpose of this blog is to research and preserve the traditional Bengali cuisines from our culinary history. One cuisine might have several minute variations depending upon various parameters like regional influence, personal liking or time period. In this process, I came across various contents and found this recipe to adhere to the originality. 
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