Channa Khurma - one of the most comforting and soothing South Indian vegan dishes

This version has been made so easy that you don't even need a ton of Indian specialty spices and it still tastes authentic.

I go on with my South Indian vegan recipes (check a few posts back for more and stay tuned for the ones that will come).

In South Indian cuisine there’s Chana Masala and there’s Vegetable Khurma. According to my knowledge, just a bit less common is the Chana Khurma. Indians, please correct me if I’m wrong and it’s the same popularity. Anyways in my opinion it should be the opposite, because this is really a good-mood well-being recipe. Feel free to share your thoughts on that!

I adjusted the recipe to be doable for everyone at every skill level and minimal worry for ingredients. Here it comes.

CHANNA KHURMA

SERVES: 4

TOTAL TIME: 1 hour if you use dried chickpeas / 15 min if you use canned ones

INGREDIENTS

BASE OF THE DISH

• 200 g dried chickpeas (or 400 g can). If you use dried ones, be aware to soak them in cold water overnight.

• 2 sprigs of curry leaves (about 16 leaves)

• 5 tomatoes (no too juicy, cubed)

• 3 tablespoons extra virgin coconut oil

• 500 g coconut milk

• Water for loosening or making the dish less heavy /according to preference)

• 1 teaspoon salt, more to taste

• Basmati rice and / or chapati for serving

SPICE PASTE / GRAVY

• 100 g onions, thinly sliced

• 3 cloves garlic, thinly sliced

• 10 g ginger, thinly sliced

• 1/4 teaspoon turmeric powder

• 1/4 teaspoon chili powder

• 1 teaspoon coriander powder or even better: mash the coriander seeds yourself in pestle and mortar

• 1/4 tsp Garam Masala

• 1/4 teaspoon salt

• 1 teaspoon cooking oil

• 1/2 cup water for smoother grinding

INSTRUCTIONS

Make the spice mixture first. Grind the onion, garlic and ginger in a blender or food processor. Pick the curry leaves from the sprigs. Heat the oil and fry the paste together with the spices on a rather gentle heat for 5 minutes. If it seems uncooked, boost the heat a bit. The paste should get properly roasted, but not burnt.

Now make the rest. Heat the coconut oil, lightly fry coconut leaves and tomato cubes in it for 2 minutes. Add your spice paste that you made at the last step and add coconut milk.

Rinse the chickpeas and wash them with cold water on the sieve (in both cases - when using dry and canned). Pour them into the pan, heat everything up to cook for 3 minutes if using canned chickpeas and at least 30 minutes, if using dried and soaked ones. Check the softness after 30 minutes and cook some more if you like them to be even more soft / mashable with a fork (which is nice by the way, because then it blends better with all the spices and creaminess of the coconut milk). But there’s nothing wrong having harder pieces of chickpeas either for sure!

Add some water throughout the cooking time, if you feel it to be necessary - too thick mixture or too heavy taste (because coconut milk is pretty fatty and there’s also a decent amount of oil). Having that said, don’t reduce the oil nor milk amount - the idea of this dish is that it should be comforting and both of these ingredients are supposed to be good for your health anyway.

Serve hot with Basmati rice, (cooked according to instructions on the package), chapati or naan (even though naan tends to be too heavy to my liking with this dish).

I really think that I need to get some chapati and / or naan recipes out there by now as well. If I keep going on with these beautiful Indian dishes, then these condiments are a must. There should definitely be a nice video to show the process and as I’ve said it out loud now, I think I’m not going to get away without doing it now.

So, enjoy this beautiful heartwarming South Indian vegan dish and stay tuned for more.