Potol Rossa – Whole pointed gourds

Little S is very excited about my Adsense earnings. Everyday as he comes back from school, he makes me open my homepage- if it is not already open that is, checks out the figures, and multiplies it by 45 to see the figure in Indian Rupees that we have reached.  He has it all charted out - the various toys and gadgets that he will buy at different milestones…so much for the earner…L

“Mamma now when we reach 550Rs, we will buy a Beyblade metal fusion, okay?”

“But you bought a metal fusion last month, and lost it in 1 day” – I complained.

“But I’m not going to lose it this time, I promise” he plants a kiss on my cheek.

Old trick, but I’m not going to give in, I say to myself as I get ready for a long drawn argument.

“But Betu you keep saying that and you keep losing things – last year you lost your new bicycle, after riding it for just 1 day, you lost your basketball this April, 3 badminton rackets in the 1 month of summer camp, I’m not even mentioning the little things you keep losing everyday in school !” I’m exasperated.

Little boy in tears now.

“I lose everything, right? What about the same Mamma and same Bapi I’m using for the past 8 years? I haven’t lost either of you, did I?”

I’m speechless.

I am quickly making all the potol (pointed gourd) dishes I know of, as they will very soon vanish from the Mumbai market, now that the monsoons are here. Alu-potol er ChheNchki, I have already posted few weeks back, alu-potoler dalna- Sandeepa from Bong Mom’s Cookbook has posted it a few days back. Today I am making Potol Rossa. I made this dish after a long long time. It was my mom’s specialty, and me and my entire extended family, we all just loved it. I had made it a few years back, but didn’t turn out to be as good as hers. So this time I made no mistake but promptly called her to re-run me through her recipe. She did, and voila! I did it!

Potol Rossa – Whole pointed gourds (parwal) in a thickish tangy gravy

What you’ll need:

Pointed gourds - whole, peeled and slitted from both ends, so that the gourd remain whole

Onion – 1 small

Garlic – 4 fat cloves

Ginger – 1 tbsp

Tomato – 1 small

Green chillies – 2

Coriander pdr – 1 tsp

Cumin pdr – 1 tsp

Garam masala pdr – 1 tsp

Whole bay leaves – 2

Cumin seeds – ½ tsp

Salt – ½ tsp

Turmeric – ½ tsp

Sugar – ½ tsp (optional, add it only if you are a Bengali)

Kishmish (raisins) – 10/12, soaked for about half an hour in water

Mustard oil – 3 tsp

How to go about it:

Step 1: Rub the gourds lightly with turmeric and salt, and fry it in 1 tsp mustard oil. Fry it well, good enough to be eaten as it is. Sprinkle water (or oil, if you don’t mind too much of it!) if you feel gourds are sticking to the bottom. Remove and keep aside.

 Step2: Make a paste of the Onion, Garlic, Ginger, Tomato, Green chillies, Coriander pdr, Cumin pdr & Garam masala pdr, adding very little, about 2 spoons of water.








Step3: Add the remaining oil in the same wok, and heat. Add the cumin seeds and the bay leaves.






Step 4: Add the paste, the soaked raisins and fry till you can smell the beautiful aroma that only mom’s kitchen can give.

Step 5: Add the pre-fried gourds, mix, so that all of them get nicely coated with the masala.

 Step 6: Add about half a cup of water, and bring it to boil. As it comes to a boil, cover and let it simmer for 2 mins. 

Your luscious, distinctly tangy and very tasty pointed gourds are ready. There are people in my native town Durgapur, who have started eating parwal after tasting my mom’s Rossa Potol ! So do try this J

PS: Avoid ripe yellow parwals with hard black seeds. If the seeds are hard and black, remove them.