Chilli Carnival

The benefits of eating chilli are plenty — from giving you great skin to increasing metabolism and from preventing cancer to reducing blood sugar levels.

King Chilli Pickle

Ingredients
100 gm king chilli/bhoot jholikia 
finely chopped
2 glove garlic finely chopped
½ cup lemon juice
4 tsp sugar
1 tsp haldi
1 tsp kashmiri red chilli powder
¼ tsp fenugreek seeds
1 tsp dhania
1 tsp jeera
Salt to taste
Mustard oil as required

King Chilli pickle

Method
Roast fenugreek seeds, whole dhania and jeera on a tawa. After it cools down, grind to make the masala. Heat oil in a kadai and add the chopped garlic and stir for a minute. Then add the chopped king chilli, sugar, salt, kashmiri red chilli powder, haldi and the masala made earlier. Stir for one to two minutes or till the king chilli becomes soft. 

Put off the flame and add the lemon juice. Mix it well. Taste the mixture, and if needed, add more lemon juice or salt. When it cools down, immediately transfer the content to a glass jar. To preserve the pickle, heat mustard oil to boiling point, cool it and pour on the pickle. Keep it refrigerated.

Khatte Tikkhe Aloo

Ingredients
½ kg baby potatoes
50 gm garlic
100 gm dry red chilies
3 tbsp oil
25 gm roasted jeera
4 tbsp thick tamarind pulp
Salt to taste

Khatte Tikki Aloo

Method
Except the baby potatoes, grind all the ingredients together and make a thick paste. Boil the baby potatoes in a pan, peel and keep it aside. Heat oil in a pan and add the tamarind paste and cook for 10 to 12  minutes. Now add the potatoes and cook until the masala coats them. Serve hot.

Green Chilli Potato Bites

Ingredients 
¼ kg green chillies
50 gm butter
1-2 potatoes
100 gm green peas, shelled
1½ inch ginger piece
2 onions
2 bunches of coriander, chopped
1 tsp garam masala
2 tbsp bread crumbs
½ tsp jeera
Salt to taste

Method 
Boil the potatoes and green chillies separately. Peel and mash the potatoes and add the boiled peas, chopped onions, ginger and coriander leaves to it. Mix in salt, jeera and garam masala. Slit the green chillies vertically and remove the seeds. Stuff the mixture into the chillies and place them in a greased pan with the slit side up. Melt butter and pour some of it into the pan along with a portion of the bread crumbs on top of each of the chilli. Cook for about 10 to 15 minutes on a low flame and serve hot.

Hyderabadi Mirchi Ka Salan

Ingredients
½ kg long thick chillies
100 gm roasted peanut
100 gm roasted coconut
100 gm roasted sesame seeds
1 tbsp cumin powder
2 tbsp coriander powder
1 onion 
2 tbsp chilli powder
1 tbsp tamarind powder
2 tbsp ginger-garlic paste
6 to 8 tbsp thick tamarind pulp 
Salt to taste
1 tsp jeera
1 tsp mustard seeds
1 tsp kalonji 

Method
Grind roasted peanut, coconut, ginger-garlic paste, onion and sesame seeds, and keep it aside. Slit the chillies and fry them in oil until they turn a little whitish. Remove from flame. In the same oil, prepare the bagar by adding jeera, mustard seeds and kalonji. Now add the paste of all the roasted masalas and cook till the mix leaves oil from the sides. Add the tamarind pulp, cumin powder, coriander powder, salt, chilli powder and tamarind powder, and let it cook till the mixture is thick. Now add the chillies and cook for a few more minutes. Serve hot with biryani or rice. 

Stuffed Red Chillies Pickle

Ingredients 
100 gm red chillies
1 kg mustard oil
250 gm coriander seeds
50 gm mustard seeds
250 gm amchur powder
150 gm aniseeds
150 gm fenugreek seeds
50 gm bay leaves
25 gm asafoetida
50 gm cumin seeds
50 gm garam masala 

Stuffed Red Chillies Pickle

Method 
Roast coriander seeds, fenugreek seeds and bay leaves together. Grind and keep aside. Now powder the mustard seeds, aniseed, asafoetida, cumin seeds with the help of pestle and mortar. 

Add garam masala, amchur powder and salt to this. Now add the mixture of coriander seeds, fenugreek seeds and bay leaves. Next, add enough oil to the mixture into a thick paste. Slit the chillies or de-stem and make a hole on top of each chilli, remove the seeds and fill the masala. Transfer the chillies in a clean jar and pour the remaining oil over them. Tie the jar with a clean muslin cloth and keep in sun for at least a week.