Banana plant / plantain is a highly useful plant. From its flower to its stem including the fruit and leaves, there is hardly any part of the banana plant left which cannot be used.
We have already seen how healthy the banana stem is. There are quite a lot of variety of dishes and recipes possible using banana stem alone.
Banana stem recipes :
Banana Halwa is quite renowned. One can eat the fruit either in its raw form or cooked.
Banana fruit recipes :
Banana leaves are popularly used in certain regions as plates to serve food. It is also used as moulds while preparing certain dishes which imparts fragrance and colour to it.
In similar lines, banana flower/blossom too is used in cooking delicious dishes which are healthy too.
Banana flower/blossom is called as ‘Poombe’ in my mother tongue – Tulu. It is called as ‘Mocha’ in Bengali and quite a lot of traditional Bengali recipes are possible with this. It is called as ‘Bale Pushpa’ in Kannada and ‘Kele Ka Phool’ in Hindi.
In today’s recipe, we shall look into how Banana flower/blossom can be transformed into a tasty dish.
Traditionally, the dish is called ‘Poombe Chutney’ in the South Canara region. Like always, this recipe is easy to prepare, great to taste and highly nutritious too. This can be easily refrigerated and relished for about a month or two. The garlic and ghee used in the dish completely changes the taste of the dish for good. A recommendation here is to use garlic and ghee liberally in this dish.
Coming to health perspective, banana flower is highly nutritious and rich in fiber content. Not only does it help in fighting infections, it also helps in reducing menstrual bleeding in women, and in fighting anemia. It is for these reasons and also the fact that it helps in lactation in nursing mothers, that it is served to new mothers as part of their diet.
Having said that, this dish is simply great to taste too.
So, let’s get started with the ingredients list followed by the recipe.
For more on postpartum recovery meal plan, check this out!
Total Time: 30 minutes
Cooking Time: 20 minutes
Preparation Time: 10 minutes
Servings: 6
Ingredients:
Banana Flower/Blossom: 1
Fresh grated coconut: 3/4th cup
Pepper: 1 tbsp.
Coriander seeds: 1 tbsp.
Cumin seeds/Jeera: 1 tsp.
Carom seeds /Ajwain /Omum: 1 tbsp.
Garlic: about 12 cloves
Ghee: ½ cup
Jaggery: 1 lemon sized
Tamarind: ½ lemon sized
Mustard seeds: 1 tsp.
Salt to taste
Method:
- Carefully peel the petals of the banana flower one by one and cut into small pieces
- Along with tamarind and jaggery, pressure cook the cut banana flower petals for about 2 whistles in medium flame
- Meanwhile, in a pan, heat a little ghee and fry pepper for about few seconds. To it, add coriander seeds and continue frying. Add jeera and ajwain. Continue frying for few more seconds
- In a mixer, grind together freshly grated coconut, cooked banana flower petals, tamarind and jaggery to a smooth paste
- Add the fried masala to the above , grind again and keep aside
- In the same frying pan used above, add little ghee and fry chopped garlic until golden brown
- Add mustard seeds and once it starts to spurt add the ground paste, salt and continue frying
- Add ghee in installments while frying. More the ghee added, the tastier it will be
- Continue frying till the water content evaporates and the chutney becomes thicker
- Serve it hot with hot rice or dose with a dollop of ghee
You can refrigerate, preserve and relish it up to a month. I recommend that each time you serve, heat it/ fry it in a tadka pan and serve it with a dollop of ghee. It tastes amazing.
Note:
- For more spice, increase the pepper input or you may even consider adding chili powder
Poombe chutney stories:
In the first 3 months of my post delivery period, my mom used to prepare a variety of dishes, most of which I never tasted before. One among which was Poombe chutney. Initially, one of my aunt had sent a chutney made of various herbs called ‘Kodi chutney’, which tastes heavenly. Poombe chutney is the urban substitute for this chutney which tastes equally good. I used to love the food pampering that I received those days (inspite of fewer food options).
Mom prepared this chutney exclusively for me, but, everyone at home loved it so much that mom had to frequently prepare it to refill the stock. Every time my mom served it, she used to fry it in ghee for a few seconds in a tadka pan and serve it with hot rice or hot dose. During my pregnancy, my friends and cousins scared me that I will not be given much to eat during my post delivery period and that the food will be bland to taste too. Of course, my mom had imposed food restriction on me, but the selected, healthy and tasty variety of food that she served overrode the feeling that I had to control my diet. My husband is so fond of this chutney that even to this day, whenever he reminds me , I prepare this chutney for him and the rest of us.
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