Ridge Gourd Kalas

Ridge gourd, also known as Sponge gourd, Turiya, Heerekai, or as ‘Darapeere’ in my mother tongue, is commonly used in Asian style of cooking. The vegetable can be used with or without the ridges. The ridges can in fact be utilized to prepare amazing chutney, which goes well with Dose / idli / rice / chapathi. Our today’s dish, the Ridge Gourd Kalas, also goes well with any of these.

Apart from food, ridge gourd, also known as Luffa Acutangula has another usage – its completely ripe form is used as natural cleaning sponges. Much before the cleaning sponges were synthetically made, the fibres of ridge gourd were used to make the cleaning sponge.

Ridge gourd’s health benefits are numerous. It contains fewer calories, thus helping in weight loss. Being anti-inflammatory, it keeps cancer and any cardio vascular diseases at bay. It is also helpful in curing any liver related diseases. Its alkaline nature helps reduce acidity.

Ridge gourd is one vegetable which I would love to cook as it is not just tasty and healthy, but also takes pretty much no time to cook!!! Yes, it is like butter, you keep it over heat and saute, it oozes out water to become mushy soft.

Getting back to today’s recipe, Ridge Gourd Kalas is a simple South Canara style coconut based gravy dish. The aroma of coconut together with the sourness of curds and the taste of jeera, in conjunction with the soft and mushy ridge gourd, will make you crave for more!!!

Lets look into this easy to cook, yummy to eat and great for health dish :

Total Time: 25 minutes
Preparation Time: 10 minutes
Cooking Time: 15 minutes
Servings: Serves 3

 Ingredients :

Scraped and chopped ridge gourd : 1.5 cup (1 Medium sized ridge gourd)
Jaggery : 1 tbsp.
Green chilli : 1
Jeera : 1 tsp.
Fresh grated coconut : 3/4th cup
Sour curds / buttermilk : ½ cup
Salt : To taste

 Method :

Quick Video :

• Wash and dry the ridge gourd. Roughly scrape the outer layer of ridges (you may keep the remnants aside and use it for preparing chutney. It tastes really good)

• Cut the scraped ridge gourd into small pieces and keep aside

• In a wide-mouthed pan, cook the cut pieces with little water along with split green chilly, jaggery and little salt. Cook over medium flame for about 10 minutes

• Meanwhile, grind the coconut along with jeera and little water to a smooth paste. (You may even opt to grind the coconut first to a smooth paste, then add jeera to this smooth coconut paste and run it for a few seconds. To keep it simple, I have followed the former instructions)

• Once the ridge gourd is cooked, add the ground coconut paste and curds / buttermilk. Add salt, if required. Mix well and bring it to boil. Remove from heat.

Add a seasoning in ghee of mustard seeds with curry leaves. Ridge gourd kalas is ready to serve

 Note :

•  You may opt to grind the coconut first to a smooth paste and then add jeera to this coconut paste and run the mixer for a couple of seconds. The half ground jeera imparts a different taste to the dish, which is also good
• You may even opt to grind the green chilly along with coconut instead of cooking it with the veggies
• Ridge gourd as such takes very little time to cook, so do keep an eye on it while it is being cooked. You need not cook till it is mushy. It tastes better when left on the crunchier side
• The dish is medium on spice. To make it spicier, you may opt to add more green chillies.
  

  Ridge gourd stories:

  Ridge gourd happens to be my daughter’s one of the favourite veggies. For kalas, she would even be willing to forego her favourite yogurt / curds for an entire day!!! Well, not just her, the same story holds good for me too!!! Whenever my mother prepared this dish, I always felt she prepared less!!! Kalas though can be prepared with other vegetables too, but somehow, I feel that it tastes the best with ridge gourd.