Lemon Rice

Lemon rice, Coconut rice, tomato rice are few of the rice varieties which find their way into my daughter’s lunch box almost on weekly basis. Whenever, I make it for her lunch, I make sure to prepare a little extra so that the others at home can also have a little of it with their lunch, since these items are an eternal favorite in our home.

Even though these recipes are always a hit at home, I never even thought of publishing them in my blog, as I thought these to be too simple. Then one day, a friend of my mine was saying that her lil one does not seem to enjoy plain rice with dal and she wanted to try something different for her. And she casually asked me how to make lemon rice. That’s when I realized that, though this is a simple recipe, it’s not necessary that everybody has to know it. So I decided I should soon post a few of these simple day to day recipes which would also definitely come in handy for bachelors.

So, for this week’s blog hop I was paired with Pinky and my immediate choice was this simple rice. You can find the original recipe here.

Lemon rice is a tangy rice variety that can prepared in a jiffy if you have cooked rice at hand. It’s great for travel. Thinking of lemon rice brings back memories of the train journeys from Jabalpur, the place we lived to Chennai (where my grandparents lived). My mother would definitely pack Lemon rice with some vadams, in one big box (Sambadam) and Curd rice in another one. I and my brother used to have so much fun during that 28 hour journey. Can’t imagine doing the same now, though!

Anyways, here is the recipe:

What you’ll need

1. Raw Rice – 1 cup
2. Lemon – 1
3. Salt to taste

For Tempering

1. Mustard Seeds – 1 tsp
2. Split Urad Dal – 1 tsp
3. Bengal Gram Dal – 1 tsp
4. Groundnuts – a fistful
5. Green Chillies – 1, finely chopped
6. Asafetida – a pinch
7. Turmeric Powder – a pinch
8. Curry Leaves – 2 sprigs
9. Oil – 3- 4 tsp

Method

1. Wash the rice well and drain it. Cook the rice with 2 cups of water. The rice should be well cooked but not mushy. So adjust water accordingly.
2. Once the rice is cooked, transfer it into a big wide plate and fluff up the rice so as to separate the grains. Allow to cool completely.
3. In a small frying pan, heat oil, add the mustard seeds, once they splutter, add the groundnuts next add the Bengal gram dal and urad dal, fry on medium heat till the dals change color, next add in the chopped green chillies.
4. Lower the heat and add the turmeric powder and asafetida. Finally add the torn curry leaves and remove from heat.
5. Pour this over the cooked rice, add salt to taste and mix well with a spatula.
6. Finally add the juice of 1 lemon and mix well.

That’s it yummy lemon rice is ready, serve with some applams or chips.

Linking this to Blog Hop Wednesdays started by Radhika.