Chora (black-eyed peas curry)
I’ll go several months before I make this dish, then when I do make it again, I’ll wonder why I waited so long. It’s a very tasty dish, and convenient, too, because if you keep the dried black-eyed peas on hand, you can easily whip up dinner even when there’s “nothing in the fridge”. Serve it with bread or rotli or cooked rice.
Ingredients:
vegetable oil
1 c. dried black-eyed peas
1 onion, chopped
remaining spice mixture ingredients:
1 tsp crushed garlic
2 tsp coriander powder
1 tsp cumin powder
1/2 tsp turmeric
1 tsp salt
a bit of fresh tomato, chopped
1 tsp tomato paste
hot pepper to taste
note: all spice quantities are approximate. Adjust accordingly.
Soak black-eyed peas for 1 hour. Boil in a saucepan of water until soft. This may take up to 1 hour. Take a pea out with a slotted spoon and give it a poke with a fork to see if it has lost its firmness.
While the chora are boiling, fry onion in a separate saucepan in enough oil to cover the pan. Fry until nicely browned. Add remaining spice mixture ingredients, stirring frequently. If the mixture starts to stick, add a few tablespoons of water. As always with “masala”, keep stirring and cooking until the spices smell nice, and the oil starts to separate from the spice mixture.
When the masala and the chora are done, lift the chora out of the boiling water with a slotted spoon, and spoon them into the masala. Add water to the masala and chora to achieve the desired thickness, but use fresh water, not the water from the chora, which tends to look rather dark and murky.