Bassaaru

Bassaaru...is a traditional dish of South Karnataka. It is a spicy curry to be eaten with Ragi mudde. Bassaaru typically means the curry cooked with the vegetable stock obtained by cooking various vegetables or lentils/cereals.

There are lot of combinations one can use to obtain the stock required for the curry, as given below...

1. Green leaves like Amaranth (Dhantu/Harive) or Dill (Sabsige) or Drumstick (Nugge soppu)
2. Vegetables like Beans, Cabbage, Ridge Gourd (Eerekaayi)
3. Green gram, Toor dal, Horse gram.

You can use combinations of vegetables and lentils or greens and lentils or just use the greens.

Here I have given the recipe for Bele-Hurulikayi (Dal & Beans) Bassaaru. The ingredients for the curry/gravy remains same for any vegetable or lentils used.

Beans Bele Bassaaru

Ingredients:

Beans - 1/2 kg (cleaned and cut into small bite pieces)
Toor dal - 100 gms
1/4 tsp salt
Water - 4 cups

Boil the water and add the dal; when it is half cooked add the beans with little salt and cook until just done, don't overcook it. Then drain the water in a big bowl; keep the dal & vegetables separately by retaining the stock.

The vegetables can be eaten with your meals just like that or can be seasoned according to your wish.

For the gravy:

Dry roast the following ingredients until you get a nice aroma (for 5 mins on a low flame)
1 tsp pepper
2 tsp jeera
1 garlic (15 cloves whole), don't peel
1 onion - cut into pieces
5 dry red chillies

Grind the above ingredients with the following
3 ripe tomatoes
few sprigs of coriander leaves

Fresh Coconut gratings - 3 tbsp

Marble size of tamarind 

1 tbsp dhaniya powder

Take a vessel, add 1 tsp oil and add 1 tsp mustard and few curry leaves for seasoning and then add the ground masala and fry until oil separates. Add the vegetable stock and add required amount of salt as per taste and bring to a boil.

Serve hot with ragi ball or rice accompanied by the seasoned vegetable.

Another variant... Cabbage and dal bassaaru / Bele Kosu Bassaaru