Paruppu Keerai Masiyal(Or kadayal) | Spinach With Dhal

Keerai Masiyal translates to “mashed spinach”. First cook the greens along with other ingredients and mash it. Traditionally the cooked spinach is mashed with a laddle called as “mathu katai” which is made of wooden. You can even pulse the spinach dal mix for 3-4 secs until well mashed.

My mom makes a lot of spinach/keerai dishes and I love them all. She uses spinach in gravies/dal and also in side dish or poriyal. I love the varieties of spinach dishes she makes. She makes 2 varities of keerai kadayal/masiyal, one with dal and the other without dal. Today i’m presenting to you Keerai masiyal with dal.

In India we get so many varieties of spinach and each variety is used in a particular preparation. Like in today’s recipe I have used Arai Keerai(which is green amaranth leaves) and arai keerai goes very well in keerai masiyal preparation. I always make keerai masiyal with arai keerai, if you can’t get arai keerai use any spinach you can get.

This Arai keerai masiyal is a mix of dal and greens together with a lovely flavor that it can be made as a main curry to go with white rice and sides like poryial or fry.

Keerai masiyal is very popular among Tamil Brahmins, they do not use onions, garlic in their preparation. Keerai masiyal is very healthy and nutritious dish. Coconut can be included to the dish. I have used toor and masoor dal to gather, I also make it with yellow moong dal. I never add coconut to this stew as I don’t like it much, but if your prefer you can add (¼ cup grated coconut. 1 tspn cumin seeds, 1 or 2 dried red chillies ground together with water).

Puruppu Keerai Masiyal recipe –

Ingredients:-
Keerai or Spinach – 2 bunch (I used arai keerai), finely chopped
Dal – ¼ cup (used toor and massor dal, you can use moong dal too)
Onions – 2 medium(chopped)
Tomatoes – 2 medium(chopped)
Green Chilies – 2 large
Garlic cloves – 5-6 pods
Salt to taste
Oil – 2 tbspn
Tamarind juice – 2 tbspns

To temper –
Oil – 1 tspn
Curry leaves – 1 sprig
Dried red chilies – 2
Mustard seeds – ½ tspn
Cumin seeds – ¼ tspn

Instructions:-

1. Heat oil in pressure cooker. Saute onions till they turn pink.

2. Add tomatoes and green chilies and cook until tomatoes turn mushy.

3. Add finely chopped spinach and garlic cloves and saute until spinach gets cooked.

4. Then add dal mix well. Add water and pressure cook for 1 or 2 whistle. Switch off flame and allow the pressure to settle down.

5. Open the lid of the cooker and drain the water from the spinach. Using a laddle mash the spinach dal mix until it turns into a smooth mix. Or alternatively you can pulse them in a blender for 2-3 secs.

6. Transfer the mashed content back to the cooker and put it on low flame. Pour tamarind juice , add salt to taste and allow it to boil for 3-5 minutes. Switch off the flame.