There are sometimes of the year when turmeric leaves are available freely in the markets in India, this normally coincides with various festivals where dishes are made using the turmeric leaves.
Over the years I have learned that these leaves are used by people from Goa, Konkan, Maharashtra, Karnataka and Bengal.
If the fresh ingredient is not available you might try it out with Dijon mustard, though you wont get the exact taste. Indian culinary traditions are so varied, I find it quite interesting to study and learn about them.
When I was growing up turmeric leaves would only be used to make a steamed sweet dish which had a rice flour covering and a coconut and jaggery filling which was quite popular. When steamed in the turmeric leaves, it gets a distinctive flavour, which is an acquired taste, and it is super delicious.
The other day I decided to steam fish in the turmeric leaves, this is a Bengali recipe.
The fish slices are generally steamed individually, but I did it a little differently. So here is how I made it…
Ingredients
6-7 pieces of clean tilapia slices,
3 tablespoons of mustard oil,
1.5 tablespoons of black mustard seeds,
1.5 tablespoons of yellow mustard seeds,
1.5 tablespoons of poppy seeds,
salt to taste,
green chillies as per taste,
juice of one lemon,
1 teaspoon of turmeric powder,
Fresh turmeric leaves as required
Method
Drain the tilapia fish slices well after washing. Apply salt and turmeric and let it stand for about fifteen minutes.
Meanwhile make a paste of both the kinds of mustard seeds, poppy seeds and green chillies. Use water sparingly while making this paste.
Once the paste is made, add the mustard to it, also add the lemon juice and salt to taste.
Apply this to the fish slices and mix well.
Take a flat dish which you will use for steaming and spread a layer of turmeric leaves at the bottom. Place the fishes with all the marinade into the bowl. Also line the edges of the dish with turmeric leaves in such a way that you are able to completely cover the fish.
Place it in your steamer and steam for about 9-10 minutes.
At this time a lovely aroma will start wafting around.
Once done carefully open the leaves and serve.
This tastes delicious with just plain rice and a wedge of lemon.
Guest Post: Mustard Tilapia Steamed in Turmeric Leaves from Every Day and Not so Everyday (https://everydayandnotsoeveryday.blogspot.com/ )
Notes:
Tilapia is the common name for nearly a hundred species of cichlid fish from the coelotilapine, coptodonine, heterotilapine, oreochromine, pelmatolapiine and tilapiine tribes, with the economically most important species placed in Coptodonini and Oreochromini. Wikipedia
This tilapia recipe is loaded with flavour and is good for this recipe, however you can use any type of whitefish for this, such as catfish, cod, haddock and pickerel.
There are similar tilapia fish recipes where you can also bake the fish in an oven or then also fry the fish in a pan using similar ingredients and cooking it differently in these methods.
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