Red Spinach (Cheera -ചീര ) is Kerala’s own spinach variety which is grown at almost every home garden. This nutritious leafy vegetable is commonly prepared as stir fry in coconut oil with coconut masala and red chilli. Cheera thoran is a perfect accompaniment for rice.
Ingredients
- Finely chopped cheera/Red Spinach :10 Cup
- Stem chopped : ½ cup
- Chopped onion : 1 (Medium)
- Chopped garlic : 2 T- Sp
- Coconut : 1 Cup(Adjust)
- Jeera : ¼ t- Sp
- Green chilli : 5(Adjust)
- Turmeric powder : ½ t- Sp
- Oil : 2 T- Sp(Adjust)
- Salt for taste
- Mustard : ½ T- Sp
- Dried green chilli : 3
- Curry leaves
Method
- Wash the cheera and keep it in a strainer for drying the water.
- Separate the stem and leaves, chop it and keep it separately.
- In a mixer add the coconut, jeera ,green chilli and turmeric powder; pulse it to make a coarse masala mixture.
- Heat oil in a pan and splutter the mustard followed by the dried red chilli.
- Then add the chopped stem along with onion, salt and garlic; sauté it until the onion became translucent (the same time is enough for cooking the stem also).
- Now add the chopped cheera and sauté it for about 1 minute .
- Add the coconut mixture and sauté it for about 30 seconds or until the raw smells of the coconut gone.
- Finally add the curry leaves.
Tips :
- Some I made double quantity of ingredients.
- Use only tender (soft) stems for thoran. Hard pieces won’t cook properly.
- Do not close the pan for the entire cooking since that will ooze water from cheera.
- Typical cooking time of cheera leaves is ~ 1 ½ minutes. But it may vary.
