Tomato Saar

First of all, can you see the steam rising from the bowl?? I took this picture when the saar was very hot and ofcourse the day was very cold, so it helped. Tomato saar is a typical maharashtrian dish. Like its counterpart rasam, it is mainly eaten with steaming hot rice and ghee (clarified butter). My mom adds coarsely ground pepper to this and we had it whenever we had a bad case of cold.

There are many variations to this saar. The basic being coarsely chopped tomato and ground coconut bits.

For my variation, I used canned tomato soup (Campbells ...the very best) and instead of coconut bits, I used coconut milk (the canned variety). That gave my saar a little thickness and creamy taste.

Personally, I loved this variation of tomato saar. S made faces while eating/drinking it. My little duckie was kind of skeptical of it at first but after first 2-3 spoons, he realized that I wasnt tricking him into something nutritious and he had more. So it was a good midday snack for him.

Anyways I called up my mom, told her the tip about using campbell's soup as the base instead of the traditional chopping dicing boiling of tomatoes, she loved the tip.

Recipe:

1 can campbell's tomato soup

1/4 can coconut milk

chopped cilantro

2 pinches coarsely ground black pepper

1/4 tsp fresh ginger

1/2 tsp cumin seeds

1tsp ghee (clarified butter)

salt to taste

1/4 tsp jaggery

pinch of asafoetida

Take the regular soup pan and warm it up. Add the entire can of soup + 1 can plain water. Add one pinch of coarsely ground black pepper. Let it come to a boil. Add salt to taste and jaggery. Now add COCOnut milk to the mixture stirring it continously. After it mixes properly, turn off the flame and let it rest. Take another small kadai and heat it up. Use this for tempering the saar. Add the ghee to this kadai. Add asafoetida, cumin seeds, ginger and black pepper in quick succession. Add this mixture to the saar mix and mix properly. Garnish with cilantro and serve hot.

This tomato saar is excellent with hot rice or even as it is like soup. The consistency of this should be little thinner than tomato soup and the final taste should be salty-sweet with hint of balck pepper and ginger