Peanut Rice is a sumptuous South Indian style rice dish made with rice, roasted peanut powder, lentils and a handful of spices. It is popular as Verkadalai Sadam in Tamil Nadu, South India. This vegan rice takes a bit of a time to prepare, but cooks within a few minutes.
Recipe Snapshot
- Prep time: 25 minutes
- Cook time: 5 minutes
- Total time: 30 minutes
- Yield: 4
- Category: Main Course
- Cuisine: South Indian, Tamil Nadu
Ingredients
- 1 cup rice
- 1.75 to 2 cups water (or add as required)
- ½ teaspoon salt (or add as required)
- ½ cup peanuts
- 1 tablespoon chana dal ((split and husked bengal gram))
- 1 tablespoon urad dal ((split and husked black gram))
- 3 dry red chilies (- broken and seeds removed (can use byadagi or kashmiri red chilies))
- 3 tablespoons desiccated coconut
- ¼ teaspoon turmeric powder
- 1 tablespoon white sesame seeds (- optional)
- 1 tablespoon sesame oil ((gingelly oil))
- ½ teaspoon mustard seeds
- 8 to 10 curry leaves
- 1 pinch asafoetida
- salt (as required, to be added later)
Method
Cooking rice
- Rinse the rice a couple of times in water and then soak in enough water for 20 to 30 minutes. If using brown rice, then soak for about 30 to 45 minutes.
- Later drain all the water and add the rice in a 3 litre pressure cooker. Also add ½ teaspoon salt or add as required.
- Add 1.75 to 2 cups water or add as required for regular white rice. If using hand pounded rice then add 2.25 to 2.5 cups water. If using brown rice, then add 3 cups water.
- For white rice, pressure cook for 1 to 2 whistles on medium flame. For hand pounded rice, pressure cook for 4 to 5 whistles and for brown rice pressure cook for 8 to 9 whistles on medium heat.
- When the pressure settles down on its own, remove the lid.
- Take the rice in a large bowl or plate and let the rice grains cool down completely. If there are lumps in the rice, then break the lumps.
Making peanut rice
- Heat a small frying pan. Keep the heat to medium-low. Add the peanuts.
- Stirring often begin to roast the peanuts.
- Roast till the peanuts become crunchy and crisp. You will see some blisters and black spots on the peanuts.
- Remove the roasted peanuts in a plate and keep aside.
- In the same pan, then add chana dal.
- Stirring continuously roast chana dal on a low heat till they change color and become golden. They will also become fragrant. Remove and keep aside.
- In the same pan add urad dal.
- Stirring continuously roast urad dal on a low heat till the lentils become golden and aromatic.
- Keeping the heat to a low, add the dry red chilies and the desiccated coconut.
- Mix and continue to roast stirring continuously.
- Roast coconut till it is light golden.
- Now turn off the heat and add ¼ teaspoon turmeric powder and white sesame seeds. Sesame seeds can be skipped.
- Mix well. Keep this mixture in the pan till it cools down.
- Take the above roasted spices, urad lentils and coconut mixture in a small grinder jar. Also add the roasted chana dal.
- Grind in small seconds to a coarse mixture. You can even use pulse option of the mixer-grinder and pulse at intervals of 3 to 4 seconds.
- Then add the roasted peanuts.
- Using the pulse option for some seconds, grind to a semi-fine powder. Do not grind too much as then peanuts will release their oil.
- Add the ground peanut powder to the cooked rice. Add more salt as per taste and mix very well.
Making tempering
- Heat 1 tablespoon sesame oil (gingelly oil) in a small pan. Add ½ teaspoon mustard seeds.
- Let them crackle on medium-low heat.
- When the mustard seeds crackle, then add 8 to 10 curry leaves and 1 pinch of asafoetida (hing). Turn off the heat and stir to mix.
- Add all the tempered ingredients in the peanut rice mixture. Mix again.
- Serve Peanut Rice as a main course or as a side dish. You can also serve it with a side of plain curd (yogurt) or raita.
Kiyaan Singh’s Kitchen Note
Keep this recipe as a working base: cook once as written, then adjust spice, texture, and serving style for your own table.