Sipping my tea and staring at the window as small droplets of rain hit the window glass, I begin to contemplate how blessed I am for being able to witness these little things in life, which were a long distant dream just two years back. I know this last one year has been giving us more than enough opportunity and reason to stay at home and satisfy our soul with these little pleasures from nature, still for a person who grew up in places that receive maximum rainfall in the world, and for whom sitting beside the window and witnessing the downpour was no less than a daily ritual, craving for these kind of moments are quite obvious.
As they say life happens and we all fall under its sway, so did I, aspiring for a self-dependent future, moved out of home for higher education, leading to job in metros, and thus, leaving behind the taken for granted innocent childhood pleasures. And this battle of life comprising, tight deadlines, late night workings, long meetings, weekend calls, strenuous work pressure continued for fourteen long years, until the day I decided to take a pause and bring my days under my control.
Naturally, after slogging for so many years, I am yet to realise my intention to go back to the same life. However, at the same time it is not possible and also would be unfair to categorise this fourteen years only on the basis of tiring work hours and ignore the beautiful memories and the best possible friendships, that have also been nurtured while burning the midnight oils and all those good times that I have shared with my office colleagues.
And among the good things that I miss often, is the office lunch. It was those 30 minutes office lunch hour that provided me with the much needed break after a stressful meeting. It was during lunch hours that I have made most of my friends. For me office lunches were much more than just catching up and socializing with my colleagues. For me, sharing the table with my cross-cultural colleagues was beyond eating food. It was knowing their culture, knowing their food habit and embracing their dishes in my own kitchen. If not most of it, atleast half of my food repertoire is the result of sharing dabbas during lunch hour. Has it not been office lunch, the Boiled Green Gram Salad would have been non-existent to me. How could I have claimed Appam & Egg Curry and Puttu & Kadala Curry are my favourites, had they not been introduced to me during office lunch hours.
My today’s recipe post, ‘Raw Mango, Cucumber & Corn Salad Raita’ is also a result of sharing dabbas during office lunch hours. And most importantly, this dish is a combination of two separate recipes from two different colleagues, shared during different days. I took the taste and idea from their dishes and combined them by adding little tweaks from my end. And the result is a blissful summer treat with optimum taste and maximum health.
So, here is my Raw Mango, Cucumber & Corn Salad Raita. Serve it as a brunch starter or as a condiment.
Caution: Once you taste this dish, it is very difficult to stop your hand from making the repeated trips from bowl to mouth. I shall highly recommend to have someone who can hold your uncontrolled hands😉
Recipe: Raw Mango, Cucumber & Corn Salad Raita
Preparation Time: 35 minutes approximately (includes chopping the ingredients) Equipment Used: A mixing bowl, a spoon, knife & cutting board, scissor, grinding stone, grater
Ingredients:
- 1 raw mango
- 1 cucumber
- 250 gm corn kernels
- 6-7 cloves of garlic
- ½ inch X 1 inch ginger
- 2 green chillies
- 1/8 teaspoon red chilli powder
- 1 cup curd
- 2 teaspoon mustard oil
- 1 and ½ teaspoon sugar
- 1 and ¼ teaspoon salt
Method:
- Wash and chop raw mango and cucumber and add them into a mixing bowl
- Wash and clean the corn kernels and add to the above-mentioned ingredients
- Peel and crush 6-7 cloves of garlic and add into the mixing bowl
- Grate ginger and chop green chillies into the bowl
- Add red chilli powder and curd to the rest of the ingredients
- Mix the ingredients properly with a spoon
- Add mustard oil and mix the ingredients again
- Add salt and sugar, stir and taste respectively. Repeat the process till you acquire the desired taste
Wash and chop raw mango and cucumber. Add them into a mixing bowl
Add corn kernels.
Peel and crush 6-7 cloves of garlic and add them into the mixing bowl.
Add grated ginger and chopped green chilli.
Add red chilli powder and curd.
Mix the ingredients properly with a spoon.
Add mustard oil and mix the ingredients again.
Add salt and sugar, stir and taste respectively.
Tips:
- No need to remove the outer skin of raw mango and cucumber. Retaining outer skin will keep the dish fresh for long and will make the dish more nutritious
- Crush the ginger properly, as accidental biting of raw ginger will leave a bitter taste inside the mouth
- Add curd little by little, so that you can adjust the quantity of curd as per the volume of other ingredients. Mixing the ingredients just after adding curd is also suggested for the same reason
- You can add more curd in case you want the dish little more runny
- Though raita is a condiment, but this raita tastes best when consumed on its own
- As taste varies from person to person, adjust salt and sugar as per your taste preference
