Cooling Curd Rice ~ Dahi Chawal

Summers are finally here in Dubai and I am always reaching out for foods that have a cooling effect on the body; what we call thandi taseer in Hindi and Urdu. I’ve started making Dahi at home finally and that’s a great addition to our meals. Besides the mandatory watermelon overload (see our Insta post below), I look towards laban, homemade lassi and chaas but these don’t count as a meal. Most of our weeknight dinners comprise of a light dal or sabzi with rice and roti alongside a bowl of homemade Dahi or raita. But it’s at the time of lunch when the scorching sun makes me crave dishes that are not hot!
Enter,  Cooling Curd Rice or Dahi Chawal.

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Curd Rice, in my opinion, is the perfect lunch for summers because Dahi and Rice both have thandi taseer or cooling effect on the body!

I learnt the recipe for this cool and refreshing Curd rice from my mother-in law on a trip to Delhi during the summers a few years ago and have been making it since. It’s a great dish to pack for a work lunch as you don’t need to heat it up. If your workplace has a fridge then you can put it there but just keep it safe from prying eyes! lol!

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All you need for this Cooling Curd Rice is yogurt/Dahi, leftover rice and onions! It’s really that simple!

There are a few other ingredients too of course but if you don’t have them you can skip them and make this with just a simple onion tadka!

When we have this for a light dinner we like to spice this up with a side of some papad or poppadum and some vadu mango pickle! For lunch, cucumber sticks with some hummus is great to refresh your system at work!

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Here’s how you can make this simple, refreshing and cooling Curd Rice in minutes!

Cooling Curd Rice
Preparation time: 10-15 minutes

Ingredients

Homemade Dahi or Store bought Yogurt, 1 1/2 bowl 
Leftover or *freshly made plain Rice, 1-2 bowls
Onion/ Pyaaz, sliced, 1 big
Sesame/Til/Gingelli or any Vegetable oil, 1 tablespoon 
Ginger/ Adrak, chopped, 1/2 inch piece 
Green chilli/ Hari Mirch, 1-2 , split into two halves
Salt to taste
Mustard/ Sarson seeds, 1/2 teaspoon 
Split and Hulled Black lentil / Urad dal, 1 teaspoon 
Split Chickpea or Bengal Gram/ Chana dal, 1 teaspoon 
A sprig of curry leaves / Kadi Patta
Crushed black pepper/ Kaali Mirch
A pinch of red chilli powder / Laal Mirch Powder
Green Coriander leaves/ Hara Dhaniya, chopped, 1 tablespoon 

Method

Incase you don’t have leftover rice, you can make a fresh batch. Just rinse a cup of rice till water becomes slightly clearer. Add one and a half cups of water for ever cup of rice. Place the rice and water in a vessel that you can cover. Cook covered on low heat for 12-15 minutes and then check if the rice is done. Cook till rice is done and no water is left.

Let’s start with this simple cooling summer meal

Start by gathering all the ingredients. Clean and peel the ginger and onion. Wash the curry leaves, coriander leaves and green chilli. Measure Dahi or yogurt in a big bowl and lightly beat it with a fork or spoon. Keep this aside.

Finely chop the ginger and keep aside. Slice the peeled onions. Slit the green chillies long into two halves. You can chop the curry leaves into a chiffonade if you prefer. Otherwise just use them whole.

There are two routes here – Either you could make the tadka in a small pan and pour over mixed curd and rice or you could make everything in one big pan. In hot summer days, I choose to make the onion tadka in a small tadka pan – it is quicker and easier when I’m making Curd rice to pack for work lunches. The tadka process is the same for both routes. Below are instructions for the latter.

The south Indian tadka

Place a heavy bottomed kadhai or big pan on medium high heat. Add oil and once the oil heats up, add the mustard seeds.

Let the mustard seeds splutter and then follow by adding chana dal and urad dal.

Then stir the urad and chana dals for a 10-15 seconds till they change colour to a golden brown. Next, add the finely chopped ginger, green chilli and cook for another minute. Follow by adding the sliced onions and stir them in.

Cook the onions for 5-7 minutes on medium high heat till them start becoming transparent. We don’t need the onions to turn brown but we do want them to retain a slight crunch.

If you are making the tadka in a small pan, you can mixed rice and curd in a another vessel and pour over the tadka on top. If not, move on to the next step.

Next, add the cooked rice and stir it in carefully so as to not mash the rice. Using leftover rice here gives the advantage of not being mushy as against freshly cooked rice. Cook this for 2-5 minutes.

Once you incorporate the onion tadka mix in the rice, you can shut the heat.

After this add the beaten Dahi or yogurt in the rice next and mix to soak all the rice. If the yogurt you are using is too thick, you can add a dash of water or even cold milk in it to make it slightly runny.

Add salt to taste and sprinkle some freshly grated black pepper on top.
Now sprinkle chopped coriander leaves in the curd rice and mix them well. If your curd rice seems too runny, don’t worry! The rice soon absorbs the water content and makes this a comforting and creamy dish.

To serve, sprinkle some red chilli powder on top. Please don’t heat this dish! It should be served cold or at room temperature.

I packed it in a lunch box with some cucumber sticks and homemade black chickpea hummus!

You can enjoy this delicious curd rice on the side of some papad, mango pickle and salad.

Full recipe for Cooling Curd Rice ~ Dahi Chawal