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Recipes with banana flower

3 recipes that use banana flower, with photos, step-by-step instructions and cook times. The quickest, Samlor proher, takes 60 minutes. It is most often cooked with sugar, turmeric and coconut.

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Mochar chopBanana flower croquettes

Mochar chop is the more patient cousin of the vegetable chop: croquettes of finely chopped banana flower cooked with potato, coconut and Bengali spices, crumbed and fried. Bengali families make them at home for Durga Puja evenings and Bijoya visits, when a plate of chops goes round with tea, and the best telebhaja shops in north Kolkata sell them through the festival. The filling is earthy, slightly sweet and nutty, under a very crisp crust. Common mistake: not removing the hard stamen and the papery hood from each floret, which stay tough and bitter however long you cook them. Chef's tip: oil your hands and drop the chopped flower straight into water with turmeric and a little salt; it stops the florets turning black and keeps your hands from staining.

by KrazyBadal 0 views

Samlor proherPumpkin and vegetable soup

Home cooks in the villages around Siem Reap make samlor proher when the garden is full: a light, clear soup crowded with pumpkin, banana blossom, long beans, little aubergines and leafy greens, seasoned with a lemongrass kroeung and a spoonful of prahok. Toasted ground rice is stirred in near the end, giving the broth a faint body and a nutty, popcorn-like aroma. It is everyday lunch food, eaten with steamed rice and perhaps a piece of grilled fish, and it tastes savoury, sweet from the pumpkin and gently earthy. Leaving the prahok raw is the big no; it must be mashed and boiled in the broth for at least 10 minutes, so it cooks through and its sharpness rounds out. Chef's tip: slice the banana flower straight into lime-acidulated water, or it will turn black within minutes.

by KrazyBadal 0 views

Mochar ghontoBanana flower and potato curry

Mochar ghonto is a labour of love from Bengali home kitchens: the florets of a banana flower are cleaned one by one, boiled and then cooked down with potato, grated coconut, ginger and cumin into a soft, dry, faintly sweet ghonto. It is served at weekend lunches and to guests, with rice and a little dal, and grandmothers judge a cook by it. The flavour is earthy, a little like artichoke, lifted at the end with ghee and freshly ground garam masala. Chef's tip: oil your hands before cleaning the flower, or the sticky sap stains your fingers black.

by KrazyBadal 0 views

Goes well with banana flower