Also Known As: Kerala Style Fish Stew. Meen Thanni Kuzhambu. Meen Vadichadhu. Chapalu Pulusu. Machili Stew. Machili Ki Soup to go with Rice. Fish Soup to go with Rice. Meen Curry.

This particular fish curry  (stew) has an interesting ingredient in it called ‘Penam Puli’ or ‘Perum Puli’ or ‘Kodakka Puli’ in Tamil and ‘Kodam Puli’ or ‘Meen Puli’ in Malayalam, ‘Sima Chinta’ in Telugu. Its nothing but a rare variety of ‘Tamarind’…widely used in cooking in Southern Tamil Nadu districts, Kerala and Karnataka. One can use this ‘tamarind’ while preparing the curry and actually get rid of it, after cooking. As the pod remains intact even after cooking, unlike our usual ‘tamarind’…its easy to get rid of it after cooking.  So this helps the curry to have deep red color and not dark brown color. Interesting huh!

• Fish 500 grams
• Kukum Star – 2 pieces
• Green chilies 3 – slitted
• Red Onion 1 – sliced
• Tomatoes 2
• Ginger 4” julienne
• Garlic 7 julienne
• Salt
• Turmeric powder 1/4 tsp
• Red Chili powder 2 tsp
• Red food color 1 pinch
• Coconut milk 1 cup
• Mustard seeds 1 tsp
• Cumin seeds 1 spoon
• Fenugreek  ¼ tsp
• Asafoetida ¼ tsp
• Black Pepper ½ spoon
• Coconut Oil few spoons
• Crisply Fried Curry Leaves

Method:

1. Heat oil in a wok, add mustard, cumin, fenugreek, black pepper and asafetida to it. Wait until it pops and splutters well.
2. Add green chilies and onions to it. Fry till onions turn to golden color. Add garlic and ginger sticks too. Fry them till its raw odor leaves.
3. Now add tomatoes and sauté for few minutes. Add salt, turmeric, chili and color powder to this. Fry for few more seconds. Then add 2-3 cups of water and kokum star(kodam puli)now. Cover and cook over medium heat. Let all the ‘sour’ from kokum star
4. Feel free to taste the stew, now and adjust according to wish, When if you feel, it has enough sourness to the curry…remove the ‘kokum star’ by gently fishing with your slotted spoon.
5. Add the fish now and cook over medium heat without covering it. Maybe it takes just 2 minutes. Now add coconut milk to this and allow it to boil once. Remove this from stove top and allow the curry to stand without lid for another 1 whole hour. Generally if you cover fish curry – it gets disintegrated and so does…. when it is cooked for long time.
6. Garnish this stew with crisply fried curry leaves. Serve warm along with steam cooked rice.