Gongura Pachadi | Gongura Pickle & Chutney

This Gongura Pachadi is tangy, hot, spicy and tastes exactly the way it should. Steaming hot rice and ghee mixed with this Gongura Chutney, is a pure delight and comfort food for the Telugu speaking people. In this post I share 2 recipes to make this. The first one is a traditional pachadi that you can store for a few weeks in the refrigerator. The second one makes for a delicious side but it is best served within 2 days.

About Gongura Pachadi

Gongura Pachadi is a tangy and spicy side dish or chutney variety made with red sorrel leaves (roselle), dried red chilies, garlic and cumin seeds. It is a staple in the states of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana where these leaves are grown in abundance.

Roselle Leaves are also known as red sorrel leaves and goes by different names in the regional Indian cuisines. In Telugu they are known as gongura or puntikura, in Kannada they are pundi soppu, in Tamil they are pulicha keerai, in Marathi they are Ambaadi and in Hindi they are pitwaa. There are different kinds of red sorrel leaves, I am showing 2 kinds here.

These leaves taste sour and super good in any preparations. Gongura pappu, Gongura pickle and Gongura chicken are some of the Andhra and Telangana dishes made with these leaves. You will find plenty of dishes on the menus of Andhra restaurants.

These leaves are cooked with prawns and lamb too. Another popular version of the pickle is made with shade dried and wilted leaves. They are sautéed and pickled to preserve for a year.

Gongura is a winter speciality and is believed to possess body warming properties. So my Mom always made these pachadi varieties during the winters. I know this pachadi is made in numerous ways. Here I am sharing my Mom’s recipes.

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Photo Guide

Step by step Photo Instructions (Recipe 1)

1. To make this gongura pachadi, I cleaned and plucked the leaves first. Then measured them tightly to fill a 3 liters pot. This is just for you to know the amount of leaves I use for this recipe. Rinse them thoroughly few times in clean water. Drain to a colander, shake off to get rid of excess moisture and spread them on a clean cotton cloth. The leaves must wilt slightly on their own and no moisture should be left. It just took me 5 to 6 hours on a hot day.

2. Heat ¼ cup oil in a pan.

3. Add the leaves to the hot pan.

4. Fry until the leaves cook and wilt completely. Keep them aside to cool completely.

5. To the same pan, add more oil and fry 8 to 10 dried red chilies as needed until crisp. Switch off and add 1 tablespoon cumin/ jeera. Increase or decrease the amount of chilies to your taste and preference.

6. When they cool down add them to a grinder along with 4 cloves of garlic and salt. Make sure your garlic is not moist. If you want, saute it for a minute in the same pan. Blend as smooth as possible.

7. Add the leaves and pulse to get a coarse texture.

Temper

8. Traditionally pachadi is made coarse. Taste test to adjust salt and spice at this stage. If it is not spicy enough, fry more red chilies & blend. Then mix with gongura pickle. Heat the same pan with 1 tablespoon oil, add a sprig of curry leaves, 2 broken dried red chilies, 1 tsp each chana dal and urad dal. When the dal turns golden, add ¼ teaspoon of hing. Stir in the pachadi. Saute for 2 to 3 mins until aromatic. Turn off and cool down.

Transfer to a clean air tight glass jar and store in the refrigerator for a month. Use clean dry spoons to scoop out the pickle.

Recipe 2 – Gongura Chutney

This chutney is tempered with vadiyalu or majjiga mirapakayalu. People also temper this with shrimps / prawns (crispy deep fried or pan fried). I have shared the recipe in the recipe card below.

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Recipe Card