Bengal’s love for vegetable is not unknown. Right from vegetable mash to variety of mix veg like shukto, labra and so on make an everyday appearance on the table. Numerous vegetable goes into one dish to make a mish mash vast number of vegetables go into one preparation. A single dish can contain potatoes, green beans, pumpkins, radish, eggplant, spinach and more. This much simple veggie dish is a wholesome bowl in itself, but the challenge lies in chopping all veggies in a particular shape and size.
Digging deeper in Bengal’s culinary graph you see that undivided Bengal saw many more array of veggies that grew seasonal. Bengal saw a lot of gourds and leaves vegetables. Also a lot of time the Bengali kitchen saw the Vaishnava influence. Even Food historian Chitrita Banerji in her book talks about the fact that “This style of cooking was ideal for large, extended families. Chorchori was an easy, delicious and time-saving way to feed people (many ingredients and one dish as opposed to many ingredients and multiple preparations).”
Interestingly Bengali Chorchori was based on no waste concept as every part of the vegetable was used in this dish. With all vegetables chopped in similar fashion helps uniform cooking. The trick lies in the fact that the vegetables that take longer to cook go in first. Very little oil and with a little tampering of red chilies, panch phoran, and the use to multiple veggies and also every part being used, this dish is highly rich in nutrients.
This simplicity of the dish can be explained in bati chorchori, where all veggies are put in a bowl with some water and left to be slow cooked. Once cooked a light drizzle of raw mustard oil does the magic. Chorchori was also a way to celebrate abundance of seasonal produce. This effortless vegetarian extravaganza that does chor chor one goes into the wok, still continue to rule household as one of the primary main course.
Mete Chorchori (Mutton Liver with Potato cubes)
Ingredients
• 500 gms Goat Liver
• 2 Onion chopped in slices
• Tomatoes
• 2 Potatoes In Cubes,
• 2tsp, Garlic Paste
• 2 Tsp Ginger Paste
• Green Chillies
• 1” Cinnamon Stick
• 3 Green Cardamom
• 1 Black Cardamom
• 2 Javitri
• 2 Bay leaf
Method
• Wash cut Mutton Liver pieces.
• Cut the potatoes into small pieces and fry them with some salt and turmeric and keep aside.
• Finely chop Onion and chop Tomato
• Slit the Green Chillies.
• Temper all whole garam masalas and keep the flame low. Saute until they emit an aroma.
• Then add the chopped onion and cook until the onions and fry them well.
• Add the tomatoes and Ginger and garlic paste.
• Cook till the oil separate from the mixture.
• Add sl the dry spices along with salt and cook for sometime.
• Mix well and cook till the oil separates from the mixture.
• Add green chilies and mix well.
• Add Mutton liver chunks and mix well.
• Cover the pan and cook in low heat for 10 minutes.
• Then add potato chunks and mix well again
• Add a little water and cook till it gets done well.
• Open the lid and cook on a high flame and reduce the moisture.
• This is a dry dish.
• Sprinkle some Bengali Garam Masala Powder and some gawa Ghee and give the final mix.