This South Indian chutney, Coconut Chutney is the best companion with Dosa, Idli or even with steamed rice. Quick and easy to make with step by step photos.
If you are not familiar with Indian food, you might find this Coconut Chutney to be quite unfamiliar like how I felt 2 years ago. It takes me exactly 2 years to love chutney. My favourite so far is this coconut chutney, peanut chutney and tomato chutney. I also tried celery chutney before, but I’m not a big fan of it.
Growing up in Asian background, I find it quite strange to mix sweet coconut with savoury spices. For me, coconut supposed to be served sweet in Dessert. Therefore, when I first make this coconut chutney to serve for Idli and Dosa 2 years ago, I just find it too strange. The sweetness and savoury all explode at the same time in my mouth. It might taste strange at first, but slowly, you get to taste that the combination of both sweetness and savoury actually pretty good.
Just like salty caramel, the combination of the sweetness and savoury, is so delicious. Who don’t love salty caramel, especially salty caramel ice cream or cake. It’s one of my favourite flavour ever, although it’s pretty strange and unfamiliar when I first tried it. The same with coconut chutney, now, I would just love to lick the last bit of coconut chutney remaining.
As coconut chutney is pretty simple to make, I usually like to make it in a small amount, just enough for 2 people for 3 days breakfast. We serve coconut chutney with Idli or Dosa for breakfast along with other condiments like potato masala for dosa or Sambhar for idli. Both idli and dosa is the same in ingredients, but dosa is crispy while idli is steamed. Therefore, we eat more crispy Dosa than healthy steamed idli.
I also make Dosa recipe with step by step fermentation guide along with this coconut chutney recipe. To prevent confusion for my reader in searching for these recipe, I divided dosa recipe with coconut chutney. Check out my next post, Dosa recipe with potato masala.
Here’s the ingredients to make coconut chutney:
- 1/2 cup roasted dessicated coconut
- 4 green chilli, slit
- 1/4 teaspoon cumin seeds
- 1/4 teaspoon coriander seeds
- 1/4 teaspoon tamarind paste
- 2 tablespoons chana dal (soak for 15 minutes)
- 1/4 teaspoon mustard seeds
- 1 red chilli
- Few springs curry leaves
- salt to taste
Heat oil in a pan, add cumin seeds, coriander seeds and green chilli. Fry for few minutes until cumin seeds and coriander seeds are few shades darker. Then, add soaked chana dal, and fry for 2 to 3 minutes.
Add roasted coconut, and mix well for 1 minutes. Switch off the flame and set aside in the plate to cool down.
Once it is cooled, grind it together with tamarind paste and a little of water to get a slight smooth-crunchy consistency.
In the same pan, add a little of oil. Once oil is hot, add mustard seeds, red chillies, and curry leaves. Fry for 1 to 2 minutes until mustard seeds start to splutter.
Pour it directly to the grinded coconut chutney. Season with salt according to your taste.
- ½ cup roasted dessicated coconut
- 4 green chilli, slit
- ¼ teaspoon cumin seeds
- ¼ teaspoon coriander seeds
- ¼ teaspoon tamarind paste
- 2 tablespoons chana dal (soak for 15 minutes)
- ¼ teaspoon mustard seeds
- 1 red chilli
- Few springs curry leaves
- salt to taste
- Heat oil in a pan, add cumin seeds, coriander seeds and green chilli. Fry for few minutes until cumin seeds and coriander seeds are few shades darker. Then, add soaked chana dal, and fry for 2 to 3 minutes.
- Add roasted coconut, and mix well for 1 minutes. Switch off the flame and set aside in the plate to cool down.
- Once it is cooled, grind it together with tamarind paste and a little of water to get a slight smooth-crunchy consistency.
- In the same pan, add a little of oil. Once oil is hot, add mustard seeds, red chillies, and curry leaves. Fry for 1 to 2 minutes until mustard seeds start to splutter.
- Pour it directly to the grinded coconut chutney. Season with salt according to your taste.