Aloo Matar paneer (Bengali style)

Aloo matar paneer or Gravy with cottage cheese, potatoes and green peas is a very simple and tasty vegetarian preparation. There are many variation of this throughout India; we will do it the Bengali way. Let’s get started.

Ingredients:
1. Paneer (Cottage Cheese) -250grm
2. Potato/Aloo-1 Medium size
3. Panch-Phoron*- 1 tsp
4. Green chili-2
5. Tomato-1 Medium size
6. Cumin powder-1 tsp
7. Red chili powder-1 tsp
8. Turmeric powder-1 tsp
9. Salt to taste.
10. Mustard oil-3tbsp.
11. Pinch of Asafoetida
12. Ginger-1tsp
13. Kashmiri red chili powder-1 tsp
14. Green pea -Boiled 1 cup or you can use frozen also.

*Panch-Phoron is an authentic Bengali spice mix used in most of the Bengali vegetarian dishes. It includes Cumin seeds, nigella seeds, fenugreek seeds, fennel Seeds, mustard seeds. All of these are mixed together together to make panch-phoron mix.

Method:
Cut the paneer and potatoes into cubes. Take a hot pan and fry the potatoes and paneer in a tbsp oil. Keep it aside for future use. Fried paneer becomes a bit harder and it adversely affects the texture of the dish. Add half a teaspoon of salt in a bowl of water and throw in all the fried paneer cubes, they will stay soft.

In a pan  pour one tbsp of mustard oil. Once the oil hot, add panch-phoron. Wait till the seeds crackle and add a pinch of asafoetida and ginger. Keep stirring the masala and make sure it doesn’t burn. Add the chopped tomatoes and give it a gentle stir. Let it cook for 4-5 minutes.

In the meantime, mix all the spices (cumin powder,red chili powder, kashmiri red chili powder, turmeric) with 2 tablespoons of water in a small bowl and add this to the masala. Cook this in low flame for 1 minute; add salt as per your preference.

Finally add the fried potatoes, fried paneer cubes and green peas. Give it a gentle stir; make sure you don’t break the paneer cubes. Add a cup or two cup of water, depending on how thick you want the gravy to be. I have added 2 cups of water. Cook it for 5 mints in high flame. Break the green chilies into two parts and add them to the mix.

Aloo matar paneer is ready, serve it with hot rice or chapati.

Enjoy.

Mo