Lady's Finger In Coconut Sauce (Okra Curry, Benda Ghasi)

Ghasi is a spicy coconut based curry prepared with any vegetable. Gashi's are thick curries that are served with rice for lunch & dinner. Benda ghashi is lady's finger in coconut curry. 

My mil made awesome awesome benda gashi. All she did was first cook lady's finger with tamarind & salt. They cooked nice & soft. Tasted yum by taking in tamarind & salt. She then added ground coconut masala to them. Cooked the curry just enough & then seasoned the curry. It tasted just yummmm.

I have eaten bad & ok benda gashi's. The only difference in cooking lady's finger first in tamarind & salt & cooking the curry just enough until the rawness of the masala goes off made a world of difference in the curries made. The end product tasted so very different. 

More details to make delicious benda ghasi below. 

Ingredients:

15-20 lady's finger
3/4 cup grated coconut
1 teaspoon urad dal
1 teaspoon coriander seeds
6 fenugreek seeds (optional)
6 red chillies
3/4 lemon sized tamarind
2 tablespoons of oil
1/2 teaspoon of mustard seeds
2 leaflets of curry leaves
Salt to taste

Serves: 2-4

 Preparing ghashi:

1. Wash well lady's finger. 

2. Remove the stem portion and chop each ladys finger into 3-4 pieces such that you have 2.5-3cm pieces.

3. Add chopped okra into a cooking pan, add all of the tamarind, salt and water and cook until the lady's finger are almost done. Cooking the ladys finger this way makes them very tasty, infused with the sourness of tamarind and it takes up salt nicely and becomes soft and tasty.  

Preparing the masala:

4. Whilst the okra is cooking prepare the masala for the curry. Fry urad dal, coriander seeds, fenugreek seeds and red chillies with few drops of oil until the urad dal starts to brown. Let them cool completely and grind them with coconut and tamarind. Use the same tamarind used to cook lady's finger with. Use as much water as you need to make a smooth paste. Keep this ground masala aside.

5. When lady's finger are almost cooked, add ground masala and water if required. Ghasi is usually thick in consistency. It'll thicken on cooking & further thicken on cooling. So add in a little more water than needed.

6. Bring it to boil and then simmer & cook till the rawness of the masala goes off. 

7. Remove off heat and season it.

8. For seasoning heat a tempering pan, add oil, mustard seeds. When the mustard starts popping add curry leaves and red chillies(optional) broken into pieces and then them fry them for few seconds. Put off flame and pour it into ghashi and mix well.

9. Serve hot with rice.

Find more Konkani cuisine curry recipes here. 

Tags: Ghasi, ghashi, lady's finger, okra, curry, lunch, dinner, Bhindi, Bhende, Konkani recipe, Konkani dish, Konkani cuisine, Udupi cuisine, Mangalore food, Konkani food.