Green Gram Juice (Muga Udha)

Green gram juice is a traditional summer drink. A healthy juice that has cooling effects on our body. That’s one of the reasons why it’s been used as a summer cooler from ages by our ancestors. 

This juice hardly takes any time to prepare. It’s homemade and is a healthy alternative to the store bought juices. The best juice to beat the heat during hot summer days. Natural ingredients and no preservatives are used to make this juice. You can also store it in the fridge for upto 2 days.

Green gram is ground with cardamom and jaggery to make a delicious, healthy juice. Cardamom gives an amazing flavour and aroma to this juice. Jaggery is used as the sweetner, which makes this drink even more healthy. Green gram juice tastes best when is served chilled and is absolutely health in a cup. You get lots of proteins and all the goodness of green gram too.

Green gram juice is called as muga udha in Konkani. Mugu means green gram in Konkani and udha refers to water.

You can make this juice in a mixie but wet grinder gives you amazingly smooth textured juice.

Here are a few more traditional drinks you can make: Poppy seeds juice, Sesame juice, Cantaloupe drink, Hibiscus Juice, Finger millet juice.

Ingredients: 

• 1/2 cup green gram
• 3 cardamoms or 1/2 teaspoon of cardamom powder
• 1/2 cup of powdered jaggery

Serves: 2

Preparation Time: 15-20 minutes.

Preparation Method:

1. Heat a skillet, add in green gram and saute them for few minutes on medium heat until they heat up. Remove off heat. This step helps remove the raw flavour of green gram. 
2. Add in a cup of water to the green gram and give it a good wash. Then drain all the water.
3. Grind washed green gram with jaggery and cardamom/cardamom powder into a mixer/wet grinder, adding water little by little until you get a fine consistency. Use upto 1 cup of water to get a smooth paste.
4. Transfer the ground juice into a vessel and add upto another cup of water. Mix well. Add more water if required. Dilute the juice according to the consistency you're happy with. 
5. Serve chilled and enjoy. 
6. You may strain the juice before serving or serve as is. If you strain you lose out on the fibres. 
7. Adjust the amount of jaggery you add according to your palate.

P.S: Refrigerate the juice to enjoy it for two days.

Wet grinder gives a very smooth juice compared to a blender/mixer. You also get a lot of less residue in the end, when you use a wet grinder. And won't find the need to strain the juice.

Here are a few more traditional drinks you can make: Poppy seeds juice, Sesame juice, Cantaloupe drink, Hibiscus Juice, Finger millet juice.

Tags: Healthy drink, summer cooler, homemade healthy juice, muga udha, green gram juice, summer drink, Konkani cuisine, Konkani food, Konkani recipes, Udupi cuisine, Mangalore food, mugu.