I include different kinds of gourds in our diet. Ridge gourd, bottle gourd, ivy gourd and this snake gourd are some of the most common veggies we use at home. In this post, I am sharing a simple snake gourd stir fry recipe. If you are new to this veggie then this post is going to help you learn how to choose snake gourd, how to clean & prepare it for cooking. Apart from that I have also shared some variations I make to this recipe. My kids love change every time so I experiment a lot to make the snake gourd dish interesting. We usually serve this snake gourd stir fry with sambaror rasam as a side. Sometimes we also eat this with some dal & roti.
Choosing snake gourd
Always choose young & tender snake gourd. The older ones are harder and tougher to cook. The older one also have a strong odor which is difficult to get rid. Some times they also taste bitter especially those grown during the hot summers.
Cleaning snake gourd
Snake gourds have a natural whitish layer coated over them. This has to be scraped off with a knife first. Then we rub the entire veggie with some sea salt and rinse off under running water. This step removes most of the odor. However some breeds of this veggie smell very strong, no matter how we clean and cook. The hybrid varieties do not smell much. Cut the snake gourd to 2 to 3 pieces and cut them vertically. Discard the seeds and the pith or the white pulp inside.
Preparing potlakaya
The variety that we get in our region of Karnataka are less juicy and can easily get a crisp texture after they are stir fried. But the variety we get here in Singapore are very juicy and tend to become mushy when cooked. So my mom always would sprinkle salt over the chopped veggie and set aside for some time. Then squeeze up the chopped pieces to extract the juice & discard. This way the veggies get a crisp texture when fried and the smell also vanishes. It is not a healthy way though so I don’t do it.
Variations
More vegetable stir fry recipes,sorakaya frybhindi fryyam roastdrumstick leaves stir frybrinjal potato recipe
