Here comes my next instant pot recipe – Mixed vegetable sambar – A simple Tamil Nadu style mixed vegetable sambar prepared in Instant Pot. After the kheer, I slowly started to experiment with a different recipe in my instant pot, especially the day to day recipes like sambar, kootu, poriyal, and rasam. Guess what, all my experiments were successful. I just love this kitchen gadget. It’s worth the money.
Before getting into the recipe, let me explain a bit about instant pot. Each and every kitchen gadgets has its pros and cons. I see these regular comments in social media regarding the need for instant pot when both pressure cooker and instant pot takes more or less same time to cook. Believe me I had the same thought too, but still went ahead and bought it as many recommended it. Instant pot doesn’t prepare anything in instant. The IP takes its time to build the pressure and cook but as I mentioned in my previous post, we don’t need to babysit and that’s a huge boon. You don’t need to worry about adding the pressure cooker weight and turning it off in 3 or 4 whistles. I turn my IP on and I forget about the food and go on with my calls and kiddos pick and drop. After cooking, the IP goes back to warm mode automatically. If you have little ones at home, needless to say about its benefits.
For the past two weeks, mostly I used my rice cooker for preparing rice and IP for preparing rasam and sambar and do the sauté in the same vessel too. The other benefit is that in the end, I need to wash only two vessels plus our plates and also no big kitchen cleaning. Weekends, I give rest to my IP and go about the regular way. :-)
Now coming back to the sambar, I prepared this as a mixed veggie sambar. Basically, I tempered and cooked my shallots first in the sauté mode, then threw all the other ingredients required for sambar and set it to manual mode and then back to sauté mode for thickening the sambar with rice flour mix. Here is the quick IP formula…
Sauté mode + Manual for 10 minutes (normal pressure release) + Sauté mode.
Here is the instant pot recipe preparation video. Please subscribe to my youtube channel for more video recipes. Also, find the detailed written recipe below.
Ingredients:
- Oil – 1 tbsp
- Mustard Seeds – 1 tsp
- Methi Seeds – 1 tsp
- Hing – ¼ tsp
- Shallots – 5
- Mixed Vegetables
- Beans – 4
- Half carrot
- Half capsicum
- ¼ cup of chopped white pumpkin
- 5 to 6 drumstick pieces
- Brinjals – 2
- Okra – 2
- Tomato – 2
- Water – 1 cup + ½ cup + 2 cups
- Tamarind paste – 2 tsp
- Sambar Powder – 1 tbsp
- Turmeric Powder – 1/4 tsp
- Rice flour – 2tsps
- Curry leaves – 1 strand
- Toor dal – 1/3 cup
- Salt – 2 tsp
- Jaggery – 1 tsp
- Chopped Cilantro – 1 tbsp
Prep – Work
- Chop the vegetables.
- Peel the shallots and chop into roughly or you can use as is.
- Wash the toor dal and drain the water.
- Dilute the 2 tsp of tamarind paste in 1 cup of water.
Steps:
- Set your Instant pot in saute mode.
- Once it is hot, add oil.
- Then add mustard seeds, methi seeds, and hing.
- As the mustard seeds start to splutter, add the curry leaves and shallots. Cook for a couple of minutes.
- Then add all the veggies and mix well.
- At this stage, add the turmeric powder, salt, sambar powder, tamarind extract and two cups of water and mix well.
- Now add the jaggery, if using and the washed toor dal and mix well.
- Check for salt and spice and adjust accordingly.
- Set it in manual mode for 10 minutes. Once done, let the pressure release normally.
- Once is the pressure is released, open the IP lid and mix the sambar.
- Set it back to saute mode again.
- If you need thick consistency, mix 2 tsp of rice flour in 1/2 cup of water and add it to the sambar.
- Add cilantro and let it simmer for a couple of minutes.
- Turn off the IP.
That’s it. Yummy and easy sambar is ready. Stay tuned for how I served this sambar. :-)
Notes:
- Instead of adding all the veggies, you can just add anyone veggie or just add onion and prepare onion sambar.
- Adjust the salt and spice as per your preference.
- Jaggery is completely optional.
- If you prefer thin consistency, ignore the rice flour mix.
- 1 tbsp Oil
- 1 tsp Mustard Seeds
- 1 tsp Methi Seeds
- 1/4 tsp Hing
- 5 Shallots
- Mixed Vegetables Here is what I used
- 4 Beans
- 1/2 Half carrot
- 1/2 Half capsicum
- ¼ cup Chopped white pumpkin
- 5 to 6 Drumstick pieces
- 2 Brinjals
- 2 Okra
- 2 Tomato
- 3.5 cups Water 1 cup + ½ cup + 2 cups
- 2 tsp Tamarind paste
- 2 tsp Rice flour
- 10 Curry leaves
- 1/3 cup Toor dal
- 2 tsp Salt
- 1 tsp Jaggery
- 1 tbsp Chopped Cilantro
- Prep – Work
- Chop the vegetables.
- Peel the shallots and chop into roughly or you can use as is.
- Wash the toor dal and drain the water.
- Dilute the 2 tsp of tamarind paste in 1 cup of water.
- Set your Instant pot in saute mode.
- Once it is hot, add oil.
- Then add mustard seeds, methi seeds, and hing.
- As the mustard seeds start to splutter, add the curry leaves and shallots. Cook for a couple of minutes.
- Then add all the veggies and mix well.
- At this stage, add the turmeric powder, salt, sambar powder, tamarind extract and two cups of water and mix well.
- Now add the jaggery, if using and the washed toor dal and mix well.
- Check for salt and spice and adjust accordingly.
- Set it in manual mode for 10 minutes. Once done, let the pressure release normally.
- Once is the pressure is released, open the IP lid and mix the sambar.
- Set it back to saute mode again.
- If you need thick consistency, mix 2 tsp of rice flour in 1/2 cup of water and add it to the sambar.
- Add cilantro and let it simmer for a couple of minutes.
- Turn off the IP.
- That's it. Yummy and easy sambar is ready. Stay tuned for how I served this sambar. :-)
Recipe Video
- Instead of adding all the veggies, you can just add anyone veggie or just add onion and prepare onion sambar.
- Adjust the salt and spice as per your preference.
- Jaggery is completely optional.
- If you prefer thin consistency, ignore the rice flour mix.
Loved this recipe, explained in a detailed way gives a clear idea. After seeing this recipe thinking of keeping away my pressure cooker.
Thank you so much. Glad you liked it. :-)
Srividya, lovely recipe! Can the dal be added to the IP cooker in an uncooked state? When mixed with tamarind water, will it cook?
Hi, I am extremely sorry about the delayed replay. Yes you can cook the dal in uncooked state with tamarind water. Soaking the dal for 10 minutes does help. For toor dal, I usually cook in manual mode for 10 minutes and if I am using masoor or moong, 4 to 5 minutes is sufficient. Hope this helps. Thanks
Hi Vidya. You should not have called it simple – this sambar was authentic, excellent and tasted like something that was complicated! But you are right…it was simple to make. Two questions: 1) methi seeds(fenugreek) made it a bit bitter – did I do something wrong? Should I use less? 2) If I wanted to vary the vegetables, do you have a formula for the total amount of cups of vegetables/shallots/tomato to add? This would make it easier to make this many different ways. Thanks for an instant pot adaptation!
Thanks a lot Brad. :-) Glad you liked it.
Actually if you over cook/fry methi seeds, they turn bitter. Please make sure it doesn’t brown. If you have fenugreek powder, you can add 1/2 tsp instead of 1 tsp of the seeds.
There is no such formula. In fact during festive days, we don’t add shallots or onions so I skip them completely. At times I go with just one veggie like 1 cup of butternut squash or just 1 cup of radish.
I would say 5 shallots and 1 tomato would be good for 1 to 1.5 cups of mixed vegetables or any single vegetable.
Hope this helps. :-) Thanks Again.
Thanks for the recipe! It looks great. I’ve tried sambar before, using store bought sambar powder and black mustard seeds and most of the same ingredients above but it was way too spicy hot for my taste – and I can tolerate heat! It smelled great and tasted great until the heat hit. I tried adding more dal to half the amount and more liquid – not a success in reducing the heat. Can you tell me which ingredients above add heat and how I might temper that some – just in case? (I wonder about the boxed sambar powder…)
ALso, is there a substitute for curry leaves – hard to locate in my area?
Thanks so much. I look forward to trying this and your other recipes too.
Hi Barbara, Thanks a lot and sorry for the delay in replying back. The main ingredient that adds heat is the sambar powder. Couple of option to try to reduce the heat are,
1) Adding about 1 or 2 tsps of cane sugar or jaggery.
2) Adding vegetables that add a tinge of sweetness to the sambar like carrots, butternut squash, pumpkin, sweet potato.
3) I usually add about one leveled tbsp of sambar powder, but if you feel it’s more, add about 1 heaped tsp.
4) Increasing salt suppresses the heat too.
Reg curry leaves, actually there is no substitute for the same. If you can’t source it, your can add cilantro instead. But there is no exact replacement for it.
Hope this helps. Please let me know if you have any other concerns or questions. Thanks
Thank you so much for your reply and your helpful suggestions! I actually made another batch of sambar today, reduced the sambar power amount and it still had plenty of spice and great flavor. I loved it! I realize now that carrots probably helped that too. I have to find some curry leaves but will try cilantro in the meantime. You’ve helped me a lot. Thanks. You’ve got a fan!
Awwww.. Thanks much. Your comment made my day. :-) :-)
Hello Srividya! This looks amazing. How much of the sambar powder and turmeric powder would you recommend? I am not seeing it in the list of your ingredients. Looking forward to making this excellent recipe tomorrow. Thank you!
Hi Jordan, thanks a lot and extremely sorry. Mentioned those two ingredients in video but missed it in the recipe description. I have update the recipe. You need to add 1/4 tsp of turmeric powder and 1 tbsp of sambar powder. Thanks again. :-)
Thank you so much for your prompt reply! I appreciate your sharing this recipe!
:-) Thanks
Hi Vidhya. We are from a vegan magazine. Trying to get in touch with you. Could you please share your email id or a contact number to aishwarrya@vegplanet.in?
Sure. Just sent you an email. Thanks
Interesting sambar and I am yet to jump into the IP bandwagon!
Please do jump :-)
Hi Vidya, Its long time.. I have some veggies at home and would love to try your recipe. Sounds delicious!!
Hi Seena, how are you?. Same here, long time naa. I have to visit a lot of blogs. Work and other stuff keeping me busy. :-)
Thanks for the comment, please do try the recipe and let me know.