By Home cook Sharmini Jayawardena
CORRECTION: Boanchi Curiya and NOT Boanchi Churiya. My apologies to all our readers who checked out this Post and to those of you who saved it.
This Sri lankan (Sinhala) side dish is to be had with plain steamed rice and other accompaniments. This is a dry curry. You can eat the bean curry along with rice and other curries such as brinjal curry, ala hodhi, tomato curry, tempered ladies finger, chicken curry, mutton curry or wild boar curry and with pol sambol, seeni sambol and salaadhey, among other dishes to be shared on Leaf’s Gournome in future posts. So be on the lookout for these delicious dishes as they are posted.
Ingredients
246 gm French beans
3 sprigs curry leaf
½ medium size onion
3 green chilies
1 tsp spice mix powder
½ tsp turmeric powder
½ tsp chili powder
¼ cup coconut cream
¼ cup water
¼ cup coconut cream¾ sea salt
Method
- Wash and string the beans. Then break into 1” pieces.
2. Eadhanva or Eadhnna is Sinhala for marinating and the Sinhala cooks are possibly the only ones known to marinade vegetables prior to cooking.
3. Marinade the beans by adding all of the ingredients into the pot or pan you are supposed to cook it in and mixing all ingredients together. Cover and set aside for about 5 minutes.
4. Meanwhile, get your coconut milk ready by mixing the coconut cream and water together in another vessel. This is your second squeeze of milk, if you are extracting the milk from freshly scraped coconut. Usually, vegetables are cooked in the second squeeze of milk, in Sinhala cuisine. The first being reserved for fish and meat and kirata and in the preparation of yellow curries such as in making the potato curry or ala hodhi.
5. Add the coconut milk into the pot of beans, add the salt and mix well. Cook on low to medium heat until the gravy is almost totally absorbed. Remove from fire and leave open before serving.
Note: Green vegetables turn an unsightly dark color when kept covered after cooking.
