This past week was really busy, and I survived mostly on microwaved frozen vegetables and brown rice tortillas. But you can only eat so much frozen broccoli in your life, and over the weekend I started looking at some cookbooks and food blogs for inspiration. I came across a great blog called Aayi’s Recipes, which had a recipe for green peas upma that looked really good.

I tried making upma a long time ago without a recipe (which was a disaster), but I thought the time had come to give it another go. I left out the sugar and coconut from the recipe, doubled the amount of peas, pre-roasted the rava, and increased the amount of water. The upma actually turned out pretty good! It felt kind of weird having upma for dinner since it’s usually breakfast food, but hey, the resident Indian is traveling for work and is not here to make fun of me…

Upma with Green Peas 
Inspired by Aayi’s Recipes.

Ingredients:

2 tsp ghee or oil
1/2 tsp mustard seeds
2 tsp urad dal
Pinch of asafoetida
2 small green chilies
4 curry leaves
1/2 medium onion
1/2 cup frozen green peas
1 cup sooji (wheat rava)
3 cups boiling water
Salt
1/4 cup chopped fresh cilantro

What to do:

1. Dry-roast the rava in a pan on medium-high heat for about five minutes. Stir often, it burns really quickly. Pour the rava into a bowl and set aside.
2. Heat oil or ghee on medium-high heat, and add the mustard seeds and urad dal when it’s hot enough for the mustard seeds to pop (test with a few first). Stir until the dal is starting to brown. Add green chilies, asafoetida, and curry leaves and give it a quick stir. Add the chopped onion, turn down the heat to medium and sauté until the onions become translucent. Add the frozen peas and defrost in the pan for a minute or two.
3. Boil water in an electric kettle or on the stove. Add the rava and boiling water to the pan, stir well so the rava soaks evenly. Add more water as needed. Salt to taste. Turn off the heat and let sit for 3-4 minutes.
4. Sprinkle with chopped cilantro and eat!