Watermelon Rind Kootu

We planted watermelon in our vegetable garden last year. This year we skipped it as the watermelon creeper grows everwhere and it becomes very messy. But somehow the watermelon plants sprouted again. There was a medium size watermelon in the creeper. After browsing the net, I decided it was time to pick the watermelon. But I was wrong, the watermelon was not ripe yet. My MIL suggested we make a kootu out of that. Even though I have seen many kootu recipes with the rind, I was still doubtful. We tried it out and it was very tasty. Please try it out the next time you buy a watermelon. It tastes like white pumpkin kootu. My husband could not tell the difference. This is one yummy kootu with watermelon rind, stuff that you would normally discard.

Ingredients

- 5 cups of wateremelon rind (chopped into small pieces)
- 1/4 cup chana dhal
-  pinch of turmeric

To Temper

- 1/4 tsp mustard
- 1/2 tsp uradh dhal
- 1/2 tsp Jeera
- 4-5 curry leaves
- 1 ts Oil

To Grind

- 3/4 cup coconut
- 5-6 red chilli
- 1/2 tsp jeera

Method

1. Boil chana dhal and the watermelon rind with salt and turmeric.
2. In a blender grind the coconut,red chilli and jeera until it become a smooth paste. Add to the watermelon and cook for few minutes
3. Heat oil in a pan and saute the mustard seeds, uradh dhal, jeera, curry leaves.
4. Add this tempered spices to the watermelon kootu.

Serve it with rice or rotis.