Lauki [bottle gourd) stuffed with paneer

Aru's lunch today is Lauki (bottle gourd) stuffed with paneer and spices, roasted on tawa, one carrot thinly sliced cooked in the bottle gourd juice and seasoned with thyme, black pepper and salt.

Recipe for this dish requires little bit of preparation, so start it half an hour before your kids come back from school or college.

Making our kids eat some of the vegetables is quite tricky, lauki is such a versatile vegetable which can be served with rice and phulkas as kootu, gravy or as subzi. But my daughter would almost eat any vegetable if I could come up with some ideas and not to serve it with rice or phulkas!

Today as I entered the kitchen for making evening snack for her, I stumbled upon a half piece lauki which was leftover from the kootu I made. 

Then the recipe automatically started flowing... One by one I kept on assembling the ingredients for paneer stuffing, chopping carrots and tada! 

The delicious dish is ready, total time taken for cooking is about 8 minutes. Isn't it interesting? 

Lauki stuffed with paneer 

Ingredients 

1/2 a piece of small lauki(bottle gourd peeled) cut into big slices, scoop out the seeds.

1 carrot peeled, sliced into thin stripes 

For the stuffing 

150 grams paneer crumbled

1 tsp jeera powder 

1 tsp coriander powder 

1/2 tsp red chilli powder 

1/4 tsp turmeric powder 

1 tsp chopped coriander leaves 

Salt as required 

2 tbsp Peanut oil/olive oil for shallow frying 

For the seasoning

A pinch of dry thyme 

A little crushed black pepper 

A little salt 

Method 

*Wash, peel and cut lauki into thick circular pieces, about 10 pieces you can cut half a lauki into. Scoop out the seeds, we need space to fill in the stuffings. 

*In a small bowl mix in crumbled paneer, jeera, coriander, turmeric, red chilli powder, chopped coriander, salt and mix in using a fork or clean hands. 

* Spread the bottle gourd circles and fill in the stuffings inside, use a flat spatula to press the Lauki slices so that the stuffing is well filled in. 

*In a preheated tawa pour oil and arrange lauki slices, make sure there is enough space for you to flip the lauki pieces. 

* Cook one side until golden brown, flip and cook the other side. Adjust the flame, allow lauki to evenly cook in medium flame until golden brown both sides. Off the stove. 

*In the same tawa/griddle add thinly sliced carrots, add thyme, freshly crushed black pepper and salt, mix in and cook it in the lauki's juice and other spices till tender. 

*Serve hot with hari chutney. I am sure you and your family is going to love this simple dish as a starter. 

Notes

*select fresh tender paneer. 

*Use soft lauki for this dish and its very important to enjoy the nutrients present in the freshly cut lauki, which otherwise gets overcooked in the traditional dishes. 

* Keep everything ready before you start heating the tawa.