Across the highlands · 45 min · Vegan · Sauce & seasoning · For beginners
Golbheda Ko Achar
In German: Tomaten-Koriander-Chutney
For 4 servings · US units
Fire-roasted tomatoes with sesame, timur and crisp fried garlic
Tomatoes blistered black over an open flame until the skins split — that's most of the work done right there. Ground toasted sesame gives the achar its nutty body, and timur, the Sichuan pepper used across the Himalaya, leaves a gentle tingle on the tongue. It goes on the table alongside rice, roti, lentils and vegetables, and one spoonful turns a plain plate into a proper meal.
Ingredients
- 6Tomatoripe, charred over flame, in a pan or under the grill, skins peeled off
- 6 clovesGarlicpartly roasted along, partly sliced and fried crisp as a topping
- 3Green chiliesroasted along, for heat
- 3Dried red chiliesdry-roasted and ground
- 3 tbspSesame seedsdry-roasted golden and ground; provides the nutty body
- ½ tsptoasted, finely groundDried husks of a citrus-family shrub, not a true pepper. Lemony and floral, with a tingling, numbing effect on the tongue.Substitute: Timur and Sichuan pepper stand in for each other well. Black pepper with a little grated lemon zest roughly matches the aroma, but the tingling and numbing are lost entirely.Read more
- 2 tbspheat until faintly smoking, then temper spices in itCaution: Because of its erucic acid content, some mustard oil is labelled for external use only, so for cooking use only oil that is explicitly sold as edible.Cold-pressed oil from brown or yellow mustard seeds, golden to amber, with a sharp, pungent smell.Substitute: Rapeseed or canola oil comes from the same plant family and works as a base; a little mustard powder or freshly ground brown mustard seed brings back some of the heat. The characteristic pungent bite and full aroma, especially in pickles, cannot be matched this way.Read more
- 1 tspMustard seedspopped in hot oil or toasted and ground
- ½ tspfry only a few seconds until dark, otherwise bitterSmall, hard, yellowish-brown seeds with a bitter aroma, faintly reminiscent of maple syrup, that develops when toasted in fat.Substitute: There is no true substitute. Dried fenugreek leaves come close to the aroma but lack the bitterness and bite of the seeds. Mustard seeds crackle similarly in oil but taste different. When in doubt, it is better to leave the seeds out than to substitute poorly.Read more
- 1 tbspGingerfinely chopped or as a paste
- ½ tspTurmericground
- ½ tspCumintoasted and ground or as powder
- 1 tspGround coriandertoasted and ground or as powder
- 1 bunchchopped, folded in at the end and scattered on topThe fresh leaves of the coriander plant, with a strong lemony, slightly soapy aroma.Substitute: There is no real substitute: flat-leaf parsley gives the fresh green but not the lemony aroma, and ground coriander seed tastes entirely different.Read more
- Saltto taste
- 1 tspdried, briefly bloomed in hot oil (optional)A dried herb from a wild allium of the Nepali highlands, fried in fat to give lentil dishes a mild, oniony, garlicky aroma.Substitute: There is no true equivalent, but dried chives briefly fried in ghee with a small pinch of finely chopped garlic point in the right direction. What is missing is the earthy, faintly smoky depth of the herb, and garlic easily takes over, so use it sparingly.Read more
- ½ tspAjwain seedsadded to the hot oil (optional)
Method
- Roast the whole tomatoes over an open flame, in a dry pan or under the grill until the skins blister and blacken. Roast the green chilies and part of the garlic alongside them.
- Let the tomatoes cool briefly, slip off the skins and roughly chop the flesh. Chop the roasted chilies and garlic as well.
- Dry-roast the sesame seeds, dried red chilies, timur, cumin and coriander seeds in a dry pan until fragrant. Let them cool, then grind finely.
- Heat the mustard oil in a pan until it is faintly smoking. Fry the fenugreek seeds and the mustard seeds in it for just a few seconds, until the mustard seeds pop — any longer and the fenugreek turns bitter. Add the ajwain seeds to the hot oil if you like.
- Slice the remaining garlic and fry it with the ginger in the hot oil until golden and crisp. Lift out some of it to use as a garnish.
- Add the tomatoes, the chopped roasted chilies and roasted garlic, salt and turmeric, cover and cook until soft, then uncover and let it reduce until the liquid has evaporated and the mixture is thick.
- Take the pan off the heat and stir in the ground roasted spice mix along with the chopped fresh coriander. Season with salt.
- Let it rest for a few minutes before serving, then scatter over the crisp garlic and a little more coriander. Kept cool, the achar keeps for a few days.
Tips and variations
If you want it quicker, pound or blitz everything with salt into a coarse paste and simply temper it briefly in hot oil, skipping the reduction. For the keeping version, dry the tomatoes, chilies, garlic and ginger in the sun for 8–9 hours, mix them raw with the ground spices and plenty of mustard oil, and pack them into a jar under oil — cauliflower works well alongside. Jimbu, a Himalayan herb related to onion and garlic, can be bloomed in its own oil and folded in with the garlic and ginger as a final tadka. Red chili flakes stand in for whole dried chilies, the sesame can be left out or just scattered over at the end, and mint leaves work instead of coriander for garnish. It looks best in a small bowl next to rice, lentils and roti.
Allergens
Contains: Mustard, Sesame
Not every ingredient in this recipe has been checked, so nothing is promised as free from.
These notes follow from this recipe's ingredient list. Ready-made products and brands may contain further allergens — please check the packaging yourself.
Something not right?
This recipe was put together from independent sources and checked before publishing. Even so, a mistake can slip through — an amount that does not add up, a step that does not work as written. If you spot something, write to us: we will look into it and put it right.
