CHICKPEAS RASAM | SENAGALA KATTU

Whenever I make any chickpeas based dish, I would be left with lots of stock(called as kattu,the water in which chickpeas is cooked).I would try to use the stock mostly in the same dish but if it is a dry preparation like Hummus, Sundal, Pulav/Rice, Kadai Cholay where I don't need much of the reserved stock, I store it for later use.

Back home my mom makes a nice tasty sundal rasam where the cooked chickpeas(or any other legume) is ground along with coconut and few spices and made it into a rasam . Today's version is the easiest one and all you need to do is just add a tempering to the stock and bring it to a boil.I would say that preparing this rasam makes sense only if you have the excess stock , otherwise soaking and cooking chickpeas just for making it is not worth the effort. Let us see how the stock , which one would have usually thrown , can be transformed to a simple and tasty rasam.
Chickpeas Rasam | Senagala Kattu Recipe:
(Serves 2)

Ingredients:
2 cups Chickpeas Stock(called as kattu,water in which chickpeas is cooked)
1/3 cup cooked Chickpeas
a pinch of Turmeric powder
juice of 1/2 Lemon
Salt to taste

to temper:
1 tsp Ghee/Oil
1/2 tsp Mustard seeds
1/2 tsp Cumin seeds
3-4 Garlic pods,slightly crushed
2-3 Green chillies,slit
a sprig of Curry leaves
a pinch of Asafoetida

Method:

• Boil the water in which chickpeas is cooked and add cooked chickpeas,turmeric powder and salt to it and let it come to a rolling boil.Slightly press the chickpeas with the back of the ladle.
  
• Meanwhile heat ghee/oil in a small tadka pan and crackle mustard seeds and cumin seeds.
• Add slightly crushed garlic pods and green chillies and fry well.
• Add curry leaves and asafoetida and fry for 30 seconds and switch it off.
• Add this tadka to the boiling rasam and boil for half a minute and switch off the stove.
• After a couple of minutes add lemon juice to it and stir and close it with lid.

Serve it hot with steamed rice with some fryums or papad.
Notes:

1. You can use canned chickpeas in the recipe,but wash it well before use.Ideally this recipe is to use the stock of cooked chickpeas.
2. You can use black chickpeas or white chickpeas in the recipe.
3. For a Vegan version use oil instead of ghee in the recipe.