Bottle gourd curry is popular across the country. There are various traditional dishes available in various parts of India. But Bengali style bottle gourd curry is very special and it is very popular in Wets Bengali as well as Bangladesh. In Bengal, it is known as lau ghonto. Lau means bottle gourd and ghonto is a Bengali style curry which is less spicy and less oily. It is generally a dry or semi-dry curry. Bengali people love this food and often cook this dish during its season.
‘Kochi lau’ (young bottle gourd vegetable) is a popular vegetable in Bengal. Bengali people always search ‘kochi lau’ during winter. Identification of a young bottle gourd is an art. Most Bengali people press a bottle gourd vegetable with his finger nail to check whether it is actually young one or not. If nail enters inside the bottle gourd very easily then it is definitely ‘kochi lau’, haha. Is this not interesting?
They often add bori (a sundried popular food item which is prepared with lentils paste) to lau ghonto. Bengali people are very fond of such bori diye lau ghonto.
So did you ever try such Bengali style bottle gourd curry? I believe that you definitely tasted because that is why you have landed on this page. Otherwise, you won’t be with me till this point and continue reading. Is this not true? But most importantly you liked lau ghonto and now you are interested to prepare it at home.
Bottle gourd is such a vegetable what everybody want to grow at their own place because it does not need a yard to grow. If you have 1 foot by 1 foot area at your yard then also you can grow because it is a climbing plant and once you starts growing you just need to provide support to this plant and soon it will reach at your rooftop and spread all over there very vigorously. That is why everybody whether he or she is living in village or city love to grow this plant.
I also grow bottle gourd at my yard every year. Last year, that plant gave us a lot of fruits.
But this year, I am growing it in a 14 inch clay pot and expecting some fruits from this plant.
Bengali style lau ghonto recipe
- 1 small size bottle gourd, cut into small pieces
- 1.5 teaspoons panchphoron (see note below)
- 2-3 pieces green chillies
- 12 daler bori (sundried item prepared with letils paste)
- Handful fresh coriander leaves
- Salt as needed
- 1 teaspoon sugar, optional
- 1 tablespoon mustard oil
- Heat mustard oil in a cooking pot and fry daler bori till those turns into light brown (or golden color), take fried bori in a separate bowl for further use
- Then add panchphoron & green chillies and saute till raw flavor goes away and nice aroma comes out
- Now add finely chopped bottle gourd and cook till it releases water and becomes perfectly cooked
- Add fried daler bori, salt & sugar (optional) and stir
- Now spread finely chopped fresh coriander leaves and mix
- Switch off flame and serve this with plain rice
Mixture of 5 whole spices at equal portions. These whole spices are mustard seeds, fenugreek seeds, cumin seeds, fennel seeds, coriander seeds.
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