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Ruchik Randhap

Food & Memories of Mangalore

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Chicken Curry – Mangalorean Style | For Sheviyo (Stringhoppers) + Video!

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This is probably the billionth time that I am writing the word ‘favourite’. How else do I describe Sheviyo – Mangalore’s very own steamed rice noodle? Called as Stringhoppers in English, it’s closest cousin is the Keralite Noolputtu/Idiyappam which according to me are slightly thinner noodles – more like a hybrid between the cooked vermicelli & the Sheviyo. The Keralite version of this delicacy is made by using rice powder and the process of creating these delicate strands of flour requires a handy, portable cylindrical machine similar to the chakli maker. Batter is poured into it and a handle is wound to compress the batter which comes out of a fine slotted steel disc placed at the bottom of the cylinder. The Noolputtu is then steamed in a steamer and served hot with a dash of grated coconut. Yum! (Did I tell you I totally LOVE Mallu food as much as I love Mangy food? – I have loads of great Mallu friends and I have been tasting their food since my college days).
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Sheviyo is made by reversing this process. Instead of rice flour, rice grains are soaked & ground to a thick paste which is then formed into lumps and steamed till done. These lumps are then quickly passed through a larger apparatus called the ‘Shevgo’ in Konkani. If you are wondering where to buy the Shevgo, well, it’s available in a few ‘Mangalore Stores’ outlets in Mumbai. I picked up mine for about Rs.800 a couple of years ago & it was well worth the investment even though I use it just a couple of times a year – as it needs an extra person for steering the wheel 🙂 For those of you who live outside India and cannot carry one abroad, I suggest you pick up the chakli maker which has 5-6 steel discs with different kinds of shapes suitable to make chaklis and sevai & other Indian dry snacks. The slotted disc will be handy to make the Sheviyo provided you add unsteamed batter & then steam it like the Noolputtu (DO NOT make the mistake of stuffing steamed batter into a tiny chakli maker – it will get stuck forever like glue – this is a tried & tested attempt that flopped which compelled me to make the wise investment of buying the Shevgo 🙂
The Chakli Maker
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The Shevgo requires two people to maneuver. One who puts the freshly steamed lumps of dough into the cylinder (almost like a copper lota) with fine slots at the bottom and the other person who helps compress the dough by turning a handle – tough job I must say, but it’s fun too as Sheviyo making time always helps strike up a great camaraderie between these two people even if they are the worst of enemies 🙂 The Sheviyo which begin to form into noodles and get squeezed out of the cylinder are quickly collected in a dish. Authentically, in Mangalore instead of a dish halved strips of the Banana tree stem are used which helps to retain the long strands of Sheviyo without having to break them. Fun isn’t it? I wonder who thought of this great practice, either ways, we must give credit to the great minds who knew to make use of everything from their gardens. What seems amazing & mind boggling for us tissue paper users was common practice in those golden days.
The Mangalorean Shevgo
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While the most popular way of eating the Sheviyo is with a chicken/mutton gravy (which are usually of a thinner consistency than regular gravies), one can enjoy them dipped in Sweet Coconut Roce (coconut milk flavoured with cardamom & palm jaggery (surai god)). Leftover Sheviyo is re-steamed the next day and converted into a savoury upma by tempering it with mustard, kadipatta etc. So you see, Mangalorean ‘Poli’ (steamed/fried rice items like sannas, appams, panpolo(neer dosa), bakri, mutli etc) are versatile as there are many ways to eat one dish – sweet, savoury or plain – take your pick!
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Chicken Curry | Mangalorean Catholic Style

Traditional Mangalorean Catholic style chicken curry that goes very well with sheviyo (stringhoppers/idiyappam), appam, sanna or plain rice
5 from 1 vote
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Course: Main Course
Keyword: Chicken Curry
Prep Time: 30 minutes
Cook Time: 25 minutes
Total Time: 55 minutes
Author: Shireen Sequeira

Ingredients

  • 1 kg Chicken, cut into medium size pieces
  • 4 short dry chillies (harekala)
  • 4 long dry chillies (byadge)
  • 1 tbsp coriander
  • 1 tsp jeera
  • 1/2 tsp peppercorns
  • 1/2 tsp mustard
  • 2 medium size onions, sliced (for grinding)
  • 1 medium onion sliced (to be boiled along with the chicken)
  • 1 small onion (for tempering)
  • 5 cloves of garlic, sliced
  • 1/2 a coconut grated
  • 1 cup coconut milk
  • 1 gooseberry size ball of tamarind
  • 1 tsp garam masala powder

Instructions

  • Wash the chicken pieces and marinate it with salt. Keep aside till required.
  • Dry roast the ingredients (dry chillies, coriander, pepper, mustard, jeera, onions, garlic) one by one on a hot skillet. Let them cool completely and then transfer to a mixer jar. Add the garam masala powder & tamarind and the coconut and grind to a fine paste using a little water.Remove the masala and rinse the mixer jar with a little drinking water and reserve this water to be used later.
  • Boil the chicken with 1 onion sliced and salt and a little water if required. Cook until chicken is almost done.
  • Add the ground masala to the chicken & bring it to a boil. Check the taste and add the salt & tamarind if required
  • Reduce the heat completely and add the coconut milk and simmer for 2-3 minutes. Do not cover the pan or the curry may curdle. Turn off the heat.
  • For the tempering, heat a small pan, add ghee and when its smoking hot toss in the 1/2 sliced onion, reduce the flame to avoid burning. Pour this mixture into the curry and cover the pan to trap the aroma
  • Serve hot with stringhoppers (sheviyo/idiyappam), sanna, appam or rice

Notes

1. If you don't have both the varieties of the chillies just use the Byadge variety or even Kashmiri chillies will do (although the final dish may not taste 100% authentic Mangalorean). To tone down the spice remove the seeds from the chillies. If you are serving this dish to kids you may want to use not more than 6-7 deseeded Byadge chillies - this is what I do these days!

Disclaimer

The nutritional values are only indicative.

Tried this recipe?Please leave a comment & rate the recipe below or share a photo on Instagram and tag me @ruchikrandhap

Sheviyo

Recipe Source: My mum
Makes 8-10 ‘ghos’ (portion of sheviyo derived from each compress)
Serves 6-8 people

You Need:

  • 3 cups boiled rice (called as Ukdo in Konkani, Ukda in Hindi)
  • salt to taste

Method:
1. Soak rice for a minimum 2-3hours and grind it to a fine paste with as little water as possible – adding 1-2 tbsp of water only if you are using a mixer grinder that refuses to co-operate. Try to retain as thick a batter as possible (it should not be runny)
2. Make 4-5 portions of this thick batter and place them onto a cloth/bairas
3. Place a Tondor (steamer) with sufficient water on full flame and bring it to a boil. Place the cloth with the portions of batter into the steaming vessel and steam for 15-20minutes when the dough looks transparent
4. Prepare the ‘Shevgo‘ by greasing the weight & compress cylinder with some cooking oil.
5. Open the steamer & remove one ball/portion of steamed dough & place into the cylinder. The weight needs to be positioned to hover right above the cylinder & the handles of the Shevgo need to be turned to release the weight rolling down into place. Press tightly to release Sheviyo, collect them immediately from below & roll back the handles of the Shevgo to repeat this process
6. Place Sheviyo on a Kurpon (disc woven out of reed) to cool off.
7. Serve Sheviyo with Chicken/Mutton curry or with coconut sweet roce (recipe to follow)

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Comments

  2. Shireen says

    🙂 You can still make the sheviyo in the chakli maker Michelle, just that you should use unsteamed batter & then steam it, not the perfect sheviyos, but better than not having any. Do you get the chakli maker in Indian stores there?

    Reply

  8. Jenifer says

    I tried the curry and it came out very well with coconut milk. The guests really liked it. Thanks a lot once again…

    Reply

  10. Sonia says

    I'm glad you mentioned the process in the chakali maker. I have made this a few times as a cook-out with mallu friends. So we just decided to do it the way they do. If I hadn't read this post I wud have tried the Mangie way when mom came over 🙂 and I wudnt have been able to take the flop for sure !

    Reply

  11. radha says

    Just wanted you to know, that I made the shevai using rice and coconut. And I could pass steamed dough through the muruku maker. The batter needs to be absolutely smooth and the steamed dough has to be hot. If you allow it to cool then you are in trouble! Your pictures are amazing.

    Reply

  12. Nate says

    the true test ….my husbands smile after eating the chicken curry as he just sat on the couch to relax…….

    Thank you shireen

    Reply

  15. Preeti D'Souza says

    Hi Shireen, I finally got down to making the Shevio & chicken roce curry today & was very proud of my accomplishment. After 11 yrs of marriage, this was my first stint at Shevio & thanks to your recipe, it was a success! I bought the "Shevgo" 2 yrs ago in M'lore & it was totally worth hauling it to US. The only issue we have here is with the variety of rice & I'm not sure "ukdo" is available here. I just used the red rice available at a Mallu grocery store. Thanks again for your recipes! Keep up the good work!

    Reply

  16. Shireen Sequeira says

    Hi Preeti, thanks so much for the compliments, it was so nice to know that you made and liked the shevio! Ukdo is boiled rice which is either available without the bran or with bran. What you call as 'red rice' is the boiled rice with bran. You can use either, its just that as per tradition we use the white (without bran) one just to get pure white shevio. Cheers to some more cooking!!

    Reply

  17. Anonymous says

    Hi! Should the grated coconut be roasted too before grinding. Also should the chicken be cooked with the skin or without. Thank you for your assistance.

    Reply

  18. Shireen Sequeira says

    @Anonymous: I have not mentioned that the coconut needs to be roasted – it is not required, unless you want to, then please go ahead. The chicken can be cooked as per your preference – with or without skin.

    Reply

  19. Anonymous says

    Hi Shireen,

    Love this recipe too. I had written to you on Sannas. Actually Im planning for a frens gt-together and will be having a group of 14 at home. Im new to cooking but still hv tot of cooking myself for all. tot of including the Sannas, sweet plv, this chicken curry (even the bunts chicken curry mentioned is good)and pork of course and may be some other fries. Hope its a good combo.

    The Question now is, for 14, should I double the portion of all the ingredients or like 3 times the portion? Pls advice, also any suggestions on a good and easy to cook menu 🙂

    Thanks
    Prem

    Reply

  20. Shireen Sequeira says

    Hi Prem,

    Thanks for writing in, sorry i was unable to reply immediately. My suggestion is to make Sannas as per this recipe – it will yield about 25 if you have warm weather like Mangalore. If you have a lot of starters, keep the maincourse simple. Make a max of 2 kgs chicken curry, 25 sanna and pulav made out of 3 cups basmati rice – not more. When there are starters, snacks n drinks, nobody will eat more – you'll be left with a lot of leftovers. Also, whenever u make biryani, don't make sanna – its too much work for a load of food that nobody will eat, so keep it simple! Try making the chicken lollipops – you can marinate the chicken the previous day and deep fry the pieces when your guests have arrived & settled down. Good luck!

    Reply

  21. Sana says

    This chicken curry is simply yummy.. Goes well with dosa or panpolay… I am yet to try sannas… I used 8 byadegi chillis cause I didn't hav the other variety at home.

    Reply

  23. Shireen Sequeira says

    Hi Megha..yes, you may use gaunchi mirsaang or kashmiri chillies..whatever is available! Just note that kashmiri chillies are less spicy so you may need to adjust the number of chillies used according to your spice tolerance.

    Reply

  24. Unknown says

    Hello Shireen
    yummy recipe…I prepare something similar but tomorrow shall cook chicken with this recipe…thank you!!
    hope you are doing good..
    cheers
    Veelma

    Reply

  25. Lavina Percy Dastur says

    Hi Shireen
    Does this curry go well with plain basmati rice too? Since I plan to make it this weekend. Also a big THANK YOU for this wonderful website with the best mangalore an recipes.

    Reply

  26. Shireen Sequeira says

    @ Lavina: Yes, it goes well with plain white rice too! Just adjust the thickness of the gravy according to your need (we make it slightly thin to go with the sheviyo) I am so glad that you enjoyed my websites 🙂 thanks for the feedback!

    Reply

    • Shireen Sequeira says

      The coconut milk is optional but you can add it in step#3, after you add the masala and bring the curry to a boil. Reduce the heat and add the coconut milk, don’t cover the pan after you add the milk or there is a high chance of it curdling.

      Reply

  29. Karen Rego says

    Ground the masala and kept… Will make the curry when guests arrive 🙂 .. Love all your recipes Shireen!

    Reply

  30. Neil pais says

    HI Shireen,t
    I am just so enamoured by your site. Everything you need and more being mangalorean!ive tried so many recipes from your site after I was introduced to it by my son who lives in Australia & was forced to cook on his own.They truly turn out ” RUCKIK RANDHAP”.!Keep up the excellent work and we’ll keep trying your recipes.Cheers! Neil

    Reply

    • Shireen Sequeira says

      Hi Neil,

      Thank you so very much for your lovely words of appreciation! I am so humbled by your words and I am truly happy that you and your son found value in my website. Do stay tuned for more recipes!

      Reply

  33. Nathline Dias says

    Hi Shireen! In the recipe card, you have not mentioned when to add the grated coconut. In the video, you have shown when to add it, but adding the garam masala is not shown in the recipe card as well as in the video.

    Reply

    • Shireen Sequeira says

      Hi Nathline,

      Thank you for pointing out – I have missed to mention adding the coconut in the recipe card. But I have mentioned adding the garam masala powder in step#2. However, in the video I missed to add the garam masala. Will update the recipe card 🙂

      Reply

  34. Vic says

    A super easy, delicious and very authentic recipe. This brought back memories of home.

    I used subbed coconut milk with 3 heaped tbsp coconut milk pdr and 250ml water.

    Used 3 hot chillies deseeded + 3 kashmiri chillies deseeded.

    Aside from that followed the recipe to the letter and it was fabulous!

    Thank you.

    Reply

    • Shireen Sequeira says

      Thank you so much for the great feedback Vic! Thanks for letting us know the substitutes you used, this will help readers who are unable to find all the ingredients

      Reply