Stuffed Raw Tomatoes with Paneer ( cottage cheese ) is a complete party dish to impress your guests at any occasion. I know – these days what guests, what parties – but still, we can give even ourselves a treat to keep spirits high! So cook these stuffed raw tomatoes with paneer (cottage cheese); but if you are not a big fan of paneer then stuff tomatoes with mixed vegetables, followed by cheese, oregano flakes and black pepper.
You might give homemade fresh paneer a try if you are fine with paneer stuffing. Naturally, I have a post on how to prepare Homemade Paneer/Indian Cottage Cheese!! As I used crushed paneer, just add vinegar or lemon juice in hot milk and milk will curdle. Sieve it, use whey for your gravy based dishes or for kneading flour and use paneer for stuffing!
Check out a few more posts for stuffed vegetables in the blog…
Stuffed brinjal/eggplant/aubergines (Bharva baigan)
Stuffed Capsicum (bharva shimla mirch)
Stuffed Brinjals/Eggplant/Aubergine
Stuffed Chilies(Bharva Hari Mirch)
Ingredients :
Small size raw tomatoes 9-10
Crushed paneer 100 gm (reduce or increase as per the size of tomatoes)
Coriander powder 2 tsp
Turmeric powder 1/4 tsp
Asafoetida powder a pinch
Salt as per your taste
Red chili powder 1 tsp
Dry mango powder/lemon juice 1 tsp
Garam masala 1 tsp
Kasuri methi/ chopped green coriander leaves 2 tsp
Oil 4 tbsp
Process:
Wash tomatoes and scoop out the pulp by cutting the top. You can use pulp for preparing gravy by grinding it for gravy based dishes.
Heat 1 tbsp oil in a pan and add paneer along with all spices. Cook this mixture for five minutes and switch off the gas.
Fill this stuffing in scooped out tomatoes and pour rest of the oil in a pan and place stuffed tomatoes in the pan. If you want, can use the top cut part of tomatoes to cover them, though it is not necessary. I used them as it looks fancy to uncover them before serving!!
Remember, we have to cook tomatoes on sim heat. Sometimes, our gas burner doesn’t give very low heat for slow cooking dishes. If that is the case with your burner, just buy one extra small size pan support and use it. This helps in supplying low heat to the cooking pan.
Tomatoes will slowly start becoming tender. When we cook on sim heat then the pan gets heat only at the center, not around the edges of the pan. Keep shifting the position of tomatoes in the pan for even cooking.
As green raw tomatoes are firm tomatoes, it takes some time for them to become soft on sim heat. Once tomatoes are done, sprinkle some kasuri methi or green coriander leaves for garnishing just before serving and uncover them!!