Restaurant style taste without onions,garlic or cream! The thickness to the gravy comes from cashews and tomatoes, while the cardamoms and kasoori methi/dried fenugreek leaves provide the restaurant flavor that we are looking for.

I make lauki ke kofte/appe pretty often as a tea time snack and just love the flavor of No Onion,Garlic or Cream Curry . In fact I love to use this curry base for a lot of curries that I prepare, including Paneer Buttermasala, Palak Paneer,Malai Koftas, Rajma, Chana-it’s that versatile. You can even use it for any non veg dish as well.

The combination of healthy lauki ke appe/kofte in this relatively low fat curry was dynamic. After one boil the koftas had completely absorbed the gravy and it was delicious with hot rotis/chapatis.

Here is the written recipe followed by the step by step pictorial one-

No Onion,Garlic or Cream Lauki Kofta Curry

Aanchal Gupta

Restaurant style no onion,garlic or cream gravy with lauki ke appe/kofte make this a very healthy and delicious dish.

Print Recipe

Prep Time 15

Cook Time 20

Total Time 35

Course Main Course

Cuisine Indian

Servings -20 kofte

Ingredients

For Lauki koftas

2 cups Grated lauki/Ghiya/Bottlegourd
1/2 Medium Onion chopped(optional)
3 green chilies chopped
2 tbsp Cilantro/Coriander/Dhaniya
1 tsp Whole Coriander seeds crushed coarsely
1/2 tsp Red Chili powder/Lal Mirch powder
Salt as per taste about 1 tsp
1/2 cup Gramflour/Besan or as needed to bind
Ghee/Oil for cooking

For No Onion,garlic or Cream Curry

1/2 cup Cashews
1 cup Crushed Tomatoes
2 tsp Green Chilies minced
2 tsp Ginger minced
2 tsp Cumin/Jeera
1 tsp Paprika optional for additional color
4 Green Cardamoms/Elaichi crushed
1 tbsp Kasoori Methi/dry Fenugreek leaves
1 cup Milk Full fat preferred. I used 2 %(For vegan option, use water)
2 Tbsp Butter/Ghee/Oil For vegan option use oil
1/2 cup water for grinding

Instructions

For lauki Kofte

Grate lauki/Ghiya and squeeze out as much water as possible.
Add all the ingredients, except salt.
Heat up the Appe pan and put few drops of ghee/oil in EACH CAVITY.
Add salt and mix the batter well
Put dollops of batter in each cavity and brown well on both sides.
Enjoy with chatni as an appetizer or as a meal dunked in gravy.

For No Onion,garlic or Cream Curry

Blend Cashews, Crushed tomatoes and 1/2 cup water till smooth.
In 3 tbsp Butter/Ghee/Oil add Cumin/Jeera and let it crackle.
Add crushed Green Cardamoms, stir and add ginger and green chili paste till the raw smell of ginger goes away.
Add tomato-cashew paste and stir for few minutes.
Add paprika and Kasoori Methi and continue to stir.
Add milk and bring to a boil and continue to cook till fat separates(For vegan option add water)
The curry will thicken upon keeping,so add milk/water as needed.
Add koftas and bring to a boil and serve immediately.

Notes

You can fry the lauki kofte, I made them in the appe pan to keep them low in fat. You can use cream for a richer,creamier taste, however ,it tastes just as great with milk.Vegans,use water instead of milk.The gravy will thicken, add water/milk as needed.

Tried this recipe?Let us know how it was!

Here is the step by step pictorial recipe-

Grate lauki and squeeze out all the water