Kootu

Thick vegetable-lentil preparation — cooked vegetables (yam, raw banana, ash gourd, raw jackfruit, or drumstick) combined with cooked chana dal or toor dal and a freshly ground coconut-cumin-dried red chilli paste, simmered together until the lentil and vegetable merge into a thick, dry-ish preparation that holds its shape on a plate. Distinct from dal (too thick), curry (not liquid), or salad (cooked); the kootu occupies a unique textural space in Tamil Brahmin cooking. The coconut paste is the binding agent and flavour carrier; without freshly ground coconut a kootu becomes something else entirely. Eaten as a side with rice, the thickest wet preparation on the leaf.