Peanut Chutney

Dry-roasted groundnut chutney — peanuts roasted until the skins blister and peel, ground coarsely with dried red chilli, garlic, tamarind, salt, and a tempering of mustard seeds and curry leaves poured over the finished paste. Anantapur district produces more groundnuts than any other district in India; the groundnut is so central to Rayalaseema that this chutney is not a condiment but a staple, eaten at every breakfast alongside pesarattu or idli and at every meal alongside rice. The texture should be coarse — small peanut fragments visible — rather than a smooth paste; the roast depth determines the chutney's bitterness-sweetness balance. Distinctly different from coconut chutney or any other South Indian breakfast chutney.