Friday 6 May 2016

LAVALOLIKKA / LOLOLIKKA /LOOBIKKA PICKLE

Recently I had been to Kerala and visited one of my family friends house. My friend's wife took me to her house at Paravoor. I was greeted with this lovely fruit in front of her house. Could not believe that the tree was full of this red, greenish berries similar to cherries.

When I checked with her what this fruit is, she said it is known as loobikka or lololikka in Kerala and normally they make pickle out of it.

I tried to eat one fruit to know the taste of it. It was very sour and I could not eat it, but I decided to collect the same and make pickle out of it. Any sour item I find will go for pickle first and then I explore the possibility of making other items. We can make jams also out of this. I felt we can make syrup with it like we make kokum sharbat. Since I did not have much time to explore all these at Kerala, I had to satisfy t myself with making only pickle out of this and collected few berries. It is also known as scram berry.

this fruit is commonly known as lovi-lovi or batoko plum, a flowering plant native to the Phillipines is also found in Asia and Africa. It is very common in South India especially in Kerala and known as loika or lavalolikka.

The fruits are produced in bunches and resemble cherries. The fruit is round and shiny, turning from light green to a deep red colour upon ripening. Each fruit measures 1 to 3 centimeter in diameter. The flesh is crunchy but sour and acidic in taste. The fruits are edible but generally not eaten fresh but made as jams, preserves, and syrups.

I tried to find out names in other languages but could not succeed. If anyone knows the name can please update me. The English name is Flacourtia inermis. After a day long search I found the names:

Flacourtia_jangomas

Bengali : bNaichee
Assamese : poniol
English : coffee plum, Indian cherry, Indian plum, rukam, runeala plum
Hindi : talispatri
Thai : takhob
Sanskrit : sruvavrksha, vikankatah
Malayalam : lubica, lovlolica, (ശീമനെല്ലിക്ക)

Now let us look at the recipe now:

Author: Raji Ramakrishnan
Cuisine: Indian
Category: Pickle

Ingredients:

1 cup Lololikka
2 tsp red chilli powder
3 tbsp oil
salt as required
few curry leaves
1/4 tsp haldi powder
1 tsp mustard seeds
generous pinch of hing powder

Method:

1. Wash and cut the lololikka.

You can cut the same like you cut the plum and in the centre portion, you can find the seeds. Discard the seeds.

2. Heat oil in a kadai. add the mustard seeds, when it splutters, add the curry leaves, hing powder.

3. Add the chopped lololikka in it along with salt, haldi powder. saute for a minute and switch off gas.

4. Allow to cool for sometime. Add the red chilli powder. the Pickle is ready.

Note: If you are using it immediately, the oil is sufficient. If you are preserving for sometime, the oil level should be above the pickle.
You can also add fenugreek powder, sugar or jaggery little bit in it.