Palak Paneer is a famous side dish of North India. It is a curry dish made of spinach/palak, cottage cheese/ paneer and other flavoring spices. Palak Paneer is one of my favorite curries which I usually love to have with chapattis or plain boiled rice. It is easy and quick to make hence I cook it every now then during the winter season and whenever fresh spinach is available in the market.

Preparation Time: 20 minutes

Cooking Time: 20 minutes

Serves: 04

Course: Side Dish/ Lunch/ Dinner

Cuisine: Indian

Ingredients:

Fresh Spinach/ Palak                                                   1kg

Cottage Cheese/ Paneer                                              300g

Chopped Onion                                                            ½ cup

Chopped Garlic                                                            1 tbsp

Chopped Ginger                                                 ½ tbsp

Fresh Tomato Paste                                                     ½ cup

Green Chilies                                                                2

Bay Leaves                                                                    2

Cumin Seeds                                                                 1 tsp

Asafetida                                                                       ¼ tsp

Cinnamon                                                                     1 inch

Cloves                                                                           3-4

Cardamom                                                                    2

Peppercorns                                                                 1 tsp

Paneer Masala                                                             1 ½ tsp

Mix Masala/ Sabji Masala                                           1 tsp

Garam Masala                                                              ½ tsp

Turmeric Powder                                                         ½ tsp

Ghee/ Clarified Butter/ Butter                                    2 tbsp

Refined Oil to fry Paneer                                             4 tbsp

Salt as required

Water as required

Directions:

1. Clean the spinach by removing any impurities, yellow leaves and cut off the roots. Thoroughly, wash the spinach with cold water and drain off excess water.
2. In a deep pan, take ¼ cup of water and put it on medium heat. Into the pot put the washed spinach, cover the pot with a lid and steam cook the spinach for 10-15 minutes.
3. Meanwhile, take a small bowl into that put all the dry masala powder: paneer masala, mix/ sabji masala, turmeric and add 1 tbsp of water to make a thick masala paste. Keep it aside for 5 minutes.
4. Take the paneer and cut it into small cubes of your choice.
5. Heat a frying pan on medium low heat, add the refined oil to the pan and let the oil heat. Once the oil is heated, shallow fry the paneer cubes till golden; don’t over fry the paneer. Keep the paneer in the kitchen towel to absorb excess oil.
6. On the other hand, take out the steam cooked spinach and let it cool. Once cooled, grind the spinach to make a fine paste and empty it in a bowl.
7. Heat another deep pan on medium low heat, add ghee to the pan and let it heat for few seconds. To the hot ghee, add bay leaves and cumin seeds and let the cumin seeds crackle.
8. Now add cinnamon, cloves, cardamom and peppercorns to the ghee and let them crackle. Add chopped garlic and ginger to the oil and fry till golden brown. Then add chopped onion and fry till onion gets translucent.
9. Then add the tomato paste and masala mix kept aside. Mix well and cook the masala till it leaves oil. Once the masala leaves oil it means the masala is cooked.

10. Now add the spinach paste to the cooked masala and mix well. Cook the spinach for few minutes. If the spinach paste is too thick then add ¼ cup of water.

11. When the spinach tends to boil, add the fried paneer cubes to the spinach and mix well. Cover the pan and cook for few minutes.

12. Once done, mix well and serve hot with chapattis or rice. When serving, add a tsp of ghee/ butter to get a rich taste.