Northeast Indian

Bhorta (Roasted Pumpkin & Brinjal Mash)

Name: Bhorta (Roasted Pumpkin & Brinjal Mash)
Total time: 30 min
Yield: 4 servings
Cuisine: Northeast Indian
Ingredients: 2 cups pumpkin; 1 brinjal; 1 tbsp mustard oil; 1 red onion; 1 green chili; 1/2 tsp salt

Bandana Gogoi @bandana_ghy

Bhorta (Roasted Pumpkin & Brinjal Mash) is Northeast Indian home cooking, eaten at lunch and dinner. On the plate it is the condiment and the cooked vegetable. Below is what usually sits beside it, what it does and does not contain, and what else to cook once you have made it.

30 min Easy Vegetarian Vegan Halal Gluten free Dairy free Pescatarian

Ingredients

Serves

The quantities follow this count.

2 cups pumpkin
1 brinjal
1 tbsp mustard oil
1 red onion
1 green chili
1/2 tsp salt

How to cook it

Cut the pumpkin into chunks and prick the whole brinjal a few times with a fork.
Boil or steam the pumpkin until soft, about 15 minutes; roast the brinjal directly over a low flame or under the broiler, turning until the skin blisters and the inside collapses soft.
Cool the brinjal, peel off the charred skin, and mash it with the pumpkin until roughly combined.
Finely chop the onion and chili and mix them in with the mustard oil and salt.
Mash everything together with a fork, leaving some texture, and serve at room temperature.

Watch how to cook Bhorta (Roasted Pumpkin & Brinjal Mash)

Someone making it start to finish, so you can see what the steps look like.

Serve it with

A Northeast Indian dinner is a plate rather than a single dish. These are the courses that normally sit beside Bhorta (Roasted Pumpkin & Brinjal Mash), read from the same composition Dinejot builds a real meal from.

The dish at the centre
- Akhuni Yam (Fermented Soybean with Yam and Mustard Greens)
  
  25 min
The protein alongside
- Lauki Chana Dal (Bottle Gourd and Lentils)
  
  45 min
What it is eaten with
- Galho (One Pot Rice, Greens and Chicken Porridge)
  
  40 min

A course labelled with another kitchen's name comes from a cuisine in the same family, which is where this plate usually borrows it from.

Safe at your table

Dinejot tracks ten allergens and tags every one of them by hand. Bhorta (Roasted Pumpkin & Brinjal Mash) carries none of them. That is a checked answer rather than an ingredient list nobody read.

Every tracked allergen in Bhorta (Roasted Pumpkin & Brinjal Mash)
Allergen	In this dish
Peanuts	No
Tree nuts	No
Dairy	No
Gluten	No
Shellfish	No
Eggs	No
Soy	No
Fish	No
Sesame	No
Coconut	No

These tags are set by a person rather than inferred from an ingredient list, and they describe the recipe as written here. Read the labels on whatever you actually buy.

What it brings to the plate

Estimated, per serving

Calories: 100 kcal
Protein: 2 g
Carbs: 14 g
Fat: 4 g
Fiber: 4 g
Sugar: 5 g
Sodium: 210 mg
Saturated fat: 0 g

Estimated values. Actual nutrition varies with ingredients, brands, and how you cook.

When to cook it

Bhorta (Roasted Pumpkin & Brinjal Mash) takes about 30 minutes from a cold stove to the table, and the cooking itself is easy going. It is eaten at lunch and dinner. Nothing in the calendar rules it out, so it is a year round dish.