I am not too convinced, as mangosteen is called Garcinia mangostana in Latin and the interior pulp is white, not purple or black...I have seen and eaten mangosteens in SE Asia, but not in India. Perhaps they are cousin brothers?

Sue

Kokum/Kokam is called Aamsul in Marathi. Aamsul surbat (cold drink like lemonade) if used to fight heat in summer. It is incredubly thirst quenching.

Pictuere.
According to this it is called Garcinia Indica.

Most famous food made from kokum/aamsul/aamsol is SoLachi KaDhi - short for Aamsolachi kadDhi.

Pratibha

tut-tut shanta!this is the beauteous mangosteen.but they are surely relatiews Sue,and do grow in india-

kokum, aamsul etc. is 'fish tamarind'.
It's used in Malayali cuisine as well. Sorry Roshna.

Check this out. Garcinia cambogia for weight loss, gotta try it.

is anyone familiar with 'thekera' as applied in assamese cooking?it seems to kokum or another relative-

recipes
http://rubymurray.com/curry/DisplayRecipe....ia+Maasor+Tenga

from gingerly's "recipe" link -- a fraction of its pomo ingredient list (line breaks as original):

part of a post that got me wondering if it was the same-

i have some 'kokum phool'-hard,dry half-sections of kokum fruit,with the seeds left in.it seems to function much like the fleshier version but with less fruitiness.does anyone know if there are specific uses for this kind of kokum?

Yes, You can use them in preparing Gujarati Dal. Most of Gujaratis use Kokum. They are used as souring agent.

gingerly, this dried, semi-hard kokum is the only kind i've ever bought in the u.s. i've been using it merrily in my kerala recipes (subbing for cambodge) never realizing there was a more optimal kind.

Gingerly,

You can use it as diet control , weight reducing agent.

unfortunately,i'm all out of the soft version-maybe someone who has some can post a pic?they taste very similar,though the dried version is a little smoky.also,i can't imagine sol kadi would taste quite right made from the dried stuff.
Nichiro,i’ll pretend i didn’t read that last post.

Dunno why I haven't paid attention to this thread before. Really took me back to the good ole days. In Delhi you didn't get kokum in regular grocery/kirana stores. You could get the good soft, moist, stain your mouth blackish purple stuff at the Maharashtra Emporium on Baba Kharag Singh Marg. I used to just eat it right out of the bag like khatta aam papad. Mmmm. Have some in my fridge but I can't remember the last time I cooked with it, I still eat it plain.

pictures of the soft peel version.
another(from one hot stove) showing the fine crystals that sometimes precipitate out of the peel.

achcha, as i mentioned recently, thanks to veena, i now have a lot of very fragrant fresh, moist kokum. considering i only have one recipe in my regular rotation that calls for kokum (as a sub for cambodge in the nadan meen kari from the penguin kerala cookbook) i am worried that i may not use it all to best benefit. so please to give suggestions.

a recipe for solachi kadi anyone?

You can use it in daals instead of other souring agents (Nichiro's tuvar-ni-daal uses it). I also toss in a few along with vegetables while making regular simple dry sabzis. It gives a subtly different sour flavour compared to tamarind or amchur.

Here's how we make sol-kadi at home: soak a few (six to seven pieces) in a cup or so of water. Keep aside while you attend to other matters. After the kokum has done its work in the water, add freshly extracted coconut milk, and salt. Proportion of water to coconut milk can very depending on how thick or thin you like it. You can jazz it up with a tadka of mustard and curry leaves, and coriander leaves; but some prefer solkadi without such intrusions. An alternative preparation is to use thin buttermilk instead of coconut milk.

Perhaps someone can provide a recipe for kokum sherbet.

Veena

For Kerala style fish curry, kodampuli is used(not kokum). In some parts of Kerala, tamarind is used as well.
Kokum and kodampuli are different.

is kodampuli cambodge? vijayan suggests kokum as a substitute. of late, given the quality of kokum available here, i'd been using tamarind. can anyone speak to the taste difference between cambodge and kokum?

there are some recipes in the upper crust link(post#23) though i think they're throwing the kokum about far too liberally.must think it grows on trees or something.
kodampuli has a cleaner flavour to it-sort of citrus to kokum's plum.

fresh kudampuli

This is a souring agent that I picked up from a rural arts and crafts exhibition in Goa. The woman who was selling it belonged to one of the several self-help groups for women that are found in Goan villages. She said it was used instead of kokum, but unlike kokum, it was ground along with the coconut masala. My father, who is from South Canara, recognized them as onTi sola.n or vonTi sola (sola.n is the Konkani term for edible peels or skin). They had a tree in his childhood home and the delicate fruit had to be collected before it hit the ground (else it would be squished). It was then chopped up, sun-dried for a couple of days, salted and then stored to be used in masala for curries. Supposed to be especially delicious in fish curries. We had it in egg curry today - it is milder than tamarind and kokum. It also tasted very good by itself (if one's taste leans towards eating imli and kairi as solo delicacies). Anyone here recognises it or knows the English or botanical name for this fruit?



Veena

Veena, could you ask your father if he recalls the colour of the ripe fruit?

hi

it looks like passion fruit


http://www.agroworld.com/passion%20fruit%20facts.html

Veena

Are these a bit sweetish? I have a vague memory of having seen/eaten this, but it's really too far back to remember anything ...

Doesn't it (oddly enough) it look a lot like the cross sections in this photo? [Mahanandi calls it kokum, but it is not the lovely moist purple peel form.]

Ye olde vottambe/vottambi sol aka jarigeda votte, perhaps?

that's what i was thinking, hibi, but something suggested jackfruit, so i wonder if it's something like lakoocha.
possibly?


wilde, some sickly specimens to look at.

Figure 3 and 11 and my memory make it seem a not implausible hypothesis.

On the souring agent I'm holding out till Veena tells us if her father remembers about color etc.

Veena:

My Kerala Christian friends use a souring agent called Kodumpuli in their fish curries. I have read that in Goa also it is used in fish curries.

Wikipedia lists Kokum as Garcinia indica. Perhaps these two are of the same family?

Ammini they are Garcina cambogia (kudampuli) and Garcinia indica (kokum). The problem might be that both fruits can be preserved in more than one way. What I have at home is the moist, purplish, salt preserved kind. See moist purple kokum and moist purple kudampuli. For kerala fish curry recipes using this moist kind of kudampuli see recipes in this blog.

However, the fruit might also be cut into cross sections and dried -- like this (and the Mahanandi photo I linked upthread).

Interesting stuff! Thanks Wildflower.

Wildflower: Thanks. I knew you would have the answer. Kudampuli is not generally used in Kerala vegetarian cooking and I have never used it. And I know nothing about fish cookery.

there's a pic of fresh kudampuli upthread.

Yep, I was deeply envious at the time.



I always meant to ask -- did you try to cook with it? What was it like when you bit into the fresh fruit?

um..not pretty. it's like extreme carambola. leaves the throat very raw, as does the dried version-unlike kokum. i didn't cook anything, unfortunately.
(bumped up hoping Veena's dad can take a look at the thread and id.)

One of my favorite things as a child (and I didn't have too many favorite things then) were these fresh kokums preserved in salt and sugar that my babysitter used to make. Sweet-sour and perfect, I always raided the jar at her place. When I was in India last year I made it a quest to find out if she still makes them, and she doesn't, because she doesn't get fresh kokums from whoever she used to get it from in the decades past. I am very sad that I might never get to relish them again. :-(

Yep, I keep pausing over the description of the fruit as delicate.
Semi-ripe G. cambogia are not very delicate, but perhaps very ripe ones are squishy; or very likely it is something else entirely.

Gingerly, WF: my father's further input will have to wait until I return to Bombay in about a couple of weeks.

Veena

Wow, didn't realise there was a whole thread about kokum, what a coincidence, just used some tonight! I often use it in dals, and also coconut milk dishes. I find it has a really subtle yet very enhancing taste. Seems to keep forever in the fridge too! I have a great big bag of softish dried stuff in there.

In keeping with the custom in my mother's kitchen I add flakes of garlic and green chillies to spice things up.

There is a variation to the sol-kadi, which involves adding garlic and green chillies to the coconut while grinding it for the coconut milk. This is called lasNaachi-kadi.

Addition to my earlier post: a cup of water might be too much for 6-7 skins of kokum. It should be more like 5-6 tablespoons of water, especially if you are going to eat it with rice. For a mild drink, a cup would probably be okay.

Veena