Manchurian Pasta with Sprouts, East meets West in a Pressure Cooker

Indian's fascination with Gobi Manchurian is never ending. From street carts that can be smelled a mile away, to the budget eatery or the fancy up class ones, at least one variation will be served. You can go to the smallest town and you will find a street cart selling "Gobi Manchuri and fride rice", spelled in as many imaginative ways as possible. You will also see curry leaves added for a good measure in some of these establishments. In fact, Indian Chinese or Chinese Indian is now an acknowledge and well loved genre. The only Chinese influence I can see in this dish is the addition of soya sauce.

I have stretched this a little bit more and made Pasta in a pressure cooker flavored Manchurian style and being the ever conscious, "healthy twist", added sprouts and frozen peas. Now, there is another secret to this. No cutting of vegetables and all the micro nutrients are there with the sprouts along with the Protein. The resulting dish is as far from Manchuria as it is from Italy, but then it tastes good and healthy too, so who is complaining?

No butter, no cheese, no red or white sauce and no Oregano/Basil in a Pasta?  Sacrilegious!!! All cooked in one tea spoon of oil. You want to take a bet? Cook and let me know or come over and join me. I will wager the delicious pasta plate. This is one also one pasta dish that will taste good even when it is cold. Please do give it a try and you will know that delicious pasta can also come in shades of brown in addition to red, green or white :-)

Recipe for the Pasta

2 medium servings

Pasta	1 cup
Frozen peas	½ cup
Moong Sprouts	½ cup
Masoor Sprouts	½ cup
Soya Chunks	½ cup washed
Green Onions	½ cup diced
Ginger	1 inch piece grated
Garlic	4 medium diced
Tomato	2 medium pureed
Sesame Seeds	1 tablespoon toasted
Soy Sauce	1 tablespoon
Tomato Sauce	2 tablespoon
Pepper powder	¼ tsp
Chilli powder	¼ tsp optional
Oil	1 tea spoon

Directions

• Heat the pressure pan with oil on medium heat.
• Add the grated ginger and diced garlic and fry for a minute till the raw smell subsides.
• Add the pureed tomato, frozen peas, the washed soya chunks and pasta. We do not need to soak the soy chunks as they get cooked later on.
• Add on the soy sauce, tomato sauce, chilli power, pepper powder.
• Mix everything and fry for about 1 minute.
• Add 2 ½ cups of water. The water just barely submerges the pasta.
• Now taste for the salt after checking. Soy sauce and tomato sauce already have salt so check and add only if required.
• Close the pressure cooker and cook for one whistle on medium heat.
• Once the pressure subsides, add the sprouts, green onions and cook for 1-2 minutes. At this point, you can check the water level and if required add some more for a gravy.
• A pinch of aginomoto can be added for an enhanced taste, but that is purely optional.
• Sprinkle the toasted sesame seeds, serve hot and slurp. The photo does not show soya chunks, they are hiding, but they are there.