The restraint of sun-dried curd chillies

Don't troll me for this, but if there's one ingredient I will happily omit from my cooking, it is the green chilli.

- NANDITA IYER

Smokey smashed cucumber salad; and (right) 'mor molagai' peanut 'podi'.

(PHOTOGRAPHS BY NANDITA IYER)

Needlessly pungent, angsty and vengeful toward anyone who accidentally bites into it, it quite literally bites back, leaving tears and regret in its wake. When people casually crunch into whole green chillies alongside their meal, I can’t help but marvel at their bravery. To me, it feels like the culinary equivalent of walking barefoot on burning coal, a voluntary suffering at the dining table.

And yet, there is one glorious exception: Mor molagai or sun-dried curd chillies. With just four ingredients—salt, buttermilk, sunlight and time—some kind of alchemy happens. The chilli I try hard to avoid turns into something I love.

Medium-sized plump green chillies are slit and marinated in salted buttermilk overnight and dried in the sun. This is typically done in peak summer when you can expect 6-7 hours of strong sun.