Sambar Powder (Sambar Masala)

Make and store this aromatic sambar powder (sambar podi) to easily cook up the most delicious south Indian style dals. This dry spice mix is made by roasting and then blending together spices and legumes, which, together, add the most amazing flavor and create the perfect texture in the finished dish. Keep a jar of this sambar powder in your pantry to quickly cook up authentic-tasting south Indian style sambars or kuzhambus: delicious vegetable dals with a tamarind base.

Powdered Indian spice mixes like garam masala and curry powder usually take very little time to make and once you have them on hand cooking healthy, tasty recipes just becomes so much easier. One spice blend I always have in my pantry, thanks to my Tamil husband's love for the food of his native land, is sambar powder.

What is sambar powder?

Sambar powder/sambhar podi, alongside rasam powder, is a mainstay of south Indian Tamil cuisine. It's a finely blended mix of two or three types of lentils, whole spices like cumin, coriander and red chili peppers, turmeric powder, and, optionally, an herb--curry leaves. Added to cooked lentils with vegetables and tamarind, it results in an amazingly delicious dal called sambar or kuzhambu.

You've likely eaten a sambar if you've eaten a dosa or idli at an Indian restaurant. It's the yellow-red dal with veggies that gets served alongside coconut chutney to dunk the idli or dosa into. Making a sambar is extraordinarily easy if you have the right ingredients, and it all begins with an excellent sambar powder.

Why you should have a jar of this spice blend in your pantry

• Sambar powder makes easy work of delicious dals and dry vegetable stir-frys or curries. If you love south Indian food you already know what I am talking about. If you are unfamiliar with it but love exploring new flavors at the dinner table you will likely adore this new addition to your repertoire for its vivid flavors.
• It is easy to make. The recipe takes no more than 30 minutes of your time to put together. This recipe makes about three cups of the spice blend which should easily last you for 24-30 uses. If you want to make less, especially at your first try, use the slider in the recipe card below to adjust the quantities of the ingredients.
• It's highly versatile. A sambar powder, likely because it was the precursor to curry powder, has a similar taste, so you can use it in any recipe that calls for curry powder. You can also add it to any dal recipe to dial up the flavor.
• It's good for you. Spices, as you already know, are great for you, and so are lentils. A serving of approximately 1 ½ tablespoons of this spice mix will add two grams of protein and three grams of dietary fiber to your recipe. And there is no added fat here.

Ingredients

• 1 ¼ cup coriander seeds
• 1 loosely packed cup of dry red chili peppers (about 30 peppers). This might seem like a lot but remember this recipe makes nearly 30 servings. If you love a lot of heat in your food you can add up to 15 more peppers. Use any moderately hot chili pepper here that's available online or at an Indian store, like byadgi or Kashmiri. There is also some black pepper in this recipe so if you are sensitive to heat scale back, if you wish, to half a cup of chili peppers.
• ⅓ cup chana dal (Bengal gram dal). These are split Indian chickpeas.
• ⅓ cup tuvar dal (toor dal/tur dal/pigeon peas)
• 2 tablespoon urad dal (black gram dal, optional). You can make a perfectly good sambar masala without the urad dal but I like the thickness it adds to the sambar so I use a bit of it here.
• 2 tablespoon cumin seeds
• 1 tablespoon fenugreek seeds (methi dana or methi seeds)
• 1 tablespoon black peppercorns
• ¼ cup curry leaves. You can use either fresh curry leaves or dry in this recipe. Some south Indians don't use curry leaves in their sambar powder and you can leave them out, but if you do that be sure to add fresh curry leaves to the sambar when you are making it. I usually add it both to the sambar masala and to the sambar when I'm cooking it.
• 2 tablespoon turmeric

How to make sambar powder

• ROAST THE INGREDIENTS:
  • Dry roast the red chili peppers in a medium skillet over medium-low heat for about five minutes or until they turn almost crispy. Remove to a plate and set aside to cool. (Be sure to turn on your vent hood or vent fan or leave a window in the kitchen open any time you roast chile peppers.)
  • In the same skillet add the remaining ingredients except the turmeric and the curry leaves. Roast them over a low heat setting--I usually keep my stove turned on to the setting to 1 or 2. Slow-roast the ingredients until they have slightly changed color and are very aromatic. This takes me about 10 minutes. You don't want to cook the ingredients too much here. Traditionally sambar ingredients were dried in the hot south Indian sun before being blended and that's what we are trying to emulate here.
  • Remove the roasted ingredients to a plate and set aside.
  • Finally, roast the curry leaves, if they are fresh, until they are very dry and crisp. If you are using dry curry leaves you can skip this step.

• BLEND THE SAMBAR MASALA
  • Once the ingredients have cooled you can begin blending them. Begin by blending the chile peppers first. It really helps to have a powerful blender here that can make a fine powder.
  • Once the chile peppers have broken down into a powder add the remaining ingredients to the blender jar, including the turmeric powder and curry leaves, and grind again into as fine a powder as possible.
• SIFT THE MASALA BLEND
  • This is an optional step but most south Indians would do this, and I highly recommend you do too because you want the sambar powder to be as smooth and fine as possible so your sambar is silky in texture. Any coarse ingredients you sift out can be blended again and added to the sifted powder, or reserve this blend in a separate jar and use it to season dry curries like these Bombay Potatoes.

Recipes to use sambar powder in

• Tomato Rice
• South Indian Green Tomato Dal
• White Pumpkin Sambar
• Tomato Chutney
• Tomato Dal
• Cabbage Paruppu Usili