Summer days mean cold, juicy slices of red, sweet watermelon. It’s usual to eat the tasty red part of the fruit and throw away the thick green skin with the white rind. When you toss out the rind, you may not know it but you’re throwing away a nutritious part of the watermelon. The watermelon rind has high concentrations of several vitamins, minerals, amino acids and fibre.
Some of the benefits of watermelon rind include its ability to strengthen the immune system with the presence of Vitamin C, lower blood pressure due to the presence of potassium, improve the skin with its antioxidants, help in weight loss with its fibre content and ensure a safe pregnancy due to the natural sugars found in the rind, which can help to minimize symptoms of morning sickness and the high potassium content helps with the swelling associated with pregnancy.
Most importantly, finding a use for the watermelon rind also helps to cut down on the amount of garbage you produce, so it’s good for the environment as well.
While cutting up a watermelon, I would hate to throw away the thick rinds along with the skin. While researching on how to use up the watermelon rind, I stumbled upon it’s many health benefits. I found many stir fry recipes for the rind in South Asian cooking and pickle recipes from the southern part of the US. But what intrigued me were the recipes which use the rind in the Dosa batter and the many Chutney recipes of Southern India.
Here I’m sharing my recipes using the watermelon rind in two types of Dosa batter. One that needs fermentation and the another which can be used within one hour of mixing.
I also used the watermelon rind to make three types of Chutneys, one using coconut, another using tomato and the third using fresh herbs like green coriander, mint and curry leaves.
This batter using watermelon rind needs fermentation. It has the sour taste of a traditional batter, yet a bit of a fruity taste from the rind. It spreads well and crisps up, though not as much as the traditional dosa. If lentils give you bloating and indigestion, this batter is for you as there are no lentils in this batter as opposed to the traditional dosa batter which uses white urad daal.
This instant dosa batter hardly needs any fermentation. It spreads well and gets a glorious golden colour. The crispness is a little less than a traditional dosa. It has the goodness of the watermelon rind, sooji and besan. There is no labourious soaking of rice as it uses rice flour. The only difficult step in this recipe is the cutting and grinding of the watermelon rind.
Watermelon Rind Chutney with Coconut
This chutney is almost like the traditional chutney and comes out thick and delicious. Some of the remaining pink parts of the watermelon on the rind give it a glorious pink hue. You need to add a bit more of tamarind to counteract the sweetness of coconut and the watermelon rind.
Watermelon Rind Chutney with Tomato
This chutney could pass off as the traditional tomato chutney served with dosas. It’s a chutney for those who do not like coconut. Adding 2-3 sprigs of fresh green coriander gives it another dimension, though if you want to retain the red colour of the tomato, don’t add the coriander. Along with the watermelon rind, it also has the benefits of flax and chia seeds.
Watermelon Rind Chutney with Herbs
This chutney is spicy and gloriously green in colour. The fresh herbs like green coriander, mint and curry leaves add to the benefits of the watermelon rind. Green chillies give it a spicy pungency that goes well with dosas or anything other food that needs to be spiced up. This chutney does not use coconut so those who want to avoid coconut for its taste can use this chutney.
This article is by Shivani Khanna
All pictures are personal images of Sttudio 292
Leave a reply