Fried Banana Flower with onions (Keselmuwa Seeni Sambal)

Banana flowers can be cooked in different ways. This is one way. This tastes awesome and can store for weeks. If you have a banana tree the right time to pick a flower is after it produces all the bananas and then after 2  or 3 petals fallen. Then cut it out and use fresh.  And make sure you pick the correct variety as some kind you cant eat at all. They are very bitter. So make sure when you buy these banana blossoms buy fresh and the correct type. In Sri Lanka we find a huge number of different varieties, the good ones for cooking is Ambulkesel, Seeni kesel or Alu kesel. They taste really creamy.

When buying try to pick small to medium sized ones. Large ones comes with a hard stem. When cleaning take the first few petals out. When you cut it take the middle stem out. It can make your curry or seeni sambal bitter. Adding it to salt water takes a bit of bitterness out and avoid it becoming browning. Add some lemon or lime juice in to the water too.

Banana flowers are full of fibre. So it helps to reduce the 

Fried Banana Flower with Onions (Kesel muwa Seeni Sambal)

Ingredients

• 1 Banana Flower Sliced
• 6 Onions Sliced
• 1 Cup Sprats
•  Hand full Dried Red Chillies
•  Salt
• 1 tblsp Chillie Flakes 
• Curry Leaves
• 2 -6 tblsp vinegar
• Oil for frying
• 1 Tblsp Oil for tempering

Method

• Cut the banana flower into tiny pieces.
• Put that to salty water to avoid browning. Add a piece of lime or lemon in to that water.
• Cut onions.
• Put a pot of oil on the stove.
• Deep fry all the ingredients except chillie flakes.
• Add a table spoon full oil in to a pan.
• Add chille flakes salt and vinegar and all the other ingredients and cook 1 minute.
• Put in sterilized jars or store in frige up to a month.