Street food is famous all over India, and tamarind sauce/chutney called sont is served along with samosas, dahi vada, chaat, allu tikkas, and other savories. Sont is a tangy sweet and sour, spicy sauce. You can turn the spice up or down in it, depending on your taste. While it is readily available at the local “halwai,” the owner of a store that cooks and sells Indian halwa (sweets and savories), it is easy to fix at home.
I modified this recipe from the one I learned from a friend, Mimi. Our husbands were doing a year-long course at the Defence Services Staff College in Wellington, which was located in the Nilgiri hills in Southern India. Mornings were a fun time for the wives while the husbands attended the course and the kids were at school. The morning coffee/tea parties lead to a lot of recipe exchanges! Our cooks were always happy to let us take over the kitchen.
Sont (Tamarind Sauce)
Ingredients
- 2 cups water
- 1 tsp tamarind paste (available at Indian grocery stores - see notes)
- ¼ tsp chili powder (or to your taste)
- 1 tsp cumin powder
- 3 tbsp brown sugar or jaggery
- 2 tbsp white sugar
- 2 tbsp chaat masala (available at Indian grocery stores)
- 2 tbsp black salt
- ¼ tsp garam masala
- ¼ tsp black pepper powder
Instructions
- All ingredients are to your taste, so feel free to increase or decrease the ingredient accordingly.
- Place all ingredients in a saucepan on medium heat. Stir well until nicely blended and bring to a boil.
- Reduce heat a bit and let simmer, occasionally stirring, until the sauce thickens. It should have a consistency a little thinner than ketchup.
- Turn off the heat and allow it to cool, but be sure to stir it a few times while it is cooling, so it doesn't form a film on top.
- Refrigerate when cool.
- Serve cold chutney with chaat, samosas, pakoras, allu tikkas. I also enjoy it with boiled channa or boiled potatoes mixed with yogurt.
