Vepampoo Rasam / Neem flower Rasam

This is one of the easiest and flavorful rasams I have come across and it is my mil’s recipe. The most difficult part about this rasam is soaking the toor dal and extracting tamarind juice, which is simplified even more if you use tamarind paste and cooked dal. 🙂 Neem flowers are supposed to have slight bitterness to it, but this is not at all bitter. ( If you prefer some bitterness, feel free to add more vepam poo than specified in the recipe). The sourness from the tamarind and spice from the chillies balances out any bitterness that the vepam poo brings to this dish.In fact it tasted pretty much similar to our usual rasam and I was pretty surprised when my mil said she did not add any rasam powder to it.

We use dried neem flowers in this recipe. It should be available in grocery stores in India. It is also pretty simple to make if you want to do it yourself. My mil has a neem tree outside her house in Chennai and she she told me that she spreads a cloth in the ground and collects the flowers which is then dried in the sun and used in recipes like these. So if you come across neem flowers somewhere , you can air dry it in the sun and store it in an airtight container for few months. Neem flowers are super healthy and they help flush out the toxins from your body.