Instant Rava Dosa – Simple and Tasty Snack

  

Thinking about Dosa more fits with the thought of going to a restaurant, sitting in the far-side table with family or friends and ordering hot dosas served along with with some tangy sambar and tasty chutneys that go with it.

Bengalis mostly prefer to eat dosas outside, more so as they think making dosa at home is a long and burdensome process. These are some of the thoughts from my Bangali friends and relatives. If I am to say about this, I’m in two minds. If the batter is ready, then making some dosas at home is not a hurdle at all. But, food from outside does taste so different. So sitting and eating out on a holiday with a plate of crispy hot dosa from the hotplate of a good eating joint does taste heavenly.

A Great Sunday Affair with lots of Goodies – a share of Vanilla Cake and some Sweet Takes…

Yesterday was a Sunday which I didn’t let it go so easily. I knew Sunday was coming and Sunday knew it was also going to make its weekly round as usual. Had thought of going out with family, have a good meal somewhere and then the cold winter evening could be spent buying something or doing some window shopping. But none of these things happened. 

With wishes unfulfilled, I was sure to catch hold of my Sunday and spend my time with this day preparing something in the kitchen. At least some good snacks to come up during evening tea-time…

Vegetable Cutlet – Tea-time snack with a Healthy Twist

Love for Jolkhabar/snacks make me yearn not only to eat but also increases my agility and ability to try and make some at home. The road-side food stall snacks give the inviting look at a glance and also create the desire to taste some. Gluttony sucks in when I see samosas or vadas or aloo-chop or vegetable chops or cutlets, mutton chop or fish chop — God don’t want to name more — being fried in roadside food stalls. Why does such food attract people towards it? …tasty tasty they are… and leaving behind hygiene and quality, this food stuff can simply invite to have a taste of it. That’s when we get trapped and compromise with our taste buds and leave aside everything else and just go and grab it.

Mothers are particular these days about the food for their children. They don’t like to compromise with the health hazards of unhygienic food the children may eat. So health and hygiene conscious mothers make the best use of their capability and cook tasty and attractive dishes at home…children are happy so are Mothers.

Cooking at home gives the advantage of making it tasty and healthy, for people are very health conscious these days. Good quality cooking oil and other ingredients are carefully chosen and bought. The super markets make buying easier at the same time gives the privilege to see and learn about products which we are unaware of.

By now you must be saying, “Enough of your sermons and now come back to your Cutlet recipe which I believe you are going to share”.

Stopping my rant here and having read your mind I’m back to what I want to share.

Biuli Dal-er Boda/ Biri Bora/Urad Dal Vada/ Lentil Fritters

Snacks are so-o-o-o tempting, mainly the deep-fried ones. There are many who like to avoid deep-fried ones, some for health reasons, others for fitness aims and there may be many reasons unknown to me.

Whatever be the intention, the kitchen is wide open to cater to the needs of the different kind of explanations.

No chance of compromise with this serving of Bodas/Boras/Vadas today. Purpose – another snack – easy to make, tasty to eat, appetising to the palate and attractive to the sight, inviting at the first view, and much more but all that ends once you get the bite and taste of it…all in reality.

More so you can call this Bhaji or Bhajjia, or as in Bengali you can call it Tele Bhaja, have your cup of hot tea ready as you relish them. You need not worry for the rain to fall or the cold to give the bite, this snack is for all throughout the year…no time and day specified if you want to cook something that you like.

Coming to the Bodas/Boras/Vadas, it needs some time for the preparation. One needs to think of making it well in advance. 

So to get ready for the Preparation:

Soak 1 ½ cup Urad dal/Biuli dal/Biri Dal, overnight.

Rest of the ingredients:

2 medium size onions chopped

3-4 green chillies chopped

8-10 curry leaves (optional)

Semolina/Suji/Rawa 1 ½ tbsp.

Salt to taste

Oil for deep frying

For the final call:

Make a paste of the soaked Dal, not very fine. To this add the chopped onions, green chillies, curry leaves, semolina/suji and salt. The suji makes the outer coat crunchy. Mix it well.

Once the oil is hot, throw in the fritters/boras/bodas with the help of your fingers or you can take the help of a table spoon. These boras are simple home-made ones, so need not worry about a perfect shape. Be sure the oil is not burning hot as this will not let the inner portion be cooked properly. Fry the Boras/Vadas till it starts getting the brown colour.

Once they are ready, arrange the plate and serve with some home-made chutney of pudina, dhania or tamarind or some bottled sauce will do. Get the bite and smack your lips and in your mind you can say, “Ah! What a snack”. Simply simple isn’t it?

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© gouriguha 2013

Onion and potato pakoras/Aloo arr piyajer pokuri

Tea time. Hah! It’s evening time and with tea what’s better than a plate of something piping hot served with it. The Indian palate likes the tastes of the deep fried pakoras, why alone pakoras, it can be garam garam samosas/singara as in Bengali or even some vegetable chops or cutlets or even…I can just breathe with these thoughts... Why me even others can go on naming so many mouth smacking snacks…hot and piping…to go with their evening tea.

Bah! It’s been a long gap and I’m back. Not that I didn’t cook or eat or had shut down my kitchen, but writing here, I hadn’t been doing for many many days, is it days? no months, no no more than a year. Not that I wanted to stay away so long but something else had held me back.

So what, again the key board has started going tak tak tak and …

It’s so simple to make pakoras. For my dish I’ve used:

Besan or gram flour: 1 ½ cup (sift and keep it aside)

2 Onions  cut into thin long strips

1 potato peeled and cut like (thin) French fries

2 green chilies chopped

Haldi ¼ tsp for colour

Red chilli powder ¼ spoon (add this if you like to feel the heat)

Salt to taste

Baking powder ½ tsp

Water for the batter

Oil for deep frying.

After taking the besan in a bowl added all the ingredients except the oil and water. I’ve used my hand to mix all the ingredients, that’s how I like. To this started adding water and mixed well to get a thick batter…consistency not thin and flowing and not very thick either…my friends have understood for they too make pakoras at home.

Heat enough oil in a kadhai/wok. Slowly in went the dumplings into the hot oil as I sang “you’r my dumpling dumpling hello honey bunny”.  Fried till it got the golden colour and then out they came onto the tissue covered plate. The same tune and the next consignment was done. Why do some jingles make so much impact on a person…don’t have an answer… And the end result you can see from the photo.

There was some dhania chutney to go with it. It’s such a pleasure in winter to gobble up such fries freshly cooked in the kitchen. I think you too like the ones from your kitchen. But, of course, sometimes those served by roadside thelas taste so good. Isn’t it for a change? Think about the hygiene factor ha ha ha…

© gouriguha 2013

Suji (Semolina) Upma

I was in bed for days, down with fever. Even after the fever left me for good, I was not the usual self that I am. I tried to spend some time on my internet, but was unable to sit with it for a long time. So I was left with little reading, posting fewer comments and no posts from my end...really boring lying down all the time.

After feeling better I made Suji Upma and how I relished it, for by now I was fed up with the food I ate. And this upma tasted heavenly, maybe because I didn’t get to eat my normal food for so many days.

I looked for the suji/semolina container which had been misplaced in my absence from the kitchen. Measured a cup of it and dry roasted it till it started to get the pinkish touch. Kept it aside. Took an onion, a big one, and cut it. The onion pieces sat on a plate while I took the next step.

Placed the kadhai on the burning stove and poured 2 tbsp of groundnut refined oil. Once it was hot added some curry leaves and then put in 1 tbsp of chana dal, 1tsp of mustard seeds and once the
spluttering started added the onion pieces and gave it a stir. When the onion started to lose its firmness added 2 cups of water and let it come to a boil. Then came the salt and soon added the roasted suji and kept on stirring. Before the water dried up totally, added 1 tbsp of ghee and my Upma was ready.

I gobbled up the simple dish like someone who had not eaten for days. And then had a cup of tea...felt so good.

Onion and Capsicum Pakoras

Looking in the kitchen cupboard, I found the half-used besan (chick pea flour) packet lying there. The thought of having pakoras for evening snacks struck my mind.

At times I wonder why foods from different kitchens vary in their taste. Why my macher jhol tastes different from that of my mother’s jhol? My sister cooks such a yummy aloo matar paneer...much better than me. Why everyone likes the taste of the Payesh from my kitchen?

So every kitchen has its own smell and taste. That’s how I feel. But don’t forget the person who brings out the taste from his/her cooking to let you find the dividing line of the different kitchens.

I was in my kitchen getting all the ingredients to make the pakora batter which I’m sharing with you.

2 onions thinly sliced.

1 capsicum cut into small pieces.

3 green chillies finely chopped

2 cups of besan

Pour the besan into a bowl. Add the onion, capsicum and green chillies.

Add 1 ½ tsp of baking powder, salt to taste, ½ tsp haldi powder (for colour), ½ tsp red chilli powder into the bowl with the other ingredients. Give it a thorough mix and then slowly add water to make a batter. The consistency of the batter is very important for the pakoras... not a very thin or a very thick batter.

When the batter is ready, time to heat oil in a wok for deep frying.

Drop the batter into the hot oil...the hand does the work to give the uneven shape and size to the pakoras which are deep fried and later placed on the kitchen tissue to drain the excess oil. Fry in batches.

Serve with sweet tamarind chutney or green chutney or tomato sauce and chilli sauce if someone wants it more hot and spicy.

Don’t forget to serve hot tea with the pakoras.