Archive for the ‘SNACKS’ Category

Mixture is a all time favorite snacks for every one .  As Diwali is fast approaching I am going to tell the preparation of Spicy South Indian mixture.

By its name itself, it is a combination of  boondhi, omapodi, fried- groundnuts, cashewnuts , aval (poha or flattened rice flakes) and curry leaves along with red chilly powder, salt and asafoetida.

mixture

Ingrediants

Besan  - 4 cups

Rice flour – 2 cups

Maida – 1 cup

Cashew nuts – 100 gms

Groundnuts – 150 gms

Fried gram – 100 gms (pori or pottu kadalai)

Aval – 100 gms

Butter – 6 tsp

Fresh curry leaves – 1 hand full ( washed and dried)

Chilly powder – 1 Tbl spoon ( to taste)

Salt- 3/4 Tbl spoon ( to taste)

Asafoetida – 1 Tsp

Oil – for deep frying

THUKADA PREPARATION

Ingrediants

Maida – 1 cup

Butter – 1 tsp

Salt – 1 pinch

Sugar 2 tsp (powdered)

Water – to need the dough

Procedure

-Mix  all purpose flour with salt , sugar, butter and water and make it into a dough softer in consistency than roti dough.

-Roll it in to a chapathi ( little thick), cut it into small diamond pieces and deep fry it immediately. If the dough stays for long thukada will become hard. Sweet thukadas are ready. Set aside and allow it to cool.

BOONDHI PREPARATION

Ingredients

Besan ( Gram flour) – 2 cup

Rice flour –  1 cup

Salt – 1/4 tsp

Baking powder – 1 pinch (optional)

Butter – 2 tsp

Procedure

-Mix besan , rice flour,  a pinch of baking powder & and 1/4 tsp  salt in water and make it into a thick but pouring  batter ( of bajji consistency) .

-Pass them into a special boondhi ladle ( shallow rimmed ladle with holes) Rub the batter evenly and quickly through the holes with a spoon.

-It will fall in fine round beads.  Now and then move them gently with a perforated spoon.  Deep fry till it is golden yellow in color.   Remove it form the oil with the help of a perforated spatula.  Allow the excess oil to get drained on a kitchen tissue paper. Repeat the process till all the batter is over.

OMAPODI PREPARATION

Ingrediants

Besan – 2 cups

Rice flour – 1 cup

Salt – 1/4  tsp ( to taste)

Butter or ghee – 2 Tsp

Oil – for deep frying

Procedure

-Mix besan , rice flour,  salt with  water and make it into a thick paste like  batter but a soft one.

-Heat the oil in the kadai.Test how hot it is by dropping a pinch of dough into it – if it sinks, the oil hasn’t become hot enough. If the dough springs to the top with bubbles all around it, then the oil is just ready.

-In your muruku press place the oma podi plate and load

the dough and press it directly into the hot oil. Fry it untill it is golden yellow and crispy.

Crispy omapodi  is ready.

Now set aside boondhi and omapodi.

- In a dry pan just fry the fried gram for about 5 minutes without applying oil.

-Again deep fry groundnuts, cashew nuts, aval and curry leaves one by one.  Allow the oil to drain well in a kitchen tissue before mixing it along with boondhi and omapodi.

-Now mix the chilly powder along with salt and asafoetida.  For getting a even mixture you can just turn one round in mixie.

-Now in a big pan first put the bondhi,  then crushed omapodi,  the fried nuts and aval- curry leaves fry and on the top put the chilly-salt powder mixture and throughly mix every thing form top to bottom so that the chilly- salt powder spreads evenly.

Spicy south Indian mixture is ready to taste.

Omapodi  is another South Indian snacks, prepared using besan and rice flour.  We add omam or Ajvain to it to get a fine flavour.  Omam is very good  for health.  Try to include it in as many preparations as possible.

Ingrediants

Besan – 2 cups

Rice flour – 1 cup

Omam -15 gms (powdered)

Salt – 1  tsp ( to taste)

Asafoetida – 1/2 tsp

Butter or ghee – 1 tbl spoon

Oil – for deep frying

Procedure

-Mix besan , rice flour, omam powder,  asafoetida &  salt with  water and make it into a thick paste like  batter but a soft one.

-Heat the oil in the kadai.Test how hot it is by dropping a pinch of dough into it – if it sinks, the oil hasn’t become hot enough. If the dough springs to the top with bubbles all around it, then the oil is just ready.

-In your muruku press place the oma podi plate and load

the dough and press it directly into the hot oil. Fry it untill it is golden yellow and crispy.

Crispy omapodi  is ready. Allow it to cool and store it in an air tight container.

We can make little variations to make it taste different.

Along with omam powder add 1 tsp of  chilly powder and prepare the batter.

For the omapodi we add for mixture adding omam is optional.  We can add chilly powder alone to do kara omapodi.

The simplest but the most tastiest snacks, easy and quick to  make snacks is karaboondhi.

Ingredients

Besan ( Gram flour) – 1 cup

Rice flour –  1 tbl spoon

Salt – 1/2 tsp

Chilly powder – 1 tsp (to taste)

Baking powder – 1 pinch (optional)

Asafoetida – 1/4 tsp

Cashew nuts – 15-20 nos

Fresh curry leaves – a few

Oil – deep frying

Procedure

-In one table spoon of oil fry the curry leaves and set aside.  Again apply 2 tbl spoons of oil and fry the cashew nuts till they are golden in color and set aside.

-Mix besan , rice flour, chilly powder, a pinch of baking powder &  salt in water and make it into a thick but pouring  batter ( of bajji consistency) .

-Pass them into a special boondhi ladle ( shallow rimmed ladle with holes) Rub the batter evenly and quickly through the holes with a spoon.

-It will fall in fine round beads.  Now and then move them gently with a perforated spoon.  Deep fry till it is golden yellow in color.   Remove it form the oil with the help of a perforated spatula.  Allow the excess oil to get drained on a kitchen tissue paper. Repeat the process till all the batter is over.

-Now mix the prepared boondhi along with fried cashews and curry leaves.

Mouth watering kara boondhi is ready.

We can make little variations to make it taste different.

Instead of adding chilly powder we can add pepper powder.  But pepper powder  should be added only at the end of the preparation of the boondhi.

Further variation you can do is not to add chilly powder with the besan-rice flour batter, but instead sprinkle it after preparing the boondhi, before adding curry leaves and cashew nuts.

Badhusha is a south Indian Sweet made out of all purpose flour(maida) and sugar.  Many feel that it is difficult to make. But it is very easy and infact can be made within 45 minutes.

Ingredients

All purpose flour (Maida) – 2 cups
baking Soda  -1.3 tsp (or 2 pinches)
Ghee – 1/2 cup (Vanaspathi or dalda is optional,  but ghee is prefered and it will stay little long when stored)
Curd – 3/4 cup
Sugar – 3 cups
Water – 1 1/5 cups of water
Cardamom powder – 1/2 tsp
or Rose essence- 5 to 6 drops -for flavur

Procedure


- Mix curd, ghee and a pinch of baking soda and beat it till it froths.
- Sieve maida along with another pinch of baking soda.
-Make dough using curd- ghee mixture, the consistency must be softer  than the chapathi dough.
-Make it into a big chapathi (thickness as that of a chapathi ) , using both the hands make pleats on the rolled dough (just like saree pleats) starting form one end.
-Now you will get a thin strip of folded dough.  Cut this into equal pieces of about 1 1/2 inch and flatten it. We do this to get layers and the badhusha will be crispy. Place this prepared dough in the fridge for about 10 minutes, take it out, leave it covered with a damp muslin cloth for about 10 minutes. Now it is ready for frying.
- In the mean time prepare a 2 string sugar syrup.  For flavor add cardamom or rose essence.
-While the sugar syrup is getting ready preheat the oil. Now fry the pieces of prepared dough till it is golden brown, drain the oil and immediately soak it in the sugar syrup.
-Let it be in the syrup for about 5 minutes. Take it out and place it in a dry plate.  Allow it to cool and store it a dry air tight container.

You can garnish the badhusha with grated & coloured  coconut, or place a roasted pistachio or badam. Roasted cashew doesn’t look that good for garnishing,  because badhusha and cashew colour  are almost the same.


To avoid the crystalisation of sugar syrup while you are frying the badhusah add 2 to 4 drops of lemon juice to the sugar syrup. 


If curd is not available increase baking soda to 1 tsp add to the ghee and make the spongy dough, softer than chapathi dough.

The famous Unniappam is a very tasty delicious rice pudding of Kerala. Though it is done on many occasions, it is considered as a favourite dish which Unni kannan likes. So we can call this as a Janmashatami special. It is also done on the occasion of Karthikai , a Tamil Nadu festival which comes during the month of December. It is also called karthikai appam.

Ingredients

I am sure Krishna Jayanthi special is Cheedai. Let me tell you about the preparation of both vella cheedai and uppu cheedai.

UPPU CHEEDAI

Ingredients

Raw rice – 4 cups
Urud dhal – 1/2 cup (i.e. 8:1 ratio)
Grated coconut – 1 cup
Chenna Dhal – 1/4 cup
pepper – 2tsp (optional)
Jeera – 2 tsp
Asafoetida – 1 tsp
Salt – 2 tsp ( add less or more according to your taste)
Edible oil – for cooking
Butter – 35 gms (appx. 2 tsp)

Procedure

- Fry the raw rice till it turns light red ( ilam sivapu) in color and make it into a little bit coarse powder.

-Again fry urud dhal till it is deep red( nalla sivapu) in color. Allow it to cool and make it into a fine powder.

-Grind pepper and jeera coarsely. If you are not going to add pepper then you can add jeera as whole.

-Soak the Chenna Dhal for 1 hour.

- Now mix the rice flour, urud flour, ground jeera-pepper powder, soaked chenna dhal, 1 cup grated coconut, asafoetida and salt and make it into a thick paste by adding water.

- Make it into round balls of marble size and spread it on a dry cloth.

- Preheat the oil. Just drop 1 ball into the oil. If it raises up then the oil is heated. Drop as much balls as possible allowing sufficient space for the rice balls to cook.

-Fry till golden brown. Drain the oil. Allow it to cool and store it in an air tight container.

VELLA CHEEDAI

Ingredients

Raw rice – 2 cups
urud dhal – 1/4 cup
Jaggery – 2 1/2 cup
Coconut – 1/2 cup ( cut it not small thin pieces ie. pallu pallu -a thiruthanam) )
Sesame (ellu) – 1/4 cup
Cardamom powder (elachi) – 1 tsp
Butter – 35 gms

Procedure

-Fry the raw rice till it turns little deep red in color (i.e you have to fry little more than uppu cheedai ). Make it into little coarse powder.

-Again fry urud dhal till it is deep red( nalla sivapu) in color. Allow it to cool and make it into a fine powder.

-Now take 2 1/4 cup of water in a vessel. Heat it and allow the jaggery to dissolve in it. Decant it into another vessel to remove the mud and other impurities in the jaggery.

-Once the jaggery water starts boiling add the coconut pieces and add the rice flour little by little so that there are no lumps and cool it for 5 minutes.

-Switch off the stove, transfer it into another vessel. Mix with urud flour, sesame seeds, cardamom powder. Make it into a thick paste.

- Make it into small balls of marble size and spread it on a plate. (If you spread it on a dry cloth, then all the moisture will be absorbed and the cheedai will become very hard).

- Preheat the oil. Just drop 1 ball into the oil. If it raises up then the oil is heated. Drop as much balls as possible allowing sufficient space for the rice balls to cook.

-Fry till it is deep brown in color.

Sweet and crispy vella cheedai is ready to be served for the kunju krishans at home.

Medhu vada is one of the most favorite snacks every one likes. It is whole urud dhal preparation.

Ingredients

Urad Dhal – 1 cup (app 200 gms)
Red chillies – 4 nos
Green Chillies – 4 nos
Ginger – half an inch
Salt – 3/4 tsp
Asafoetida – 1/2 tsp (Hing or perungayam)
Oil- for frying

Procedure

-Soak urad dhal in water for 1 hours.

-Grind the soaked urad dhal along with chillies, ginger and salt into a fine paste i.e. when you take the batter in your fingers you should not feel the grains (Add water to the batter little by little so that the batter doesn’t go watery). The batter should be thick. It should not flow freely from the spoon when you pour it down.

-You can either make plain vada just by adding curry leaves and finely chopped coriander to the batter or you can add the following vegetables.

Finely chopped onion, finely chopped cabbage, grated potato, leafy greens (keerai) such as arai keerai, mulai keerai, murungai keerai etc.

-To make the vada crisp you can add a pinch of baking soda just before making it or just mash a boiled potato to the batter and mix it well. By adding boiled potato the vada will remain crisp and puffy for a long time

-Heat oil in a kadai. Dip your hands in water. Take the batter of the size of a small ball in your palm or plantain leaf or a polythene sheet and pat it to form a circle. Dip your index finger in water and make a hole in the patted batter in the center.

-Fry the patted batter in oil till golden brown on both sides. Soft and puffy Vadas are ready to be served with any chutney. It tastes good with coconut chutney or pudina chutney.

-While taking the batter in hand dip your palm in water so that after patting the batter, you can drop it in the oil. If the batter is watery it will not freely drop into the oil. To check if the Vada is cooked fully wash the tip of a knife and pierce the vada. If no batter sticks on the knife then the vada is fully cooked or else it needs more cooking.

DHAGI VADA

The procedure to prepare the vadai remains the same. The only thing we have to do is soak the vada in the curd after deep frying it.

Instead of soaking the vada in the seasoned plain curd let us make the curd little bit spicy by making the following alterations.

Ingredients to grind and mix with the curd:- Green chillies – 2 Nos, Coconut – 1 tbl spoon, Ginger -1/4 inch, Finely chopped coriander - 2 tsp, Hing – 1/2 tsp, Salt – 1/2 tsp

Grind all the above mentioned ingredients and mix it with the curd. Season it with mustard seeds and fresh curry leaves.

or

Just add little bit of salt to the curd and mix it well. Soak the Vada and Garnish it with grated carrot, finely chopped coriander, finely chopped green chillies , karaboondhi and thin omapodi. If you prefer you can add 1 pinch of chat masala.

But remember one thing . The garnishing should be done only at the time of serving the curd vada. Otherwise the garnish will get soaked in dhagi and it will loose its fresh taste

SAMBAR VADA

The procedure to prepare the vadai remains the same.

Instead of soaking it in dhagi you have soak the vada in hot and spicy sambar. For this the sambar should not be very thick. Soak the vada atleat for half an hour before serving. Only then the sambar will penetrate into the vada and will taste good.

If it is soaked for a very long time there is a chance for the vadai to get dissolved in the sambar. Everthing will become together and will not be good to taste. So even if there is going to be a delay for serving the vada, remove it from the sambar and keep it aside and while serving it add the sambar, garnish it with finely chopped corinader andthen serve.

MYSORE BONDA

Ingredients

Urad Dhal – 1 cup (app 200 gms)

Green Chillies – 4 nos

Ginger – half an inch

Grated coconut – 1 Tbl spoon

Raw rice powder – 1 Tbl spoon

Salt – 3/4 tsp

Asafoetida – 1/2 tsp (Hing or perungayam)

Oil- for frying

Procedure

-Soak urad dhal in water for 1 hours.

-Grind the soaked urad dhal into a fine paste along with salt( i.e. when you take the batter in your fingers you should not feel the grains (Add water to the batter little by little so that the batter doesn’t go watery). The batter should be thick. It should not flow freely from the spoon when you pour it down.

-Finely grate the chillies and ginger and add to the batter along with coconut and hing. Season it with 1/2 tsp of mustard.

-You can either make plain bonda just by adding curry leaves and finely chopped coriander to the batter or you can add the following finely chopped onion or carrot. Either you can grate to coconut or make into small pieces and add to the batter.

-Heat oil in a kadai. Dip your hands in water. Unlike vada you need not pat it to form a circle. You can drop it into the oil just in the form of a ball itself.

-Fry the batter in oil till golden brown. Soft and puffy Vadas are ready to be served with any chutney. It tastes good with coconut chutney and sambar.

-While taking the batter in hand dip your palm in water. If the batter is watery it will not freely drop into the oil. To check if the bonda is cooked as you did for vada fully wash the tip of a knife and pierce the vada. If no batter sticks on the knife then the bonda is fully cooked or else it needs more cooking.

Mullu thenkuzhal is one of common seer bakshanams of South India. It is displayed in almost all the occasions in seer thattu.

Ingredients

To prepare the flour for thenkuzhal

Raw rice – 3 cups

Moong dhal -1 cup

Chenna Dhal – 1 handful

Mix the above ingredients and make it into a fine powder.

If you are going to mix it as powders then the ratio is

Rice flour – 3 cups

Moongdhal powder – 3/4 cup

besan – 2 tbl spoon

butter – 1 tbl spoon

sesame – 1 tbl spoon ( for contrast colour use black sesame)

Chilly powder – 2 tsp (Optional)

Asafoetida – 1/2 tsp

Salt – 1 tsp

Procedure

-Mix the flour along with chilly powder, sesame, asafoetida, salt and butter with water into a thick paste but a soft one.

-Heat oil in a kadai. Test how hot it is by dropping a pinch of dough into it – if it sinks, the oil hasn’t become hot enough. If the dough springs to the top with bubbles all around it, then the oil is just ready.

-In your murukku press, place the thenkuzhal plate and load the dough and press it directly into the hot oil. Fry it untill it is golden brown and crispy.

Crispy thenkuzhal is ready. Allow it to cool and store it in an air tight container.

It is one of the easiest snacks made from besan and rice flour. Again this a beginner’s recipe and takes less time for preparation.

Ingredients

Besan – 2 cups

Rice flour – 1 cup

Chilly powder – 2 tsp

Asafoetida -1/2 tsp

Butter – 1 tbl spoon

Table salt – 1 tsp

Oil – for deep frying

Procedure

-Mix the besan and rice flour along with chilly powder, asafoetida, salt and butter with water into a thick paste but a soft one.

-Heat oil in a kadai. Test how hot it is by dropping a pinch of dough into it – if it sinks, the oil hasn’t become hot enough. If the dough springs to the top with bubbles all around it, then the oil is just ready.

-In your murukku press, place the pakoda plate and load the dough and press it directly into the hot oil. Fry it untill it is golden brown and crispy.

Hot and spicy ribbon pakoda is ready.

You can made small alterations to bring different taste.

Instead of adding chilly powder alone you can add the extract of the following.

Red Chilly – 3 to 4
Fennel or sonuf – 1 tsp
Garlic – 4 flakes
Ginger – 1/2 inch (Grind these coarsely and take the juice from the mixture. Adjust the spices as per your taste)

To make the ribbon pakoda more crispy instead of instead of adding 2 cups of besan

add 1 cup of besan, 1 cup of pottukadalai mavu, 1 cup of rice flour.

Enjoy doing ribbon pakoda and post your comments.

Bajji is one of the celebrity preparations on all occasions both normal and festive. It is adeep fried snacks and very tasty. The preparation is very simple and can be done within half an hour. You can call it a beginner’s delight.

Ingredients

Let me first tell you about the basic ingredients of preparing the bajji batter.

Besan – 1 cup

Rice powder – 1/2 cup

(If you want the bajji to be less oily we can even add 1 : 1 ratio of besan and rice powder)

Chile Powder – 1 tsp

Salt – 3/4 tsp

Baking Soda or baking powder – 1 pinch ( Optional)

Turmeric powder – 1/4 trsp

Asafoetida – 1/2 tsp

The above mentioned are the base for any variety of bajji.

Vegetables of your choice

Cooking oil – for deep frying

Procedure

-Mix all the ingredients together and add the required amount of water and make it into a smooth batter of dosa consistency. Allow it to stay for 5 minutes.

-Usually the vegetables used for bajji are Plantain, Onion, Potato, Brinjal, Bangalore Brinjal (Chow-chow), Bread, Paneer, Chillies, Cauli flower.

-Chop the onions ,bangalore brinjal ,brinjal ,potato into circular slices .

Plantain can be either chopped into circular slices or longitudinally.

Try to get fresh paneer fairly large piece. Bread and Paneer can be cut into triangular shapes.

If you don’t want the chili bajji to be very hot, just slit the chili longitudinally, remove the seeds and apply little salt on the inner part of the chili.

Cut the whole cauliflower into 1-inch-thick slices cauliflower florets.

-Heat oil in a frying pan (kadai).

-Take each vegetable piece and dip each of them one by one in the above prepared batter mixture and drop into the oil pan and deep fry until it turns brown.

Delicious bajjis are ready to taste. Serve it with coconut chutney or tomato ketchup.