Month: February 2019

Ingredients:

1/4 cup Chana Dal (Bengal Gram)

1/4 cup Coriander Seeds

2 Sprigs Curry Leaves

1 teaspoon Fenugreek Seeds

1 teaspoon Mustard Seeds

2 tablespoons Cumin Seeds

2 teaspoons Black Peppercorns

1 inch pieces of Cinnamon

¼ cup Dry Red Chilies

4 tablespoons grated Dry Coconut

1 teaspoon Turmeric Powder

Method:

Dry roast coriander seeds and curry leaves in a pan over low flame until you smell aroma of coriander seeds turn slightly light brown. Transfer them to a plate. Now one by one roast chana dal , mustard seeds, fenugreek ,cumin seeds, black peppercorns and cinnamon, also roast dry red chilies , grated dry coconut. Let the roasted spices and coconut cool at room temperature , then transfer to a grinder jar. Add turmeric powder and grind them in a blender or grinder until slightly coarse texture. Your Sanbar Masala is ready.

Ingredients:

1-1/4 cups pigeon peas (arhar/tuvar dal)

500 gm shallots, peeled and kept whole

5-6 green chillies, slit

1 tbsp tamarind pulp extract

1 sprig coriander leaves (chopped)

Spice paste:

1 coconut grated

3-4 tbsp sambar powder

1 tsp turmeric powder

1 tsp red chilli powder

a large pinch of asafoetida salt to taste

Tempering:

2 tbsp coconut oil

1 tsp mustard seeds

1 tsp husked black beans (urad dal)

2 dry red chillies, torn into pieces

2 stalks curry leaves

Salt to taste

Method:

Place coconut for the coconut-spice paste in a frying pan over low heat, and dry-roast, stirring constantly, till it turns brown. Cool and grind to a fine paste with 1 cup of water. Mix in spice powders and salt.

Wash dal and place in a pan with onions, green chillies and 2 cups water. Cook over high heat about 25 minutes. Mash when cooked and blend with the spice paste. Add the tamarind extract, bring to boil, add salt to taste remove from heat immediately and sprinkle coriander leaves. Add some biling water if you feel the consistency is too thick.

You can add veggies of your choice (I used drumsticks. chopped tomatoes, diced pumpkin, beans) while sambar is cooked. But make sure you saute all the veggies in oil and add pinch of salt before adding to the sambar

Ingredients:

1 cup urad dal ( Black Lentil husked)

4 cups idli rice ( or any Broken rice)

1tbsp fenugreek seeds

Pinch of salt

1 cup chopped vegetables of your choice (Cabbage, Cauliflower, onion, capsicum, carrots etc,)

2 Green chilli chopped

2 Tbsp. chopped coriander

Cooking oil or clarified butter for frying uttapams

Method for preparing batter:

Soak fenugreek seeds, urad dal and idli rice separately in lots of water for minimum 4 hrs. Soaked black lentil should be washed thoroughly.

Grinding:

Grind the soaked fenugreek seeds, grind black lentil (urad dal) by adding water little by little. This lets the dal to fluff up well. The dal should fluffy and fill the mixer grinder. Transfer the dal mixture in a bowl. Keep aside, And last it is the turn of idli rice, grind the soaked and drained idli rice for about 30 minutes till the rice is smooth, add enough water while grinding. Transfer the batter to the lentil and fenugreek mixture and mix well. Take a bigger bowl which has enough space for the batter to expand while fermenting. Ferment the batter for overnight . Add the salt after fermentation.. Once fermented the batter should have increased in volume. mix the batter well.

Preparing Uttapam:

Heat griddle (Tawa) and coat with little oil , on low to medium heat, pour the one big spoonful of batter and spread it to a desired shape and size, but don’t spread too much. When the batter is still not done on the top, add the mix vegetables , chillies and coriander. Gently press with spatula , drizzle some oil on top and flip the uttapam carefully. Cook till your veggies get nice golden brown to dark brown colour. Serve straight from the griddle to plate with sambar and coconut chutney.

Ingredients:

½ Cup semolina

½ cup rice flour

¼ cup whole wheat flour

1 green chili chopped

1 onion chopped

½ Tbsp.r oasted cumin seeds

½ Tbsp. black pepper powder

Salt to taste

Oil for cooking

Water to make batter (as required)

Method:

Take all the above ingredients in a bowl except water and oil. Mix well , now add 2 cups of water , whisk till you get smooth batter (No lumps). The secret of good dosa lies on the consistency of the dosa batter. Not too thick ,not too thin .

Cover and let the dosa batter rest for 30-15 minutes.

Prepare your griddle on low to medium heat, just before poring your dosa batter , make sure you keep whisking. A ladle full of batter on griddle, cook on low to medium heat. When the top side looks translucent , drezzile little oil or melted clarified butter , flip and repeat the process. You must know that rava dosa take longer time to cook than normal dosa. Make sure your base is golden brown.

Remove from griddle and serve hot with coconut chutney and Sambar.

Ingredients:

2 large ripped tomatoes, chopped

1 tsp urad dal

2 tbsp  coconut oil

1 tsp chana dal

3 kashmiri dried red chilli

¼ tsp turmeric powder / haldi

½ tsp sugar

salt to taste

For Tempering :

2 tsp oil

½ tsp mustard seeds / rai

½ tsp urad dal

pinch of hing /asafoetida

few curry leaves

Method:

In a large pan, heat oil., add urad dal, chana dal, and red chilli, saute on medium flame till dal turns golden brown. Add chopped tomatoes and continue to sauté till the water from the tomatoes evaporates. Now add turmeric powder, sugar and salt, mix well. Let the mixture cool completely and then transfer to a blender. Blend to a smooth paste (without adding water).keep aside.

For Tempering:

Heat oil in a small pan, add mustard seeds, urad dal, hing and curry leaves. Allow to splutter. Then pour the tempering over the tomato chutney.

Ingredients

½ cup fresh coconut chopped

2 tbsp Bengal gram (Chana Dal roasted)

2 green chilies

¼ tbsp. cumin

¼ tsp lime juice

Salt to taste

Water as required

¼ cup coriander leaves (optional)

For Tempering:

1tsp coconut oil

3-4 curry leaves

¼ tsp red chilli powder

¼ tsp mustard seeds

¼ tsp urad dal (split black gram husked)

Pinch of asafetida (heeng)

Method:

Add the coconut, cumin ,green chilies ,roasted gram, lime juice and salt to a blender .Blend the ingredients well without adding water first .then add water little by little to get a smooth coconut chutney. Taste and adjust the salt. Transfer the chutney to a bowl.

Tempering Coconut Chutney

In a pan heat coconut oil on medium flame, add urad dal, stir for 1-2 minutes until the dal turns a little red. Then add a pinch of hing, mustard seeds. When mustard seeds crackle add curry leaves and red chili powder. Pour this over the coconut chutney.

Ingredients:

1 cup split washed urad dal (split black gram)

1/8 teaspoon asafoetida (hing)

1 tablespoon green chili chopped

2 tablespoons cilantro chopped (hara dhania)

1 teaspoon salt

Oil to fry

Method:

Wash and soak dal in about 3 cups of water for about 4-6 hours. Drain the water and grind dal to smooth paste using very little water just enough to grind. Blend for another 2 minutes to whip dal to make fluffy. Transfer the batter in a bowl.

Add all the ingredients to the dal batter, cilantro, green chili, coriander, asafetida and salt, beat the batter for 2-3 minutes this will make the batter light and fluffy. To make sure batter is ready put one drop of batter in a bowl of water, batter should float.

Keeping the right consistency of batter is very important; add water as needed batter should be soft but not runny. When you put the batter on your palm batter should hold its shape.

Heat the oil in a frying pan over medium high heat.

To check if the oil is ready, put one drop of batter in oil. The batter should sizzle and come up but not change color right away.

Wet the palms and take golf size batter and place over your palm, flatten to round shape and make hole in the center looking like donut now with other hand wet fingers slowly slide Vada into the hot oil.Fry the Vadas from both sides till golden brown. Take them out over paper towel to drain access oil.

Serve with Coconut Chutney, and sambar .