3 flour murukku it is!

That day when I realised there are no munchies at home and me being me don’t like my family feeding on store bought munchies hence checked my grocery. And I remembered I had bought urad flour from the market last week, so just went on to exploring  making some crispy snack. If we check on to murukku recipe there is no dearth for it with the variety of combinations it has. Hence I thought of going my way.

Picked out rice flour , gram flour, and rice flour and mixed and kneaded  with some spices and extruded using using the chakkuli maker and used the thick seviya strand moulds.

Anyway the The recipe follows....

Ingredients

•   1 cup urad flour
•   1 cup gram flour
•   1 cup rice flour
•   Ghee – 2- 3  tsp.
•   Water – as required
•   Spices – (jeera, ajwain, asoafetida, turmeric powder, chilli powder, pepper powder, sesame seeds)
•   Salt

Method

In a huge bowl throw in all the flours, ghee and spices and mix well and then add water little by little and make a not so soft dough, dough will be sticky so use a fork to start mixing the dough and use your palm at a later stage. Let the dough rest for 10- 20 mins.

Heat the oil and fill the dough in the murukku press and then hold the press above the hot oil and squeeze out the dough in the hot oil. Turn the murukku over and remove it it to a kitchen towel once it stops bubbling.

Note :

The dough will be sticky use a little water to put out just enough dough to fill in the mould.

Fry in high flame

If the dough turns out to be watery add any of the flours  little more since wet dough will absorb oil.

Thanks you 

Chaithanya

Kerala uniyappam recipe

Kerala uniyappam recipe

Kerala uniyappam is a very famous sweet snack of Kerala, it’s also an auspicious snack as it is prepared in temples and also on auspicious family occasions or just any other day too. I personally was not a fan of uniyappam though my mother makes it well during Vishu. But my darling son loves most of the traditional food and one is uniyappam. Usually my mother makes it whenever we visit her and it’s been a long desire of mine to make it by my selves. 

Over the years I have tried many recipes, various combinations and with various rice and flours. I tried with wheat, rava...all those came out good but I wasn’t satisfied with the taste, texture and authenticity.

One of my good friends is an expert in making uniyappam, few years back I tried her recipe too, that was yet another disaster and I just left it there.

Last week I gave another attempt with the same recipe. The taste was very close to what I wanted but the texture was close to a disaster.

So yet another trial with all the courage and prayers and it came out successful.  The taste and texture was just the exact way I wanted.

Uniyappam is generally made using rice flour but here I have soaked and ground the rice to make the appams. Small well ripe banana is an essentially ingredient for making delicious apam. And a few spices mixed in the batter makes beautiful and tasty uniyappams

The recipe follows

Ingredients  

Ponny raw rice or Dosa rice – 1 cup ( note below)

Small well ripe bananas ( elakki )- 3

Jaggery syrup – one cup ( note below)

Water - ½ cup

Cardamom powder – a pinch

Jeera powder – a pinch

Dry ginger powder – a pinch

Coconut pieces - few

White/black sesame seeds – 1 tbspn

Ghee – 2 tsp

Oil for deep frying ( to your preference)

Method

• Wash and Soak the rice for a minimum of 2 hours.
• Grind the rice using sufficient jaggery syrup and water alternatively so that the rice is well ground. Add the bananas and grind again until the rice and banana is blended well. Make sure the batter is finely ground and well mixed. That’s a very important step to get the batter right.
• Add the spices and fry the coconut pieces in ghee and add to the batter. Mix the batter well with remaining jaggery pieces and water, cover and let it rest for 1 1/2 to 2 hours.
• Take and appam pan and keep on flame and add oil (we use coconut oil) once the oil is hot enough reduce the flame and bring it to medium flame.
• If the flame is too high the appam will burn and the centre will remain uncooked and the flame is too low the appam will soak a lot of oil, hence medium flame is advised.
• So when the batter is poured, ideally the appam will rise over, and after few minutes flip the appam once and then drain from oil to a kitchen towel.
• Repeat the same process with the remaining batter and once cooled store in an airtight container.

This quantity will yield about 20 – 25 med sized appams.

Note:

Regarding jaggery syrup, I usually melt one kg jaggery in one cup of water, sieve and store. Used one cup from this syrup.

Regarding appam chatti , you need paniyaram pan/appam chatti for deep frying the appam

I use a cast iron appam pan hence make sure the pan is well seasoned, else chances of the batter sticking to the bottom pf the pan is high and it will spoil the show

Tip: smear the oil and leave the pan for few days before you plan to make appams or if your pan is already seasoned well and good

Regarding rice: Raw rice preferred

If by chance you find the batter is too water add a tbpsn of chirooti rava to the batter.

Thanks regards

Chaithanya

Sev

Came across the recipe of sev recently and since my daughter loves savories, thought of giving it a try too. I made few alterations in the recipe, the main changes made was in the measurement of the flour.The flour measurement in the original recipe resulted in a loose dough .

Ingredients
Heat oil for deep frying.
Fill the mould with enough dough and press out directly into oil .
Deep fry on medium heat till crisp and golden yellow.
Note : making this a bit messy affair since the bengal gram flour is very sticky, so be very careful while filling the mould and placing the blade. 

Hence the altered recipe is as follows :)

4-6 cups of bengal gram flour

2 - 2.5 tsp salt

1/2 tsp turmeric

1/2 tsp asafoetida

1 cup water

oil for deep frying

1/2 cup butter or1/4 cup oil

1/2 tsp cumin seeds and pepper powder

Method

Mix well salt, asafoetida and butter in water until they dissolve ( you may also heat it a bit and let t cool).

Add all the remaining ingredients and prepare the dough

Gathiya ( name as suggested by a reader of my page :) )

That day my family wanted to eat something deep fried and crispy, I searched for different flours in my storage and found urad flour, rice flour and bengal gram flour. I mixed these flours and added some freshly ground spices, made a dough and deep fried in oil. My family loved it :)

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Here goes the simple recipe , all you need is

Rice flour - 1 cup

Urad flour - 1 cup

Bengal gram flour - 2 cups , more if necessary

Butter melted- 1 tbspn

Salt 

Spices - powdered cumin seeds(jeera), carom seeds(ajwain), pepper, turmeric powder, asoafetida, chilli powder

Method

Mix the flours and spices in a large bowl and pour in the melted butter and then slowly add water and knead the dough to a non sticky soft dough. Let it rest for 10 mins or a little more if are patient enough :) .. After that take the chakkali maker , select the mould and put the dough in it after smearing a little oil inside the chakkali maker and close it. Meanwhile keep the kadai on the stove and pour in oil. Once the oil is hot squeeze in the dough in the oil and then fry, strain it once cooked. Done! :) .. Let it cool and store in a airtight container 

Add more bengal gram flour if you feel the dough a little watery. 

Bakarwadi - a spicy deep fried snack

I have eaten bakarwadi of  a famous brand of snack makers of  Pune. Been wanting to try this snack at home since long time and I was delighted to find the recipe in book [Rasachandrika] I bought last week. Tried it last week and it was good!!

Following is the recipe
Ingredients 
Grated onion/very finely chopped = 1 cup
Garlic cloves - 8
Chopped coriander - 1 cup
Garam masala - 1/2 tspn
Grated coconut - 1/2 cup
Green chillies - 4 - 5
Salt - as required
Jeera - a pinch
Ajwain - a pinch
Red chilli powder - as required ( for spiciness and color) u can omit green chilies
Besan ( gram flour) - 1.5 cup

Method
Make a dough of the gram flour with a little oil, salt and water.
For the filling crush the chopped garlic and chillies with salt and mix all th eother ingredients.
Take a small portion of the dough and roll out.
Sprinkle a little of filling evenly on the chapati, roll it and press slightly with the palm.
Cut it evenly into 2 cm broad pieces and then deep fry in oil
Enjoy with a hot cup of tea/coffee!!!

Banana chips

I remember making banana chips years back in my mom's kitchen and had totally forgotten about it, mom never encouraged me to make it after one trial and that speaks everything about it :) . Anyway I never bothered to try this at home until my little girl asked me to make at home. So I thought of giving it a try and I was happy with the result and so my kids when they saw the chips in their snacks box, love the delight on their faces. 

So this is how I made it 

Ingredients
Raw bananas - 2 - 3 long ones
Oil to fry ( I use coconut oil)
Salt - 1 tsp
Turmeric powder - 1/2 tsp
water 2 - 3 tbsp

Method
Wash the bananas and make a thin  vertical slit which makes it easier to peel the skin of the banana and then keep it aside.
Now you mix the salt and turmeric powder in water and keep aside, also keep a spoon handy.
Now keep the kadai on the stove and pour in the oil.
Once you realize that oil is hot enough take a slicer , if you have an adjustable slicer, adjust it to make sure you don't slice it too thin or too thick, slice the banana to the hot oil, the slices starts to fry and once the sizzling sound stops  add the salt and turmeric mixture with a spoon to the hot oil. It starts to sizzle again and once the sizzling stops, remove the chips from oil to drain it to a tissue paper.
Repeat!!
Let the chips cool and store it in an airtight container as long as it lasts! :)

Drumstick leaves pooris

I have tried puris with spinach, fenugreek leaves, tomato, but today it was with drumstick leaves. And as always the verdict are given my my little judges and they happily approved it during their snacks time.

Ingredients

Wheat flour- 2 cups

Drumstick leaves- 1 cup

Green chillies- 1 

Cumin seeds- a pinch

Ajwain seeds- a pinch

Turmeric powder- 1/2 tspn

Garlic - 2-3 cloves

Salt - a pinch

Garam masala- a pinch

Method

Grind the leaves with all the other ingredients and mix with wheat flour and required amount of water to a stiff smooth dough. Heat up the oil in a kadai. Make a slightly bigger ball from the dough,roll it out , cut into four pieces and fry in the hot oil. Remove when cooked and drain in a kitchen towel and serve hot with potato curry, chana curry or spicy chutney or simply tomato ketchup :)

You can make small balls and roll out smaller puris, I mentioned the above method to only save time and effort.

You can replace the Drumstick leaves with any greens or vegetable of you choice and change the flavours/masalas according to you taste.

Done!