Upma Kozhakattai

Back to blogging :) I was away from blogging for a while but definitely not from cooking.

Upma kozhakattai is steamed dumplings of rice upma. You can just make this as arisi upma in a crumbled form or make neat balls. In the former case, I follow a slightly diff list of ingredients/ method and make it more spicy and flavourful. This is a simple and standard dish made at home and fits as anytime meal. I like it a bit spicy with addition of chillies. I specially love to eat the upma that gets into the broken red chillies and comes out red :)
Tomato/cilantro/pudhina thokku or sambar is a classic combination. I will post the recipe for tomato thokku, soon.

Ingredients:
Coarsely Broken rice (Wash the rice, dry in a paper towel and quickly pulse in a blender/mixie) - 1.25 cups
Grated Coconut - 1.5 tablespoon (or even 2 if you want it rich and flavourful)
Finely chopped green chillies - 2 to 3
To Season:
Channa dal, urad dal - a tsp each (optional - The authentic method doesnt need this)
Dry red chillies - 1
Hing/Asafoetida - a pinch
Mustard - 1 tsp
Curry leaves - a handful
Oil - a tsp or 2 (You can also use coconut oil if you like the flavour)
(You can reduce the chillies. The original recipe has the coconut, dominating and less spicy)

Method:
1. Heat the oil, add the dal, hing, red chilli and mustard. When the mustard pops, add curry leaves, green chillies and coconut. Saute for 10 seconds.
2. Add 3.75 cups water( 3 times that of rice). Bring it to a boil and add salt to taste.
3. Slowly mix the rice rava without any lumps. Cover and cook till almost all the water is absorbed and rava gets cooked.(Retain a little moisture to help make the balls)
4. Set this aside for sometime to cool down. However, it should have a little heat left to make the balls. Taste once for the salt content and adjust. Rice rava might require a little more than normal rava.
5. Now make elliptical balls and steam in a pressure cooker at medium heat for 10 to 15 min. Don't use the weight.
Serve hot with pudina/cilantro/tomato chutney or sambar.

Tips:
1. You can make the rice rawa and store it. If you are planning to store the rawa, the rice should be completely dried. Alternatively, you can use the readymade idly rawa. It's good enough.
2. You can add some grated carrot as a variation to make it colorful.

Adai Avial

Adai is a protein rich food made of lentils. I also add greens to my adai as an enrichment. It is traditionally served with avial (a vegetable stew), jaggery and butter. The protein rich adai with vitamin rich avial, iron rich jaggery and fatty butter makes a balanced diet. Iron is best absorbed along with proteins and I wonder how the elders arrived at this combination.

When it comes to variation with the recipe, the options are unlimited. Sometimes, I add spinach or drumstick leaves, sometimes, shredded cabbage and so on.

Normally, channa dal, urad dal & rice are added to the batter. However, I add toor dal and moong dal also. This time I have used black urad dal which is more nutritious than the skinless urad dal. You can include any kind of lentil to the batter and the dish tastes yummy with just anything. This is a healthy, balanced diet for kids and can be served as a rich evening snack or an early dinner.

Ingredients:

Onion - 1 medium chopped
Spinach - a few leaves (optional) or shredded cabbage (optional)
Oil - 2 tsp/adai to cook & grease the adai (You can reduce it to 1 tsp. I use sesame oil)

For the batter:
A bowl of lentils & rice(Channa dal, rice, urad dal, toor dal, moong dal) - I use equal proportion of the dal varieties and a handful of rice. This time I used black urad dal and used a little less than normal.
Shallots or sambar onions - 5 to 10
Cilantro - 1/4 bunch
Red Chillies - 4
Green Chillies - 1
Ginger - a medium piece
Curry leaves - 10 to 15
Salt to taste
Hing a pinch



Method:
1) Soak the lentils, rice and red chillies for 2 to 3 hrs. Add the rest of the ingredients and grind them to a coarse paste adding water. It should be coarse to get crispy adai. Just whip once or twice.


2) Mix the chopped onions to the batter. Add a little water. It should be of dropping consistency; not so watery.
3) Heat a griddle, drizzle a little oil. Pour the batter using a ladle and spread it to make a perfect round. Don't make it very thin like dosa. After pouring a batter, just spread a little using the ladle. Drizzle oil and cook on both the sides till golden brown. This take a slightly higher cooking time than dosa. So be patient.

Serve hot with avial, jaggery (optional) & a dash of butter on the adai (optional).

Check out the avial recipe here.
I served adai with avial, capsicum chutney, butter & jaggery.



Variation: You can add a handful of shredded cabbage or chopped spinach ( 5 leaves) to the batter. In that case, add just before pouring on the tawa.



Sending this to Susan's My Legume Love Affair 14