Read The Best Of Samaithu Paar Online
Authors: S Meenakshi Ammal
The Best Of Samaithu Paar (6 page)
URD
R
ICE
(THAYIR SAADHAM)
Chop the green chillies and ginger. Keep aside. Cook the rice till very soft. Crumble the curry leaves with the salt and add to the rice. Mix well with the rice, using a spoon. The rice must be made pulpy. Add the curd and the milk. Should the rice be loose, increase the quantity of curd or milk or both. Mix well. Heat oil and fry the mustard. Add the chopped green chillies and ginger to the seasoned mustard and fry. Take off fire, add to the rice and mix.
Ingredients
Green chillies
2-3
Ginger
3" piece
Rice
2 cups
Curry leaves
(Broken) 1 tbsp
Salt
2½-3 tsp
Curd
1 cup
Milk
1½ cups
Oil
2 tsp
Mustard seeds
1 tsp
To serve
4 persons
ICE
P
ONGAL
(VENN PONGAL)
Dry roast green gram dhal lightly. Wash and clean the dhal as also the rice. Boil the water in a vessel. Add the rice and dhal. Stir quite often as it cooks. When almost cooked, add salt and cook well. Remove from fire when the water is absorbed completely and the rice becomes very soft.
Prepare a coarse powder of the pepper and cumin seeds. Cut ginger into small pieces. Break the cashewnuts into small pieces. Heat the ghee in a frying pan. Fry the broken cashewnuts lightly. Add the pepper-cumin seeds powder. Fry for a few moments. Add ginger and fry for a while. Add the cooked ‘pongal’ and mix well. Serve hot.
Ingredients
Green gram dhal
½ cup
Rice
1 cup
Water
3 cups
Black peppercorns
1½ tsp
Cumin seeds
1½ tsp
Salt
1 tsp
Ginger
1" piece
Cashewnuts
12
Ghee
¼-½ cup
To serve
4 persons
Note:
Rice and dhal may be cooked together in a pressure cooker till very soft.
WEET
P
ONGAL
(SAKKARE PONGAL)
Mix the milk with water to make 7½ cups (if new rice is being used) or 8 cups (if old rice is being used). Dry roast green gram dhal lightly. Take a heavy vessel. Smear the outside with a paste of rice flour. Boil water and milk mixture in it. Wash the rice and green gram dhal five or six times. Remove stones, if any, and drain completely. Add to the boiling milk and water mixture. Stir quite often. Cook till the rice becomes a very soft pulpy mass and the water is absorbed fully. (Do not strain out the water.) Add sugar or jaggery. Cook over a slow fire, turning it quite often to prevent sticking to the bottom. (You can add 4 tsp of ghee to prevent this.) Keep cooking till jaggery (or sugar) mixes well with the rice and the ‘pongal’ attains a sticky consistency.
Grate the coconut. Fry the cashewnuts, raisins and grated coconut in ghee till golden. Add to the ‘pongal’. Grate the nutmeg and fry in ghee separately. Finely powder it after frying and add to the ‘pongal’. Dissolve saffron in 1 tsp water or milk and add. Powder the cardamom. Add along with borneal flakes. Add 4 tsp of melted ghee. Remove from fire and serve.
Ingredients
Milk
1-3 cups
Rice
2 cups
Green gram dhal
¾ cup
Jaggery or sugar
3 cups
Coconut
½ (Medium)
Ghee
½ cup
Cashewnuts
15-20
Raisins
2-3 tbsp
Nutmeg
½
Saffron
¼-½ tsp (to be used only with sugar)
Green cardamoms
7-8
Borneal flakes
¼-½ tsp
To serve
4 persons
Note:
If sugar is being used, the quantity of green gram dhal may be reduced by a handful and supplemented with a handful of Bengal gram dhal.
ROKEN
W
HEAT
P
ONGAL
(GODHUMAI RAVA PONGAL)
The wheat should be coarsely broken. Steam the wheat with the water in a cooker or steamer. Cook over a slow flame. Add more water, if necessary, to cook the wheat. Keep turning it often so that it does not stick to the bottom of the vessel. When the wheat is cooked, remove from fire and strain out water completely.
Dry roast green gram dhal lightly. Wash well. Cook in 1½ to 2 cups water. When cooked, drain out the water.
Cut the ginger into small pieces. Heat the ghee in a frying pan. Fry the cashewnuts, broken pepper, cumin seeds and cut ginger. Add cooked wheat and dhal along with salt. Mix well. Take care to see the ‘pongal’ does not stick to the sides. Remove from fire and serve hot.
Ingredients
Broken wheat
2 cups
Water
4 cups
Green gram dhal
½ cup
Ghee
3-4 cups
Cashewnuts
12
Black peppercorns
(Broken) 3-4 tsp
Cumin seeds
1 tsp
Ginger
A marble-sized bit
Salt
1½ tsp
To serve
4 persons
DLI
(WITH PAR-BOILED RICE)
Wash the rice twice. Drain water. Soak the rice in 5 cups of fresh water for not less than 2 hours. Wash the dhal twice or thrice. Soak in 2 to 3 cups water separately for not less than 2 hours. The dhal may be soaked with fenugreek seeds.
Grind the rice into a somewhat rough and firm mass in a mixie/food processor, adding enough water. Grind the dhal separately, sprinkling a little water first, till it becomes smooth. Keep adding water, little by little, while grinding the dhal till it becomes very soft, very smooth and spongy. Remove and mix with the ground rice. Add salt. Mix the rice and dhal vigorously together. Transfer the dough to a large vessel, for as the dough ferments it increases in volume. If the container is too small, the dough will spill over the sides as it expands. Keep the lid tightly closed. Allow the dough to ferment for at least 24 hours.
Lightly grease the hollows in an idli tray with oil. Pour a little dough into each hollow. Do not fill the hollow completely as the idli expands while cooking. Boil water in a pressure cooker. Place the filled idli tray in it. Close the lid. Do not put on the ‘weight’. Steam the idlis on a high fire. When the idlis are cooked, water will start dripping from the lid. It takes at least 10 minutes for the idlis to cook well. To check if the idlis are done, open the lid and insert a fork into one. If the dough does not
stick, it means that the idli is cooked. If the idlis are not fully cooked, steam for some more time. When cooked, take out the idli tray from the cooker. Sprinkle water round the idlis. Invert the idli trays to remove idlis. Serve hot with coconut chutney and sambar.
Ingredients
Par-boiled rice
2½ cups
Raw rice
¼ cup
Black gram dhal
1 cup
Fenugreek seeds
1 tsp (Optional)
Rock salt
¼ - ½ cup
To serve
4 persons
Note:
Even if the dhal is of an inferior quality, the idlis will still be soft if fenugreek seeds are used.
If the dough is allowed to ferment for too long, the idlis will taste sour. Thus on hot days, if idlis are to be prepared in the evening, the dough can be prepared in the morning, as it will not need 24 hours to ferment.
DLI
(WITH RAW RICE)
Idlis can be prepared with raw rice as well if par-boiled rice is not available.
Wash and soak the rice for 2 to 3 hours. Wash again. Drain the water completely and powder the rice in a mill or mixie/food processor. Sift the rice powder through a coarse sieve. Knead the sieved rice flour into a firm dough with tepid water. Soak black gram dhal and fenugreek seeds, if being used, for 2 to 3 hours. Grind dhal into a very smooth spongy mass, adding water a little at a time while grinding. Mix with the rice dough along with the salt. Allow the dough to ferment for at least 24 hours before preparing idlis. (See
Idli
on how to prepare the idlis.)
Ingredients
Raw rice
2½ cups
Black gram dhal
1 cup
Fenugreek seeds
1 tsp (Optional)
Rock salt
¼-½ cup
To serve
4 persons
Note:
Pinched curry leaves or a little bit of dried ginger (‘sukku’) may be mixed with the dough.
If the dough is allowed to ferment for too long, the idlis will taste sour. Thus on hot days, if idlis are to be prepared in the evening, the dough can be prepared in the morning, as it will not need 24 hours to ferment.
EMOLINA
I
DLI
(RAVA IDLI)
Heat ghee in a frying pan and fry the semolina till it turns light brown in colour. Keep aside. Chop green chillies and ginger. Heat 2 tsp of ghee in a frying pan and fry the mustard, green chillies and ginger. Break the cashewnuts into small bits and fry in ghee. Mix the seasonings and fried semolina with the sour curd. Add salt.
Boil water in a idli vessel. Cover the hollows of an idli tray with bits of plantain leaf. When the water has boiled, pour out the semolina mixture into the hollows. (If necessary, add water to the semolina mixture so that it can be easily poured.) When the water boils, insert the idli tray into the vessel and steam the idlis. When cooked remove from the tray on to a plate. Repeat till all the mixture is used up.
Ingredients
Semolina
2 cups
Ghee ¼
cup
Green chillies
4-5
Ginger
½"-1" piece
Mustard seeds
1 tsp
Cashewnuts
12
Curd
(Sour) 1 cup
Salt
1 tsp
To serve
4 persons
Note:
Add enough water to the semolina mixture only at the time of pouring out the idlis to prevent them from becoming sticky.
OSAI
Wash the par-boiled and raw rice well and keep soaked in water for at least 2 to 3 hours. Wash the black gram dhal well and soak along with fenugreek seeds, also for 2 to 3 hours. Grind the rice into a smooth, firm paste. Separately grind the dhal into a smooth spongy mass. Mix both together with salt.
If you want to prepare the dosais immediately, mix ½ cup of sour buttermilk with the batter. Otherwise, allow the dough to ferment for 24 hours as for idlis. If the dosai batter is to be used on the same day, do not use fenugreek seeds. If it is to be kept for more than 24 hours, first grind the rice separately. The next morning, grind the dhal and fenugreek seeds together, mix with the rice paste and prepare the dosais in the evening. This will make the dosais tasty and not too sour. Mix enough water to the fermented dough to prepare a semi-solid batter.
Heat a flat pan or ‘tava’ on a low flame. (The ‘tava’ should not be concave.) Pour 1 tsp of oil on it and smear it all over with a soft, clean rag. Pour another ½ tsp in the centre. Pour about ⅕ cup (or a large ladle) of the batter on to the pan and spread into a circle. Cook over a slow fire. Use a flat ladle to scrape the sides and centre of the dosai before flipping the side. Spread a little oil on the side now facing down and cook. When both sides are well cooked, remove from the ‘tava’ on to a
plate. Continue till all the batter is used up. Before preparing each dosai, remember to smear a little oil on the ‘tava’ before spreading the dosai.
Ingredients
Par-boiled rice
3 cups
Raw rice
¼ cup
Black gram dhal
1 cup
Fenugreek seeds
1 tsp
Rock salt
¼ cup
Oil
As required
To serve
4 persons
Note:
If the dhal is of a very good quality or if you found that the dosais tended to stick to the pan when preparing, then use only ¾ cup of black gram dhal for every 3 cups of par-boiled rice.
Add water to the fermented dough in batches to make the semi-solid batter.
Dip the flat ladle used to flip the dosai in a small vessel filled with water. Clean it each time before using.
Nowadays, non-stick ‘dosai tavas’ are available which can be used.