REAL JAM RECIPES! » Snacks

Pakora

Maria — Wed, 02 Apr 2008 17:22:26 +0000

Pakora is vegetables fried in dough. You can use for pakora almost all the veggies, just cut them in equal pieces so that they are cooked at one time. I usually serve pakora as a single dish, with or without chutney.

1 ½ cup besan
3 onions, sliced
1 large potato, finely sliced
1 tbsp ginger, grated
4 green chilies, sliced
1 tsp chili powder
1 bunch cilantro (coriander), chopped
3 tbsp ghee or butter
pinch of soda and salt
oil

1. Stir 1 tbsp ghee with soda, until mixture bubbles. Combine with besan, ginger, chili powder, salt and ghee and add enough water to get thick dough.
2. Add vegetables and cilantro and mix well. Heat oil in a big saucepan to 180 C.
3. Scoop dough with a spoon (moistening spoon in hot water) and put into a pan. Fry until goldish.
4. Put pakoras on the rack to let grease flow down. Serve up with coconut chutney or tomato dressing.

Alupatra

Maria — Sun, 23 Mar 2008 15:33:03 +0000

Alupatra is a variety of samosa with potato filling. Once I’ve tasted it, I understood why it’s one of the most popular Indian dishes nowadays. You can add also some fresh panir cheese for diversity.

4 potatoes
2 tbsp grated coconut
2 tsp ginger, grated
2 pods hot pepper, sliced
1 tbsp coriander leaves, chopped
2 cups wheat flour
2 tsp sugar
1 ½ tsp salt
2 tsp sesame seeds
2 tsp garam-masala
½ tsp turmeric
¼ tsp red Cayenne pepper
½ cup water
2 tsp ghee butter
ghee or oil for flying-up in deep fat

1. First of all make a filling. Boil potatoes in their jackets and peel them. Mash potatoes together with grated coconut, all spices, hot pepper, sugar and 1 teaspoon salt.
2. Combine flour, turmeric, Cayenne pepper and ½ teaspoon salt in a big bowl. Rub ghee into flour. Pour in water and make dough. The dough must be tender and springy.
3. Roll out dough in shape of rectangular flat cake 3 mm thick. Place evenly potato blend on top. Collar dough.
4. Slice the roll: the slices should be ½ inch (1 cm) thick.
5. Heat ghee or oil in a deep-fryer or deep pan. Immerse slices into the fryer and cook 3-5 minutes until goldish color.

Delicious Indian snacks

Maria — Sat, 22 Mar 2008 21:54:51 +0000

Today I want to say some words about Indian appetizers and snacks. They consist of many ingredients, such as potato, onion, spinach, chili, and can be called by right vegetarian dishes; they are cooked in rich spices and look very decorative. Indian appetizers can be served as a main dish or an addition to other courses. They will perfectly suit you if you want to snack between dinner and supper. I like to cook it for my children because they always want to filch something dainty from the kitchen. They are simply enraptured with these fragrant snacks; in my turn I’m glad to offer them more than a usual sandwich or even worse harmful chips.

A lot of Indian snacks are taken with chutney and tea. Some of them, for example pakora and seeval, can be cooked right away; samosa and kachori take more time, but no sooner you taste it than you forget a long cooking process at one stroke.

Many appetizers of Indian cuisine cannot be done without ghee, anyway I usually use it for frying-up. Once I tried to replace it with vegetable oil, but I’ve drawn a conclusion that snacks with ghee have much more exquisite taste.

Another component commonly used for Indian snacks is chickpea flour (also known as gram flour or besan). It has a special taste, and it’s easy to find in any oriental grocery.