I started this blog in 2013. I scribbled all my experiments with food and day to day recipes.
You know a secret? at some point, this blog turned out as my personal food journal and I refer this blog while making my own recipes ;)
Now I'm here with my 100th recipe. I'm very happy to post Krishna Jayanthi recipes as my 100th post.
And I Thank all my Friends, Visitors for keeping my blog live and vibrant!!!!!!
Uppu seedai or kara seedai is one of the most important dish for Krishna Jayanthi. Tradetionally its prepared with rice flour prepared at home. Here i have used the store bought rice flour.
Im trying this seedai 3rd or 4th time and it came out in an excellant taste this time. Usually the story of seedai bursting scars people to do it. But to avoid it, keep the seedai balls moisure free by placing in a clean cloth or
news paper for 15 min before frying it.
Frying in batches will helps the seedai get cooked well.Now we can move to uppu seedai recipe,
Ingredients:
Rice flour - 1 1/2 cups
Urad dal flour - 1 1/2 tsp
Butter - 2 tbsp
Red chilli powder - 1 tsp
Hing - 1/2 tsp
White sesame seeds - 1 1/2 tsp (fry it in a pan till it turn light brown)
Salt - as required
Water - as required
Oil to fry- any cooking oil, coconut oil gives more taste and aroma.
Method to make Urad dal flour:
In a pan take urad dal 3/4 cup and fry till it turn golden brown.
Remove from heat and cool it down.
Grain it to fine powder.
Sieve it using a sieve/strainer for twice.
Now store the flour in a air tight box.
It stays fresh for 2 to 3 weeks.
Method:
In a pan take the rice flour and fry till for 2 min in medium flame. Remove from the heat before it turn brown.
Let it cool down.
In a wide bowl take rice flour, urad dal flour, hing, red chilli powder, fried sesame seeds, salt, butter and mix well.
 |
| Adding urad dal flour |
Now start sprinkling water to the mix and make a soft dough.It should not be too hard or too soft.
Once the dough is ready, rub your palms and fingers with ghee, take the dough in small portains and start making small balls.
Roll it in a way as we do for gulab jamuns. Avoid pressing it too hard. Do it in a smooth way.
Place the balls in a clean cloth or news paper. Let them rest for at least 15 min before frying it. By doing this the paper absorbs the extra moisture and avoid busting.
Heat the oil, once its ready place one or two seedai balls and make sure its not busting. stay one step away for your safety.
Add first batch in oil and fry it in medium heat. Turn it once in while. Fry till the sizzling sound calms down.
One the sound slows down and stops, remove form the oil and place it in a paper towel. You will see a light brownish shade seedai.
It will turn little dark after sometime.
Now crispy and tasty uppu seedai are ready.
Let it cool down and store it in a air tight container. It stays fresh for a week.
Tips:
Prepare rice flour and urad dal flour the day before and store it in a air tight container. It will save time.
Fry the rice flour in medium heat and make sure its not get burnt or roasted too much.
Use the room temperate butter or melt the butter slightly.
While frying keep the flame in medium, so that it cookes well inside out evenly.
If you feels the seedai is hard, add some butter to the dough.
Fry it in batches to avoid over crowed in oil and it makes space for all seedai cook evenly.
Add little more red chilli powder if you want spicy seedai.
Vella seedai one of the special sweet made for Krishna Jayanthi. In South India Krishna Jayanthi/ Gokulashtami is not completed without Vella seedai and Uppu Seedai .Vella seedai is made of rice flour and jaggery and uppu seedai is just with salt and little chilli powder. Follow the tips below to avoid bursting which is one of the common fear in making seedai. Lets go to the recipe,
Ingredients:
Rice flour- 1 1/2 cups
Urad dal flour - 1 1/2 tsp
Jaggery- 3/4 to 1 cup (my jaggery is less sugary so I added 1 cup)
Shredded coconut - 2 tbsp
White sesame seeds- 2 tsp (fry till it turn light brown without oil)
Butter -2 tbsp
Oil to fry
Method:
Fry the rice flour in medium flame till it turn light brown and the aroma arises.
In the mean time prepare the jaggery sauce.
Jaggery sauce:
Take jaggery in a pan and add water till it cover the jaggery.
Boil it in medium flame.
Once it reach the thick sauce consistency switch off the stove and remove from the heat.
Make sure it doesn't reach the one string consultancy.
Take the rice flour in a wide bowl, urad dal flour (check here for how to prepare urad dal flour)add fried sesame seeds, shredded coconut, butter, and mix well.
Now slowly start adding jaggery sauce. Add the required jaggery sauce, if its start sticking stop adding.
Sprinkle required water, repeat the process till you get a soft dough.
Once the dough is ready, start making small gooseberry size seedai balls (little bigger than uppu seedai).
Follow the Uppu Seedai method to make the balls by applying ghee in both hands.
Place it in the news paper or clean cloth for at least 15 min before frying it.
Heat the oil in a pan. Make sure the heat is medium to low. High heat turn the seedai dark outside without getting cooked inside.
First check with one seedai if its bursting. Remove it from oil and add the first batch.Stay one step away from stove for safety.
Flip them slowly and carefully once in a while to make sure it cook evenly all the sides.
Once it turn brown colour, remove from oil and place it in a paper towel.
Repeat the process to the rest of the seedais.
Do it in batches.
Let them cool down completely. Store it in a air tight container.
Finish it off in one week as we are adding coconut to it.
Tips:
You can fry the rice flour and urad dal flour the day before preparing the seedai and store it in a air tight container. It will save time.
Make sure the flour is not burnt while frying.
To avoid bursting, place the seedais in news paper before frying. (making them moisture free)
You will see cracks after frying it which is common in vella seedai.
If the seedai balls start separating after placing it oil, it may be because the ratio of jaggery is more, so fry some rice flour and add it to the dough.
It may be also the heat is high. Bring it to medium to low heat and start the batch.
Bring the butter to room temperature and slightly melt it before adding to the flour mix.
Paal poli is one of the Tamil New Year sweet in our household, along with pooran poli.I like paal poli than pooran poli. Though its not made on regular days,its one of my favorite sweet. This method I learned from my Mother in law. The method is little different than the regular paal poli but it tastes exactly same.
Here the poori is soaked in the sugar syrup and required milk is added finally before serving. One of the advantage is, the sugar dipped pooris can be stored for a week and the paal poli can be instantly made. Here goes the recipe,
Ingredients:
Yield 8 to 10 pooris
Maida/All purpose flour - 1 1/2 cup
White Rava / Semolina - 1 tbsp
Sugar - 3 cups
Water - 2 cups
Cardamom powder - 1/2 tsp + 1/4 tsp
Salt - a pinch
Food colour - a pinch (optional)
Milk - as required
Oil - as required
Ghee - 1 tsp
Method:
Method for Sugar Syrup:
Take 3 cups of sugar and 2 cups of water in a wide pan and boil.
We need the one string consistency for the syrup.
Let it boil till it reach the consistency.
Add cardamom powder 1/2 tsp, food colour a pinch and remove from heat and keep aside.
Method for making poori:
In a wide bowl take the maida flour, add salt, rava and ghee 1 tsp and start kneading the flour adding required water.(pour the water slowly)
It should be firm and soft like poori dough.
Keep it covered for 30 to 40 min
Make small balls out of the dough and roll it into flat pooris using the chapati roller.
Dust it with maida flour if it sticks.
Heat oil in a wok and fry the pooris both sides and place it in a paper towel.
Now dip the poori into the sugar syrup one by one.
Flip both sides.
Let them sit for few min in the syrup till it get soaked well on both sides.
Remove from the syrup and place it in a plate or wide bowl.
Now the poori is ready to get dipped in the milk.
Method for paal poli:
Boil required milk ( approx 2 to 4 cups).
Boil until it get reduced in quantity a little.
Add cardamom powder 1/4 tsp, stir well and remove from the heat.
Place the fried pooris in a wide bowl and pour the required milk over the pooris.
The pooris should get soaked completely in the milk for 30 to 60min before serving.
Serving:
Place the soaked poli in a serving bowl, pour the soaked milk, sprinkle some finely chopped badam/almonds or cashews and serve.
Serve it chilled by refrigerating it or hot. Both tastes good.
Note:
Prepare the sugar syrup simultaneously while preparing the poori dough and frying poori. It will save time.
Cool the sugar syrup before dipping the poori.
Soak the pooris completely in sugar syrup before placing it in the boiled milk, as we are not adding any sugar to the milk.
Store the pooris in an air tight container or zip lock and refrigerate it to stay fresh.
A simple Vethakuzhambu with added paruppu urindai is the yummy paruppu urundai kuzhambu. It goes well with idly, dosai, steamed hot rice. I prepared this for idly. It tasted so yum. The spicy and tangy taste from the kuzhambu mingles with parruppu urundai and gives a delicious flavor to the food.
Ingredients:
For Paruppu Urundai:
Toor dal - 1/2 cup
Channa dal - 2 tbsp
Red chilli - 4
hing - 1tsp
Salt
Oil - 1 tsp
Mustard seeds - 1/2 tsp
For Kuzhambu:
Small onion - 4 to 5
Tomato - 1/2
Garlic pods - 4 numbers
Tamarind - small lemon size
Mustard seeds - 1 tsp
Fenugreek seeds - 1/2 tsp
Channa dal - 1 tsp
Curry leaves - 5 to 6
Sambar powder - 1 tbsp (if your sambar powder is spicy, make it 1/2 tbsp)
Turmeric powder - 1 tsp
Sesame oil - 1 1/2 tbsp
Salt
For Grinding:
Coriander seeds - 1 tsp
Channa dal - 1 tsp
Urad dal - 1/2 tsp
Hing - a pinch
Coconut - 1 tbsp
Oil - a drop
Method:
For Paruppu urundai:
Soak both the dal for 1 hr.
Grain it with red chilli, hing and salt without adding water. Grind it to coarsely.
Heat oil in a pan and add mustard seeds, once it splutters, add hing and grinded dal.
Fry for 2 min and remove from flame.
Once it become warm, grease the idly plate with oil, make small balls of the dal paste and place it in the plate.
Steam cook for 15 min.
Remove from the plate and keep ready to place it in the kuzhambu.
For kuzhambu:
Soak tamarind in 2 cups warm water and keep aside.
Peal the skin from small onion and cut tomato into small pieces.
In a wide pan (we are going to add the paruppu urundal so the pan should have wide space) heat oil.
Add mustard seeds, once it splutters, add channa dal, curry leaves, fenugreek and fry for few seconds.
Add the onions, garlic and fry for a minute.
Add the chopped tomato, sambar powder, turmeric powder, little salt and fry till the tomato become mushy and oil ooze out.
Pour the tamarind puree and add 2 more cups of water. We need the kuzhambu little watery, as after adding paruppu urundau the kuzhambu becoms thick.
Keep the flame in medium and let it boil till the raw small from the tamarind and sambar powder goes off.
In the mean time, fry the ingredients to grind in a drop of oil.
Grain it to a fine paste adding required water.
Once the raw smell goes, add the ground paste to the kuzhambu.
Let it boil for 10 min.
Now slowly add the paruppu urundai to the kuzhambu.
Keep the flame in medium-low or low and boil it till the balls get cooked in the kuzhambu.
Once its ready take a ball and check if its cooked well.
Boil for some more time if its not cooked.
Remove from pan and serve hot.
