Since we were good yesterday and had some nutritious mung sprouts soup, we can indulge ourselves today with this crispy kuzhi paniyaram or fried dumplings. Usually this is made with leftover idli batter but since we are on a protein rich theme, we shall make this with cowpeas / one eyed peas / lobia. The husband and daughter loved it so much that they can’t believe they weren’t given this delicacy all this time.
My mother saw this recipe on TV by one of my favorite chefs, Venkatesh Bhat last month. She remembered my protein rich theme and immediately called me. I was so happy with this recipe because it shows that protein rich need not always be only healthy food but can also be fun. This is a lovely snack for a rainy evening, which is what we have been having in Bangalore for the past week or so. When I made this with some cardamom tea, the husband was ecstatic and the daughter gobbled quite a few within minutes.
The only time consuming part is the soaking of the cowpeas for 6-8 hours. The rest of the procedure is as easy as they come. An additional equipment you will need is an appe pan (as shown in the image below)
Once the cowpeas are soaked, all you need to do is grind it with onion, green chillies, curry leaves, ginger and grated coconut. I had the coconut all ready but forgot to add it and so I omitted it. It tasted fabulous even then.
Protein – Cowpeas / One eyed peas / Lobia / Karamani
Recipe from Samayal Samayal TV show
Serves 4
WHAT WE NEED
Cowpeas                  1/2 cup
Onion, medium            1
Curry leaves               1 sprig
Ginger                    1″
Green chillies              1-2
Grated coconut            1 tbsp
Salt
Ghee / clarified butter      to fry
WHAT TO DO
- Wash and soak the cowpeas in 4 cups of water for 6-8 hours, till it can be mashed by your fingers
- Drain the water and transfer the cowpeas to a mixer / blender
- Roughly chop the onion, curry leaves, ginger and green chillies and add to the blender
- Blend all the ingredients together with little water. The batter needs to be of consistency similar to the idli batter
- Heat the appe pan and add ghee to each cavity of the pan till it almost half full with ghee
- Once the ghee is sufficiently hot, use a spoon to drop batter in each cavity of the pan till it is full till the brim
- When the sides of the paniyaram start to brown, use the backend of a spoon to gently turn it around to the other side
- It should be completely cooked within a minute or so
- Take it out of the pan
- The paniyaram will be crispy on the outside and cotton-like light on the inside
- Serve hot with ketchup or any other chutney or dip of your choice
- Enjoy!
NOTES
- According to the original recipe, the onion, ginger, curry leaves and chillies were to be fried in a teaspoon of oil and added to the cowpeas after it was ground to a batter. I did not do so because it would be an additional pan to clean and the daughter is not a huge fan of curry leaves and keeps pulling it out of all dishes to discard. You could do it for a good bite and more pronounced flavours.
- If you end up adding a little too much water while blending, add 1-2 tbsp of rice flour or semolina to thicken the batter
This is my post for the second day of the Mega Marathon for ‘Protein Rich Dishes’.
Check out the Blogging Marathon page for the other Blogging Marathoners doing BM# 80
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