Sweet Pongadalu with Coconut

Ingredients:

Raw rice - 1 cup
Grated coconut - 1/2 cup
Cardamom pods -5 tsp
Grated jaggery - 1 1/2 cups
Wheat flour - 1/4 cup
Oil for deep frying

Procedure:

• Soak raw rice for 1 -2 hours.
• Drain the water completely and grind the rice first in a mixie.Then add little water, grated coconut, cardamom pods and grind it to a smooth paste. 
• Add grated jaggery to it and mix well till it dissolves.
• Then add wheat flour and mix well .The batter should be of dosa batter consistency, so adjust accordingly by adding the flour.
• The batter need not ferment, you should make pongadalu immediately after grinding it.
• Heat oil in a small kadai, keep it in medium flame, take a small amount of batter in a small ladle or ice cream scooper and drop it gently into the oil. One pongadam at a time is preferred. 
• When it puffs and float on the oil, turn over and cook the other side also till golden brown(refer notes if it is not comes out in the correct shape). Drain the oil using a slotted ladle and take it out from the kadai. 
• Repeat the same process for the rest of the batter.
• Sweet pongadalu is ready to be served. It can had as a tea time snack.

Notes:

• If it sticks to the pan when the batter is dropped into the kadai, then the batter is thin and need to adjust the consistency by adding little wheat flour.
• If the pongadam gets squeezed and rises up rather than puffing up in the middle and flat on the edges then the batter is thick and need to adjust the consistency by adding little water of 1 tbsp at a time. 

Pappu Chekkalu/Chekka Vadalu

Ingredients:

Rice Flour - 3cups
Maida - 2 cups
Green Chillis - 12
Chana Dal - 1/4 cup
Chilli powder - 1tsp
Ajwain seeds/Vamu - 2tsp
Butter - 1/4 cup
Oil for deep frying
Oil - 5tsp for making Chekkalu
Curry leaves - few
Salt - 2 1/2 tsps

Procedure:

• Soak chana dal for 2-3hours and keep aside.
• In a large mixing bowl take rice flour, maida, salt, chilli powder, ajwain seeds, chopped curry leaves, soaked chana dal and mix well.
• Now crush the green chillis, jeera in the hand grinder or mixie and mix it into the flour.
• Heat butter and add that into the flour and mix well. 
• Now add little water at a time and mix well till the dough is similar to chapati dough. (for right consistency test make sure that the dough is not sticky to hands while mixing).
• Take thick polythene cover (preferably any ziploc cover) to roll these chekkalu. 
• Add 1-2 drops of oil on the ploythene cover and place small ball of the dough on it and press it with fingers evenly till they are thin round shapes as shown in the picture.

• Now heat oil for deep frying and add these pappu chekkalu one by one into it and fry till they are golden in color.

          (Make sure they are not too dark. Because dark colored chekkalu may taste bitter)

• Repeat the process with the remaining dough and let them cool and store it in a dry air tight container. 

Ravva Laddu

Happy Dasara to all my friends and Family. As this is the season of Navaratri specials i just wanted to share at least one sweet with you all. This is one the favourite sweets to the Goddess so i made this sweet this year for Naivedhyam. This is one of the dishes that i made during these 9days and wanted to share with you all. Yet more to come in my next posts.

Ingredients:

Goduma Ravva - 1cup
Grated Coconut - 1cup
Ghee- 3tsp
Cashews- few
Grated Badam - few
Kiss Miss(Raisins)- few
 (i took 1/4 cup of each dry fruits as per our taste)
Sugar - 1 cup
Milk - as needed

Procedure:

• Heat ghee in a pan and fry the cashews and kiss miss till light brown in color and keep aside.
• In the same ghee pan add the goduma ravva on low flame fry them till light golden color and take aside in a bowl.
• Now in the same pan without any ghee add the grated coconut and fry for 5 mins and add this to the goduma ravva bowl.
• Add the fried dry fruits, elaichi powder and sugar to this mixture and mix well. 
• To this add some cold milk 1tsp at a time and mix well till they are lightly wet and good enough to make balls.
• Now make round balls when it is lightly hot only. Because if it is cold it will become hard and when cold serve.
• You can store them in refrigerator for 2 weeks to enjoy fresh ravva laddu.

Tips:

1. Make sure that you do not fry the ravva on high heat. Because it changes the color very easily which makes it taste very bitter. 
2. Be careful while adding the milk to the mixture at the end. If you add more milk it will avoid us to make balls  easily and will be sticky to hands.
3. You can add any of the dry fruits of your choice to this recipe.

Daddojanam (Andhra Style)/ Curd Rice

I generally have this Daddojanam or Curd rice in temples but never tried it at home. But in one of the festivals time i did not get much time to make pulihora so i made this curd rice for the first time by asking this recipe from one of my friends and frankly saying it was not that great that day. But later with some changes to the recipe it was a big hit. First time i mixed the curd in hot rice and also used little curd, and the rice consistency to what it got cooked is also not cooked to the right amount. So to avoid all these mistakes in my second attempt i made some modulations and it came out yummy. But please do remember to follow the right amount of ingredients while doing the recipe to get the perfect Daddojanam.

Ingredients:

Rice - 1cup
Curd - 5cups
Cashews - 1hand full
Chana Dal - 2tsp
Urad dal - 1tsp
Mustard Seeds - 1tsp
Curry leaves - 15
Jeera - 1tsp
Green Chillis - 2
Ginger - 1/2 inch piece
Red Chillis - 2
Asafoetida - pinch
Oil - 1tsp
Ghee - 2tsp
Coriander Leaves - hand full
Carrot - 1/2 cup grated
Keera/Dosakaya - 1/4 cup(optional)
Salt to taste

Procedure:

• First cook rice with 1cup rice and 2 1/2cups water in a pressure cooker and remove it out and let it cool and  keep aside.
• Now make a paste of green chillis, ginger, jeera and salt together.
• Heat ghee in a pan, fry cashews till light brown colour and keep aside.
• In the same pan add the oil(or ghee is fine), chana dal, urad dal fry for 2 mins till light color change
• Add red chillis, mustard, jeera, curry leaves added and fry for 2 mins on low flame. 
• Now in this add the green chilli paste that we made above and a pinch of hing. 
• Now we get an aroma of the hing mixed with all the ingredients.
• This mixture is now mixed into the rice and also the cashews, grated carrot(half of the quantity), grated keera, salt is also added to rice. 
• Add the whipped curd into the rice and mix well till all the ingredients are well mixed.
• Now garnish it with the carrot on top and serve it cool. 

Points to remember:

1. Make sure you mix all the ingredients only after the rice is cool. Otherwise if you add it when hot then it may become hard after it gets cool. So better to add in when cool.
2. Use only fresh curd rather than sour one. Because after sometime it may change the taste to sour, so if we use sour curd it becomes more worst. To avoid this add little more salt too.
3. To get the గుడి(temple) style daddojanam add whole pepper corns instead of green chillis. 

Undrallu/Kudumulu, Aardhi for Vinayaka Chavithi

We generally do this Kudumulu for almost many of the festivals and one main festival we do this is for Ganesh Chaturdhi. This is a very common and favourite dish for Ganesh. 

Kudumulu

Ingredients:

Rice - 1cup
Chana Dal - 1tbsp
Jeera - 1tsp (optional)
Salt to taste

Procedure: 

1. Soak the chana dal overnight in water.
2. Soak the rice in water for 1 hour and let it dry under sun or fan till half dry.
3. Now course grind the rice by just pushing the grinder button to pulse mode and repeat it again depending on the consistency (it must not be very powder or very course. need to see at least some course rice like cream of rice)
4. Now sieve it and keep the course rice aside. 
5. For one cup of rice add 2cups of water and to this add the chana dal and let it cook till done.
6. Now add some salt to taste and add the cream of rice in it and mix well.
7. Keep the lid on it and let it cook for 5-10 mins till done. You will know that it is done when it is not that sticky if you test it by hand.
8. Now make this mixture into small balls (lemon size) and pressure cook them in the idly pan for 10-15 mins and now the kudumulu is ready to serve.

Points to remember(Hints):

• You can directly use cream of rice that we get it from the store by avoiding the steps 2, 3 and 4. But the above method is and old tradition method which gives us the perfect taste of kudumulu.
• Depending on the consistency after adding rice you can add some water if necessary. If it becomes very hard as soon as we added rice.
• Do not mix while adding the cream of rice. Mix it only after adding the full rice into it. If you do mix it while adding it may become very thin consistency.
• If you do not have pressure cooker or wanted to do it in the old method just add some water to a big pot and tie a wet cloth on top of it and keep these kudumulu on it and cook them on stove for 10-15mins.
• Some people do the same procedure with rice flour which is known as undrallu.

Aardhi

Happy Ganesh Chathurthi

Happy Vinayaka Chavithi to all my friends and Family...

Ganesha Chaturthi also known as Vinayaka Chaturthi, is the Hindu festival celebrated on the occasion of birthday of Lord Ganesha, the son of Shiva and Parvathi, who is believed to bestow his presence on earth for all his devotees in the duration of this festival. It is the day Shiva declared his son Ganesha as superior to all the gods, barring Vishnu, Lakshmi, Shiva and Parvati. Lord Ganesha is believed to be God of power, prosperity,wisdom and good fortune. In India, people worship Ganesh before initiating any work or start any travel. Ganesh Festival is one of the main festivals celebrated blissfully and joyfully all over India.

In Andhra, kudumu (rice flour dumplings stuffed with coconut and jaggery mixture), Vundrallu (steamed coarsely grounded rice flour balls), Panakam (jaggery, black pepper and cardamom flavored drink), Vadapappu (soaked and moong lentils), Chalividi (cooked rice flour and jaggery mixture), etc., are offered to Ganesha along with Modakams. These offerings to god are called Naivedyam in Telugu.

In Andhra, Matti Vinayakudu (Clay Ganesh) and Siddhi Vinayakudu (Turmeric Ganesh) is usually worshiped at homes along with plaster of paris Ganesha. But now a days due to the pollution control and other factors that are effecting the natural resources in the process of nimajjanam the new mantra is getting rounds in India i.e., Go Green by using eco friendly Ganesh. So say no to idols made of chemical, Plaster of paris, baked clay, plastic, thermocol (polystyrene). Opt for natural, biodegradable material so that after immersions (visarjan) it does not pollute water and surroundings. Natural products can be used to make the idol such as unbaked clay, coconut, paint with natural colours, etc. 

So by following this rule for this year I made an idol with my own hands which i wanted to share with you all...  Here are some of the pics of our Bojja Vinayaka and our Puja at home. People celebrate in various ways in each place depending on their customs and traditions. In the same way in Andhra too there are different variations especially the prasadams we offer to God. May be the procedures are the same but the name of the item is different. So according to our tradition we offer Kudumulu and Aardhi(Palu ardhi or bellam kudumulu which is called in some of the places). 

For recipes of kudumulu and Aardhi click here :

So here is our Puja: