Maash / Urad Vada

Day before yesterday was reading a blog on biggest question lingering in every woman's mind and yesterday my cousin called up to ask me "What should I Cook?" 

I cannot give a solution to this universal problem but at least can help in designing a day's menu.

Weekends are supposed to be special with outings eating out and late nights. What if we start our weekend with home cook food and make way for lavish dinners? I don't know how many of you plan not just your activities but also your menu before hand for the weekends. But I do. Because that is the only part of the week when my husband eats his breakfast without saying " Agar mein yeh kha liya to lunch nahi kar karunga".

We Indians are lucky to have a variety of cuisines within our own country to choose from. On saturdays I personally prefer south Indian delicacies which pave a way for heavy sunday lunch or dinner. 

Today I shall give you a nice saturday brunch recipe of Vada with samabhar and chutney. Brunch because the left over sambhar can be easily eaten with rice and any of the fried items like potato fry or fried bhindi/lady finger or simply with boiled and fried eggs or papad combined with pickle and curds. So here we begin.

Ingredients for Vada: 

1.  Maash ki daal/ Urad daal - 1 glass
2.  Rice         - 1/2 cup
3.  Green Chillies - 7
4.  Kothimeer/ Coriander - 1 bunch
5.  Salt  - 1 teaspoon/according to taste
6.  Khane ka soda / baking soda/ sode ka namak - 1/4 teaspoon
7. Oil for frying

Method : Wash and soak daal and rice together overnight or for 6-8 hours. Some may say 4-5 hours of soaking is enough, but daal doesn't get grounded well so does the rice. We are adding rice for crispness. The next morning drain the water and in a mixer put all the ingredients together except baking soda and grind. Do not add water as it will make the batter runny and it cannot be used for frying and it will also absorb a lot of oil. But if you feel the daal is not getting grounded well then you can add little bit of water.

Do not add the whole daal at once.
It will stop the mixer.
Add daal in batches.

Add salt while grinding for proper mixing.

Once the daal is properly grounded, remove it in a mixing bowl add baking soda and let the batter rest for nearly an hour. This is for the aeration, after an hour mix the batter once more, this makes the vadas more fluffy and crisp. This resting period can also be utilised for making chutney/ sambhar.

Now heat oil in a kadhai/wok for frying vadas. Frying the vadas should be the last stage of cooking before serving, as they are piping hot and very crisp.

Now take a handful of batter and flatten it with your thumb simultaneously making a hole in the center but before that dip your fingers in a little water so that the batter falls down easily. 

Turn the vadas upside down to avoid burning. Once they are slightly brown remove them in a plate

Serve hot vadas with sambhar and chutney.








Sambhar recipe in the next post. 
And please let me know if you have tried the recipe. It motivates for doing more.