Medhu Vadai

This snack item is very famous one in whole of south India. In Tamil Nadu almost all the hotels serve this with any breakfast item you order. Idli-vadai, pongal-vadai, dosa-vadai even with puri – vadai is served. This vadai has various names – medhu vadai, ulundhu vadai, sambar vadai, thair vadai, rasa vadai… Here is how I prepare it.

Ingredients:

Urad dal-  1 Cup or 200 grams

Onions – 50 grams

Green chilllies – 20 grams

Pepper – 5 grams

Rice flour – 1 spoon

Curry leaves – few

Salt – to taste

Oil – for frying

Method:

• Soak the urad dal in water for 4 hours. We can make medhu vada just by soaking the dal in water for 45 minutes but if we soak it for more hours then we would get more softer vadas
• After 4 hours, drain the water and add the urad dal to the mixer/grinder.
• Grind the urad dal first without adding water. Grind it into a soft paste by adding as little water as possible.
• Now take the urdal batter in a bowl and add salt and mix well. Add finely chopped onions, green chillies, curry leaves and pepper powder. Add the rice flour and mix well for about 2-3 minutes
• Now heat oil in a pan, and when the oil is hot, test it by dropping a little batter. If it raises immediately in oil, then we are ready to make vadas.
• We need to wet our hands and take a small quantity of the batter and roll it to a ball and make a small hole in the center and gently drop in the oil.
• When the vadas are fried enough in one side, use the spatula to turn it to other side.
• Allow the vadas to fry in oil in a medium flame and when bubbles ceases, we can take the vadas out of the oil.
• Dry it in a tissue paper to remove excess oil.

Serve hot with chutney or sauce.

Tips:

• If we are using a mixer to grind the urad dal, we might need to add more water. To overcome this, we can add little urad dal powder to the batter and mix well before making vadas.
• I have added onions and chilllies to this vada, so that it can be eaten without any side dish.
• I add one spoon of rice flour so that the vadas become crisp.

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Home Made - Whole Wheat Sweet Bread

It has been my long term wish to bake a bread at home... After much surfing and checking recipes, videos I finally succeeded in making one. After the experience I think, if we plan to bake ordinary breads, like the ones we get in stores then efforts will pay off only if we bake in large quantities. If the plan is to bake just one loaf, then I would suggest buying it. But then the advantage of baking at home is that we are sure about the ingredients that went in.

So I decided to bake a whole wheat sweet bread, since this is not easily available at stores. I took a mix of various recipes. And the dough preparation techniques from Vah re Vah.

Ingredients:
Whole wheat flour - 3 cups
Water - 1 cup
Butter - 50 grams
Yeast - 20 grams
Sugar - 50 grams
Raisins - 25 grams
Salt - to taste

Method:

• Heat the water to about 50-60 degree Centigrade. The water should be luke warm and not hot otherwise the yeast will die of. 
• Add the sugar and dissolve well. Add yeast and keep it aside for about 15 minutes.
• Meanwhile mix the wheat flour, salt and raisins evenly and keep aside.

• After 15 minutes the yeast should have bubbled up. Heat the butter and add it to the yeast water and mix well.
• Add the flour mix little by little and knead it into a dough. 
• The texture of the bread depends upon how well you knead the dough. I kneaded the dough for about 10 minutes until it became soft. There is a technique called "folding the dough" which is explained very well in the vah re vah site which I have linked earlier. Folding the dough will make the dough soft and gives a smooth and shiny look to the dough.
• Now grease the dough with little butter. Cover it with a wet cloth and keep it in a warm place for about 2 hours.
• After 2 hours the dough would have risen to double its size.
• Now grease the bread container with butter. Take the dough and punch it gently so as to release the air.
• Knead it for another 2 mins. Make it in the shape of the container and place it in the container which we have already greased with butter. 
• Close it with a wet cloth and leave it aside for about 45 minutes.
• The dough should have again risen in the container.
• Now pre-heat the oven at 185 degree centigrade.
• Bake the bread for about 30 minutes.

After baking, remove the bread from the container and place it in a wired rack and allow it to cool.
Slice the bread and make interesting sandwiches.

People at my place didn't have the patience to allow the bread to cool completely. Even before I cut the bread into slices people started munching it. To my delight they loved it. The bread came out wonderful and it was interesting to eat it with butter and jam.

Linking this post to the Cooking with whole foods event guest hosted by Nivedhanam

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Oats and Coconut cookies

I got the idea of making this cookie from Zesty South Indian Kitchen. The cookie tasted wonderful. I made little changes to the recipe. Please visit Zesty South Indian Kitchen for the original recipe.

Ingredients:

Dry Ingredients:
Oats - 150 grams
Wheat flour - 100 grams

salt - ½ teaspoon
baking powder - ½ teaspoon
bicarbonate of soda - ½ teaspoon 
desiccated coconut - ½ cup 
Chocolate chips - 25 grams

Wet Ingredients:
Vanilla Essence - 1 teaspoon
Butter - 30 grams
Honey - 30 grams
Caramel - 20 grams

• In a bowl add all the dry ingredients except chocolate chips and mix together. 
• In another bowl add the honey, butter, Caramel, vanilla essence and mix together.
• Make a well in the centre of the dry ingredients and slowly add the wet mixture. Combine together to make dough. Add a little more flour if the mixture becomes too wet.
• Bring the dough into a ball and cover and refrigerate for 30 minutes.
• After 30 minutes divide the dough into walnut sized balls and place them on an oiled baking tray. Don’t place them too close together.
• Using the flat bottom of a glass, press the walnut sized balls down to flatten them into cookie shapes about 5 mm thick. 
• Place the chocolate chips and press them into the dough.
• Preheat oven to 350 º F / 180 º C. Bake cookies for 20-25 minutes till golden brown.

Transfer to a baking tray and allow to cool. Cookies should be golden brown with a soft chewy centre.

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