Ribbon Pakoda

Ribbon Pakoda can me made in many ways. I always use this proportion of 3 rice flour to 1 gram flour. Less gram flour makes the ribbon pakoda very thin and I feel it consumes less oil. I am trying to post all the snack recipes before diwali so it's easy for the followers of this blog to pick the snack for diwali.

Karadayan nonbu adai

(Check Preparations before this)
Ingredients

Preparation for Karadayan Nonbu

For making Karadayan Nobu adai we can prepare the basic things the day before and refrigerate it. This not only saves time also makes sure we make the adai without hassle on the D-day.

Take 4 cups of rice flour. Wash and soak it for 15 minutes. Completely drain the water using a colander and dry this over a cotton white cloth for 30 - 45 minutes.  Then grind this to make a fine powder. This can be done using our Mixer.(Sieve once or twice inbetween grinding to remove lumps)
In a kadai, add 2-3 ladles of wet rice flour and saute it until it loses its moisture. Repeat the same for the entire flour. Some people process this to the next step..until the rice flour changes it colour. I prefer my adai to be white in colour. So I stop at the stage where it loses its moisture.
(for more video description check this. The same preparation used for Seedai.)
For people who don't have time to do the above process, don't worry..just dry roast the ready made rice flour available in the shops.

Thiruvadirai Kali

Margazhi is a weird month.  It is filled with celebrations that are contradictory with respect to the palate.  When the month starts, Andal recommends "நெய்யுண்ணோம் பாலுண்ணோம்” ("we don't eat ghee and milk").  Soon enough would come Vaikunda Ekadesi where the more tenacious of Sri Vaishnavaites would not even swallow their own saliva ! Ekadeshi is followed by the early morning Dwadishi spread of agathi keerai, mor kozambu (or aviyal), and nellikkai pachadi.

Coconut rice payasam

Ingredients
Raw rice - 1 tablespoon(soak for an hour after washing the rice)
Coconut - 6-7 tablespoons
Jaggery - 1 1/2 times the measure of coconut
Cardamom- 2-3
Cashew nuts - chop and fry in ghee

Puliyodharai (Tamarind rice) Adi Perukku special

The eighteenth day of the month of Aadi in the Tamil lunar calender is important for people living along rivers banks, especially, the Kaveri.  The festival is a thanksgiving celebration to the sustaining power of water. Called Aadi pathinettu, or Aadi perukku, the day is also a celebration of the onset of monsoon in this part of the country.  This day also starts the sowing season for the main crop of the season - Rice.

The festival is celebrated, as usual, by cooking different types of rice dishes, such as coconut rice, lemon rice, tamarind rice and so on, and the carbohydrate extravaganza is traditionally partaken along the banks of the nearest river.

Thiruvaadi Pooram Akkara Adisal

Around the beginning of the common era*, in the month of Aadi, when the Pooram star was in the ascent, a baby girl, who would grow up to compose soul-searing songs in praise of her lover, Lord Narayana, was found on a Tulsi Bed in Srivilliputhur.  Vishnu Chitthan, who was later to assume importance as "Periyaazhwaar" in the Sri Vaishnavaite sect, brought up the baby - Kodhai - as his daughter.  Kodhai would then become one with her Lord in Srirangam, and has since been immortalized in the Sri Vaishnavaite tradition as Aandal, the only woman among the 12 Aalwars.

Today is Thiru AAdi Pooram.

People brought up in the Sri Vaishnavaite tradition would be aware that Aandal is associated not only with  Thiruppavaai and the month of Margazhi, but just as closely with the sweet, Akkara Adisal.  Why Akkara Adisal?

Modhakam- Kozhakkatai - Salt

Prepare the dough for the outer layer as given in Sweet Kozhukkattai

Modhakam - Kozhakattai - Sweet

Kozukkattai,/Modhakam/Modhak are delicious Indian dumplings that are made in different forms.  The basic principle is a bland or slightly salty envelope, enclosing a sweet or salty filling. There are some forms of kozukkattais that do not conform to the general rule - paal kozukkattai and upma kozukkattai.  These are exceptions to the rule and kozukkattais or modhaks are generally understood as the former variety, unless specified otherwise .

Aama Vadai

This is one of the recipes which is prepared during auspicious days. This is called AAMA VADAI as the shape of the vadai resembles the back of the tortoise(Tortoise - aamai in tamil). Unlike masala vadai where only kadalai paruppu is used, three types of dhals are used for this aama vadai. Traditionally onions are not used on auspicious days. Over the years we have accepted the use of onions in the kitchen just like any other vegetable. My daughter loves to eat this with onion. So I make two portions of this batter, one for God and other with onion. I have always wondered why people make this vadai on Diwali day/Mattu pongal day. With so much of rituals going into every function in "Tambrahm" household, we all know that we are supposed to eat the goodies only after 'Neivedhyam' (offering to God). But on Diwali/Mattu pongal days we don't perform any Pooja. So Urad dhal/Ulutham paruppu Vadai is made on days where offering to God is a must and Aama vadai on those days where there is no 'Neivedhyam' involved. 

This vadai tends to lose it's crispness if it's made and eaten after hours. So keep the batter in the fridge and fry it when you want to eat. 

Ingredients

Thuar dhal _Thuvaram paruppu - 1 cup

Channa dhal- Kadalai paruppu - 1 cup

(Both the above dhals in same proportion)

Urad dhal- 2 tablespoons

Red chillies-2/3

Green chillies- 1

Asafoetida

Salt to taste

Curry leaves

Ellu podi sadam(Sesame seeds rice)

With adi perukku on August 3rd this year I will try post more variety rice. Instead of the usual lemon rice and coconut rice, we can try to make something different.
Ingredients
Cooked raw rice or boiled rice
Sesame seeds- ellu- 1/4 cup(I have used white seeds, if you want you can use black also)
Channa dhal- kadalai paruppu- 1/2 cup
Red chillies- 6-7
Salt to taste ( I have added a tablespoon of salt for the above measure as we are going to mix it with rice. Always add less salt as it may be added after mixing with the rice)

The milk of Aadi

The Tamil lunar month of Aadi starts today.  With Aadi, begins a long line of festivals and ceremonies that Hinduism is famous for.

Image Source

Tamil Nadu is watered by a few rivers, predominant among them being Kaveri, that flows through the  "granary of the South" - the Thanjavur area. Born on the Kodagu hills in the Western Ghats in Karnataka, the river is fed during the South West monsoon rains during this month, thereby washing away the debris of an almost dry summer river bed of the planes, and making the land suitable for the next crop - the adage goes "Aadi pattam thaedi vidhai (Rough translation: Sow the seeds in Aadi)". For a population that had been scorched by the Indian summer, the fresh water brings with it an end of two months of heat induced lethargy and the start of business.  Thus, the kitchen, which functioned minimally in summer, now gears up for the bounty that nature would soon offer, and the celebrations of more pleasant weather that would follow.  

Puthandu special- Mango Pachadi

While the ongoing Chithirai Vs. Thai tussle remains a political issue, the Tamil public is happy to celebrate New Year at all given occasions - after all, in the circle of life, each day is a start of the next year. As actor Trisha says, if it means an extra holiday, hey,join the party ! Let the debate continue to rage, the more conventional of us will celebrate Tamil New Year as the sun moves into Aries, which was, today. The Tamil New Year is close behind the vernal equinox, where the tilt of the earth causes the sun to cross the equator into the Northern hemisphere, thus heralding a few months of summer up North. The Tamil New Year thus formally announces the blaze of the sun to us - as if we needed an announcement.

Shri Ramanavami recipes

With reference to Lakshmi's previous post on "Food in mythology", I am inspired to post these Ramanavami recipes.  Sri Ramanavami, for the uninitiated, is the birthday of Lord Rama, the hero of one of the two great Hindu epics - Ramayana.