Sabudana Thalipeeth - a Maharastrian delicacy made my way

Hope everyone's weekend was fun and fulfilling. Mine is (I have a few more hours left in the day and I definitely will milk it to the last possible minute:-)). With showers coming down strongly for the last 2 days, it has been a little cooler than it was earlier in the week. The trees and shrubs in the yard are doing a happy dance, fresh from their bath, the dust is washed off the leaves and they look spotless, brighter and happier.

I worked from home due to a really minor and freak fall I had at work (no worker's compensation material, this one :-)), lesson learnt - dont try to walk on a foot that is asleep, and don't lean on a chair handle that is not fixed. The foot swell up to a small pumpkin size and refused to go into the shoes. It was like Cinderalla's much bigger sister trying to squeeze her foot into the dainty little glass slippers, I gave up and opted to work from home for last 2 days. There was so much to catch up coming back from the 4 day long vacation and the working from home just seemed to stretch the days longer. I was exhausted completely when I wrapped up late Friday evening and the positivity of the vacation had almost wore off.

After 3.5 days of icing and keeping the foot elevated, it has shrunk to almost the original size and I am able to walk around normally. Getting up and walking around in the slightly wet, totally green and beautifully fragrant yard helped me to bounce back. We did our (hopefully) last round of spring cleaning this weekend, yeah it takes all of spring and then some to get it done :-), and are now just waiting excitedly for DD to get home next week. 3 weeks of summer bliss after that.

I recently read an article by a very popular Indian nutritionist named Rujuta Diwekar here. I will say it is one of the more comprehensive write ups about the food we eat, trends in people's food habits and the changing fads and notions about super foods at any given time. I say comprehensive because it almost touched on both sides of the coin and one term that resonated with me is the 'yo-yo' concept of adapting a certain trend as the super food only to find a few years later that it never was a super food and then jump to something different. I guess we humans take joy in transient things in life and are always on the look out for something??

I liked the detailed explanation in that article about why not to go after certain food fads, and her championing locally grown food. However, I personally feel that there is a need for tailoring the traditional food habits to the modern life too. Given the life style differences between our generation and that of our parents & grandparents, it simply is not realistic to assume that we would digest and benefit from the food in the same way they once did. My physical activity is nowhere to close to that of what my parents did, I sit infront of my laptop for more than 8 hours a day by way of work and then some more hours of browsing, emailing, personal work on the machine. I have to make a conscious effort to get my limbs moving while my parents got their 10K steps easily as part of their daily chores. It was much easier for them to digest the 2 spoons of ghee than it is for me :-). While I like her argument of continuing the traditional food habits, I would still tailor those to suit the current life style. If I were a farmer working in the field or someone doing manual labor every day, 2 spoons of ghee would have been a necessity perhaps, but for now it is a luxury that grows on my waistline :-). She is the nutritionist, I am not. So my opinion is my own and I am not asking anyone to follow it.

Talking of traditional food, here is one. Simple, delicious and preferred on 'vrat' days. Now that concept of 'vrat' when you are supposed to be eating light or fasting entirely is one of the most misused terms in Indian culture. Don't get me wrong, there are folks that do an honest 'fasting' and then there are some who just eat better tasting, richer food in the name of fasting/vrat :-). There is a funny poem in Kannada which goes like this, "aache mane subbamange, ivattu ekadasi upavasa, eno swalpa tintarante, avalakki, uppittu, paayasa .." :-). I won't attempt to translate it as it will spoil the fun for me but here is the synopsis of it - a lady named Subbamma was fasting on a day and she was eating a food mountain that had a multitude of dishes. Mostly, vrat days are those when people do not eat certain ingredients or ingredients in certain forms, the most common one being rice. So there is no cooked rice consumed on vrat days but there are a lot of great food and in some regions vrat foods are way more delicious than the every day, common man food.

My parents also would not eat rice on certain nights for dinner for religious beliefs and we would actually fight to get a bite of the delicious uppittu or avalakki or rotti instead of our boring anna-saaru for dinner. One of my aunts didn't eat rice in the evenings at all and her tiffin items were so sought after that she always made extra quantity for us kids :-).

This thalipeeth (or rotti) is a favored dish during vrat time in the western region of Maharashtra in India. But since I don't follow vrat, I end up making these whenever we fancy eating them. That is the best part about these traditions, they don't stop you from making/eating these delicacies on non vrat days :-). Traditionally, boiled potatoes are used in this recipe as the binding agent, I chose to add my favorite jicama instead. It works well and tastes delicious, less starchy than the spuds.

5/16/16 update: Thank you all for your interest in the recipe and questions about Jicama (pronounced as Hee Ka Ma). I realized I should have given some details about this vegetable since it is not a common one we use. Jicama is a tuber grown widely in South America (and other parts of the world) and is used commonly in Mexican cuisine. It is a tuber, usually round in shape and has a thick outer skin that needs to be peeled off. You can eat it raw or cooked, it imparts a crisp, slightly sweetish taste to the dishes. Find more information here. I have used these in cutlets and also salads.

What do you need? 
Makes about 7 thalipeeths (good bf for 2 people)
1 cup sago/sabudana/sabbakki
1 small jicama
1/4 cup peanuts (raw or roasted)
1 Tbsp finely chopped cilantro
2 green chilies (finely chopped
2 Tbsp Rajgira flour (replace with rice flour if you like)
3/4 Tsp salt (adjust to taste)
2 Tsp oil to roast thalipeeth

How do you make? 

• Wash sago in 2-3 changes of water, soak in water just above the sago level(about a cup) in a wide pan over night or atleast 5 hours. 
• You will get plumped up (it doubles in size) sago and if the amount of water is right, it will all be soaked in. 
• If you had added extra water, don't fret, just take the entire soaked sago into a colander and let it sit and drain for 10-15 minutes before using.
• If you had less water, don't  fret either, sprinkle a couple Tbsp water on the sago and let it sit for another 15-20 minutes
• And finally, if the soaked sago is a little mushy, don't fret at all :-) as it helps in forming a dough easily. Remember you are looking for a soft, soaked sago with no running water accompanying it.
• Wash, peel jicama and chop into quarters. Take it in a microwave safe bowl, cover with water and cook until soft and given in when pressed (about 10mins and I removed the bowl after 5 mins and set it back again)
• If you are not a MW user, go ahead and boil the jicama pieces in a pot of water until they are tender. 
• Take them out of water, let cool down and grate. You need about a cup of grated, boiled jicama for this recipe. 

• If you are using roasted peanuts, just crush them (you can make a powder if you like or keep some pieces for the bite in the thalipeeth, choice is yours)
• If using raw peanuts, roast them dry in a pan until the skin develops golden spots, let cool, remove the skin by rubbing the nuts together ina ziplock. Crush or powder them. 
• Or you can even use the peanut powder if you have it ready at home :-) and save some work. 
• Take a wide bowl (where you can work your hand muscles), add soaked sago, crushed peanuts, salt, chopped cilantro, green chilies and grated jicama. Use the hand and fingers to bring them all together into a mushy dough. 
• Add the flour and mix well. If you take a handful of mixture it should stay as a ball and not break/fall apart at this stage. 

• Heat a flat griddle on medium heat. 
• Take an aluminium foil, put a couple drops of oil and spread it around. 
• Pinch off a big lemon sized piece from the dough, place it in the center of foil and pat into a circle of desired thickness and size using your fingers. Dip your fingers in water to help the patting process and avoid sticking of the dough. 
• Spread a couple drops of oil on the griddle, place the sheet with the thalipeeth side down and let it cook for a minute. 

• Gently lift and peel off the sheet after a minute and let the thalipeeth cook for another 30seconds or until you notice the underside get golden brown spots all over. 
• Flip it and let the other side cook for a minute. 

• On medium-low heat, a thalipeeth takes about 2.5-3 minutes to cook completely. Do not do this on high heat. 
• Transfer the cooked thalipeeth to a plate and enjoy when it is hot with a cup of yogurt of chutney/chutney pudi of choice. 

Notes: 

• Sago should be soaked until soft for this recipe, do not use if it is dry, add some more water and let it soak.
• Jicama starts off fibrous(like kohlrabi) when it is raw but gains a little starch as it is cooked and works its charm.
• You can use a plastic sheet to pat the thalipeeth, and transfer them onto your hand and then to the griddle if you like :-). I prefer the ease of aluminium sheets as they can be put on the hot griddle and left there for a minute before peeling off of the thalipeeth. Plastic will not stand the heat. 
• If you have access to banana leaves, go ahead and use them, they are the best :-)
• The flour helps absorb excess moisture and make the dough pliable. If you choose not to add any dough at all, be gentle while patting, transferring and flipping the thalipeeth as it will easily break.
• This thalipeeth tastes best when eaten right off the griddle, it tends to become stretchy as it cools down due to the inherent sago texture. 
• Use potatoes (as in the classic, traditional recipe) by all means, I sometimes like to experiment with locally available veggies. 

Jicama(Hee Ka ma) cutlets with Broccoli - a heart healthy, green cutlet

With the weather warming up substantially and week days a blur of work and more work, I fell into a rare saturday afternoon, post lunch siesta last weekend. The groceries for the week were not yet shopped for but the body just refused to get up and do anything at all and I succumbed to the call of sleep. It doesn't happen regularly, if I sleep in the afternoons, I get up heavier in the head and clogged in mind and feel lazier than I did before. It also makes me toss and turn late into the night and messes up the routine badly. But then again, there are days where I just can't fight the urge to lie down after the brunch and this was one of those weekends. And when I sleep, I dream, mostly they are dreams I wake up happy about but sometimes they are nightmares (or daymares if there is something like that :-))

Now if you are thinking I am next going to talk about my visits to the shrink and effects of dreams/nightmares, you are totally wrong. First off, I don't go to the shrink and secondly these are harmless, harmless, everyday sort of dreams that everybody gets once in a while :-). This particular one though left me shaken and that is why I thought I would share it with you.

It was something of the sort of Alice in Wonderland (did I mention that masterpiece by Lewis Carroll as one of my favorite books? not so much the movie they made with Johny Depp) afternoon, perfect for lying down under a tree with warm sun rays striking your body, with a book in hand and go to the dreamland, only I ended up in my local Indian grocery store :-). As I do every time I visit the store, I first go to the fresh produce section and pick up all kinds of greens, veggies and fruits along with herbs and chilies. Ouch, that is where the problem was, while the store seemed to be full of fresh vegetables, there were no chilies to be found anywhere. I marched up & down 3 times before determining that they didn't indeed have chilies and thought I would go to the other indian store in the vicinity. Since I had already purchased enough vegetables to last me the week (and some more), I went straight to the place where they store green chilies, cilantro etc.

Again to my horror there were no chilies and no empty baskets either, I would have atleast consoled myself that someone had bought all the chilies just before I came and the store guy would replenish it in no time but all the baskets seemed to be full of something but other than green chilies. Not wanting to think about the world of 'no-chilies', I went & asked the lady at the counter if they had reorganized and kept chilies else where and was told that there was a ban on green chilies for the area and they wouldn't be getting any atleast for another 3-4 weeks. My family tells me that I take after my paternal ajji (grandmother) who was a spice lover and green chilies for me are like the best form of spiciness in life. They are my best friends in the kitchen, for all my savory dishes, green chilies go in some form or other (roasted, chopped, cut, ground etc) and imagining a sojourn in the kitchen without these tiny, shiny, green objects just makes me sad. Here is the sadder and more frightening part of the story, I wasn't sleeping anymore and hence wasn't dreaming, not even day dreaming. I had actually gone to the store (after I got up from the afternoon siesta ofcourse) for my weekly grocery shopping and was told that green chilies had gotten into some problems and won't be available for a few weeks :-((. Total bummer.

I ended up picking up a handful of serano peppers (peppers are thicker skinned, much less sharp in their spiciness and I don't typically use them in my south indian cooking :-(). I have been counting the days which seem to be going really slow so far. If any of you are in seattle area and know of a store you have seen carrying regular Thai chilies, would you mind dropping me a line on the blog with the store location? I think I am already in withdrawal from the absence of green chilies in my life, miss them so much.

As I felt cheated without the green chilies, I ended up buying a very foreign (from Central America) vegetable, rather tuber/root called Jicama. If you have been to San Jose (San Hose), you already know how to say the name of this tuber, it is 'Hee ca ma' and not 'Ji ca ma'. I brought it and there it sat on the counter for an entire week before I could get my hands on it. That is one of the beauties of this tuber, it is hardy & sturdy and doesn't go bad on you easily. Amma looked at it suspiciously, asked me for the name and stayed clear from it. She tends to stick to known vegetables in the kitchen which is pretty much limited to potatoes, brinjal/egg plants, beerakayi and a few others. The week whizzed by and I tried to deal with 'no green chilies' by throwing myself deeper into work. Weekend happened again and when I still couldn't find green chilies, I decided to clean up the counter top, refrigerator, pantry etc to take my agitated mind off of 'green chili' thought - cleaning, scrubbing seems to help and found the jicamas (oh I forgot to mention the tiny detail right, I bought not just one but two of them :-)) sitting there feeling totally ignored and unloved.

I have eaten jicama before, cut into thin strips and added to salads and I love the crunchiness it provides and the unassuming taste that lends itself into a pot full of salad ingredients. But with inlaws at home who don't really care for a salad, I had to quickly think of an alternative way to use them. They are tubers and starchy like potatoes. What comes to your mind when I say potatoes - yep, fries, cutlets would be on the top of the list for all spud lovers. My family is no exception, starting from the oldest to the youngest, everyone loves potatoes. I decided to sneak in jicama in some of the most favorite potato recipes and viola they were a huge hit too. And serano peppers didn't disappoint me as I ground them (a little more than I would have if they were Thai chilies), lending a beautiful sharpness and balancing the bland jicama in a yummy cutlet. I also added a bunch of broccoli florets to make it very heart healthy and green :-). Here I present my jicama-serano-broccoli cutlet and some baked jicama fries that nobody in the family guessed was not made of potatoes.

This root is known for many health benefits. The raw jicama resembles kholrabi sans the unmistakable cabbage smell & taste. It is rich in fiber infused with inulin, which has zero calories and doesn't metabolize in the body. Inulin promotes bone health by increasing absorption of calcium. With a very low glycemic index, it is great for diabetic recipes. It can be eaten raw or cooked and tastes absolutely delicious.

I had a half of french bread that was 4 days old and had turned hard, cut that into cubes and run them in the blender to make my own bread crumbs.

For those of you who really care about me :-): I am doing ok without the green chilies. For all the drama I make in their absence, I have actually fallen in love with the serano peppers. They hold their shape when you add them to the dal towards the end and are not too spicy to bite into. I might try other peppers like anaheim, haberno and others if the ban on chilies continues. Will tell you all how they turn out in my recipes and any tips.

What do you need to make Jicama-Broccoli cutlets? 
2 cups grated jicama
2 cups steamed/cooked broccoli (about 12-14 florets)
1/4 cup tightly packed mint leaves
1 cup finely chopped onion
1 cup bread crumbs
1 Tsp salt (adjust to taste)
2-3 green chilies (adjust to taste)
2-3 Tsp oil (I used cooking spray)

How do you make Jicama-Broccoli cutlets? 

• Separate broccoli into florets and boil them in 2 cups water and a pinch of salt for 10 minutes or until they are soft. 
• Drain the water (use this for any gravy you are making or in mixing roti dough), let the broccoli cool down
• Wash, peel jicama and grate it (use the largest holes on the grater, this gives the crunch when you eat cutlets). 
• Take green chilies, salt and mint leaves in a blender and pulse it to a semi smooth paste. 

• Add cooked broccoli and pusle until it is shredded completely and mixes with the mint-chili paste. 
• Add 3/4 cup bread crumbs and give it a whirl. 
• Take the mixture onto a plate, add grated jicama, chopped onion and mix everything together into a lump. 

• Taste and adjust salt or spices as needed. 
• Heat a flat griddle, spray it with oil or cooking spray. 
• Take golf sized balls out of the mixture, flatten into a pattice (or any shape you desire), dredge it in the remaining bread crumbs. 
• Put it on the hot griddle, reduce heat to medium and cook until the under side is light brown. 

• Flip them over, spray oil all around and cook until both sides are light brown (if you like them crispier, cook them further until they turn dark brown)
• Take them out and serve them with any chutney, sauce or ketchup. 

How do you make Jicama fries? 

• Wash, peel jicama and slice them into 1/2 inch thick pieces. 
• Cut the pieces lengthwise into strips 
• Mix 1 Tsp all purpose flour, 1/2 Tsp corn flour, 1/4 Tsp red chili powder, 1/2 Tsp salt, 1/8 Tsp asafoetida and 1 tsp of crushed kasoori methi. 
• Pre heat oven to 400F, spray a baking sheet with cooking spray. 
• Put the jicama pieces into the flour mix and move them around to give a light coating of the mixture. 
• Arrange them in a single layer on the baking sheet and bake for 40-50 minutes, turning them over once midways. 
• Switch off and enjoy the crunchy, spicy fries. 

Notes: 

• Fries take longer than regular potato fries, take them out (about 50 mins) when they have reached the desired crunchiness. 
• Jicama by itself is a mildly sweet tuber and blends well with any spice.