Dhokla - Home made and instant

Even at the expense of sounding like a broken record, I state that I am a self confessed snack junkie and a grazer by all ccounts. I love my snacks more than regular food and love spicy ones better than sweet ones. I have successfully transferred that habit of mine to BH in all these years of togetherness. He was the 'happy to overeat' at regular meals but 'not bother about snack' person. On the contrary, some of my best childhood memories are with the snacks nammamma stored in the tin cans and plastic jars. I don't remember our kitchen devoid of some kind of snack item at any given point of time. The quantities used to be large as the house was always filled with visiting friends, family and others :-). I love to keep something in the kitchen for my cravings. These items have varying shelf lives depending on what they contain and how they are cooked.

A lady I knew in Midwest made rotis at home that used to get grabbed almost immediately by people who either had no inclination to cook at home or were busy to do so. I have got rotis from her on occasions when work was too hectic. I could walk into her kitchen and chat with her as she deftly made rotis and packed them hot and soft. I later learnt she also made some curries and was famous for her 'made from scratch' Dhoklas. Once when we had family visiting and went out on a trip, I asked her for a couple of dozen rotis and Dhokla. She hesitated a little bit as it was a long weekend and she had other plans but handed me the Dhokla box when I went to pick up my rotis. One of the sweetest ladies I have met and the Dhoklas were to die for.

She told me later she soaks dal, grinds it and makes the dhokla. I don't go into all that trouble but I do make some real good Dhoklas. Lot of my friends have been asking for the recipe and though I have made it many times in the last year, I had either not taken pictures and the pictures had not turned out to my satisfaction. But I made some this past weekend for a pot luck and remembered to also take pictures. Since everyone liked it at the party, here is an easy and quick recipe for Dhokla. Look for the tip in the notes section to make every Dhokla piece taste equally tangy & good.

What do you need to make Dhokla? 
Makes about 20 1X1 inch piece dhoklas
1 cup besan/fine gram flour
1/4 cup plain yogurt (preferably home made and a day old)
1/4 cup oil (I used Sunflower oil)
1 Tsp eno fruit salt
1 Tsp salt (adjust to taste)
1 Tsp grated ginger
1/2 Tsp green chili paste
1/4 cup water
1/8 Tsp asafoetida powder
1 Tblsp Chopped cilantro for garnish
1 Tblsp Grated coconut for garnish
For seasoning:
1 Tblsp oil
1 Tsp mustard
1/2 Tsp cumin (optional)
1 Tsp white sesame seeds
1 Tblsp lemon juice

How do you make Dhokla? 

• Take a big bowl, add besan, salt, asafoetida, grated ginger and green chili paste. Mix well.
• Whisk the yogurt once to make it uniform.
• Add oil, eno, yogurt and water and mix it in. Consistency of this batter should be thicker than the regular dosa batter and it should fall in clumps. Follow the proportions above and you get the right consistency. 
• The batter should be mixed well without any lumps, I employ my trusted hands for the job as I can feel the texture better. 
• Pour the mixture into a pressure cooker vessel (or any other vessel you can fit in your pressure cooker) and cook it without the pressure cooker weight for 15 minutes after the steam starts coming out. 
• Switch off and let the steam go down, open the cooker and let the dhokla stand for a few minutes before cutting them into pieces of desired shape and size. 

• Arrange the pieces in a wide plate.
• Heat oil in a pan, add mustard, cumin(if using) and sesame seeds. Let mustard crackle. Add lemon juice into the hot oil and switch off the stove. 

• Using a spoon, pour the seasoning all over the Dhokla pieces. 

• Garnish with chopped cilantro and grated coconut.
• Enjoy the moist, melt in the mouth Dhokla with your evening tea or coffee. 

Notes:

• Ensure your Eno is fresh & potent. When you add Eno to the mixture, it should feel frothy in your hands as you mix it in. 
• I add asafoetida in most of my non-sweet dishes using besan to ward off the side effects of the flour. You can omit it if you consume besan regularly or do not like the smell of asafoetida. 
• Cooking Dhokla is same as cooking idli, no weight on the pressure cooker, turn the heat down to medium low once it is full steam and cook for 15 minutes. A knife pushed into the Dhokla should come out clean.
• The lady who made the Dhoklas for me said adding lemon juice to the hot seasoning helps Dhokla to absorb the lemon juice uniformly and I find that tip to be very useful. 
• I use plain Eno salt, you can use flavored ones if you like them. 

7 cups burfi - Mithai making nirvana

Hope you all had a good weekend, we enjoyed ours and had the finale of Summer over the past 3 days. Had some guests on Saturday, watched some movies on Sunday and Monday, got ready for another school year. Back to school for DD from today, another year has started. Time seems to be just flying. I miss my little girl and the cuddly times but so proud of the confident young woman she is growing into. It has been a good Summer, contrary to what many said, weather has been extremely pleasant, I am happy that we all settled in without major 'hitchkies' and completed a full year in the new home.

So, to celebrate a good year, good summer and also to wish for sweet tidings in the future, I made some yummy mithai (burfi) last evening. This is called 7 cups burfi (I would imagine it was some one who was extremely creative on the cooking side but had exhausted those streaks when it came to naming their creations :-)), the name is just suggestive of the quantity of ingredients that go into the mithai. Mithais or burfis are Indian desserts made in different ways but usually ending up as a semi firm - firm piece of sweet comparable to fudges. For a long time, I had not ventured into the mithai making as I always thought getting the right consistency is for experts only :-). I am slowly feeling confident that I can manage burfis in the kitchen now.

This is a very 'novice friendly' recipe with no syrup involved, a few things need to be kept in mind while making this mithai which applies equally well for all mithai making, look for those tips in the notes section below. As nammamma puts it 'Ganapati maadbeku andre kashta, avarappanna maadokke enu kashta? (It is difficult to make an idol of the Hindu diety Ganesha/Ganapati as he has eyes, trunk, mouth, flappy ears and so many other details to be taken care of but making his father Shiva represented by a lingam - a very easy to depict structure should be totally effortless.). So here is a very simple recipe of the 7 cups mithai you can attempt in your kitchen and enjoy these melt in the mouth desserts.

The cup referenced below can be any size, use the same container for measuring all the ingredients. I used my small katories from the kitchen.This is a semi firm mithai with a coconut flavor, the pieces hold their shape well and can be kept for 4-5 days . If you want to extend the shelf life, put it in the refrigerator.

What do you need to make 7 cups mithai? 
1 cup kadle hittu/besan/gram flour (use the fine powder)
1 cup grated coconut (fresh or frozen)
1 cup ghee/clarified butter melted to liquid form
3 cups sugar
1 cup milk (I used 2%)
1/4 Tsp fresh ground cardamom

Other needs: 
1 - 8 inch pan or steel plate with edges to spread the mithai
1 heavy bottom pan to make mithai.

How do you make 7 cups mithai? 

• Prepare the 8 inch pan by spreading 1/2 tsp of melted ghee, keep aside. 
• Heat the heavy bottom pan on medium heat, add all the ingredients and mix them well. 

• Keep stirring constantly with a spoon. 

• The color changes to a slightly darker shade and you start to smell the roasted besan in your kitchen. 

• Continue to stir until milk reduces and all the ingredients start to come together into a soft mass. At this stage, you will also notice ghee oozing out from the sides and the mixture looks dry.

• Add cardamom powder and mix well.

• Pour the mixture into the prepared pan and with either wet hands or a flat spatula, spread it into a even thickness in the pan and smoothen the top. 

• Using a sharp knife, make markings for the pieces - do not do all the way to reach the bottom of the pan/plate at this time. 

• Let the mithai cool down before cutting them into pieces of desired shapes. 

Notes: 

• Always keep the heat on medium low - the basan needs to get cooked while you make the mithai. High heat burns the mithai while fast cooking renders basan uncooked/undercooked. 
• I use my thick non stick sauce pan as this has a handle which I can hold while mixing. 
• One of the readiness tests I do on the mithai is to wet my hands, take a small portion (~1/4 tsp) in my hands and roll into a ball. If the ball holds the shape, does not stick to your fingers and stays up, the mixture is ready to be poured into the pan. 

• I have made this burfi without milk and reduced sugar - turns out fabulous too. We call it '5 and 3/4 cup burfi' or '4 platforms behind Hogwarts express' - <wink>, <wink> for any Harry Potter fans out there. Just eliminate the milk and use a little less than 3 cups sugar. I recommend using milk as it further softens the texture but try this variation if you want an extended shelf life.
• Make the markings for the mithai as soon as you have spread the mixture into the plate. This helps cut the mithai into nice looking pieces.

• My Indian grocery store carries two kinds of basan - one slightly rough and meant for making boondi or laddoos and the other a super fine powder used in burfis, kadhis and dhoklas. I use the super fine powder in this recipe.

• You can use nutmeg powder for a different flavor or just enjoy the mithai with the roasted basan & coconut flavor.