Sunday, August 25, 2019

Kalathappam

A post after a long while… I would never complain as lack of time for not being active here as I believe everyone can make their own time for their priorities. The blog just came down in my priority list considering various other factors that popped up.


This recipe is a keeper and I had to save it somewhere. The books and papers are least referred nowadays and I had to have this in my own space. The trigger to prepare this was having this yummy snack from a friends and getting it right to perfection was all from the video blog of Veena.





Ingredients(Serves 8 - 10):

Jeerakashala Rice / Kaima rice  --  1 cup (You can also use ponni raw rice, but kaima is the best)
Cumin Seeds       --  ½ tsp
Cardamom          --  seeds from 2 pods
Cooked Rice       --  2 tbsp
Jaggery                --  250 - 350 gm (based on how sweet you need)
Water                    --  1 ½ cup
Coconut Oil         -- 4 - 5 tbsp
Sliced Coconut  -- 3 tbsp, thinly sliced
Shallots                -- 1, thinly sliced    
Baking Soda       -- ½ tsp
Salt                        -- As required





Preparation:

Soak rice for 4 - 5 hours or overnight.

Wash and drain the soaked rice. Add the cumin seeds, cardamom seeds, cooked rice and ½ cup water to the drained rice and grind it to a very fine mixture. Once it is done add another ½ cup of water to it and mix well.

Meanwhile, melt the jaggery in ½ cup of water. Once completely melted, strain the syrup into the prepared batter.

Add baking soda and salt to the batter and stir well.

In a small pan, add 1 - 2 tbsp of coconut oil and fry the sliced coconut and the shallots until golden brown. Strain and keep aside.

In a sauce pan heat the batter to luke warm temperature. Make sure the flame is medium - low and you keep stirring while heating the mixture. If not there are chances that the mixture gets cooked in the sauce pan. Keep it aside.

While heating the batter(depends on how much you can multi task) or after keeping the batter aside,  heat the pressure cooker on high flame. Once it is really HOT, add the left over coconut oil from frying the shallots and coconut and the remaining 3 tbsp of coconut oil. Swirl it well on the sides of the cooker to grease it well.

Add the batter to the HOT cooker. Top it with the fried coconut pieces and shallots.

Close the lid of the cooker with the washer on and no whistle / weight. Let it cook on high flame for 90 seconds and then quickly switch it to the lowest flame and let it cook for another 15 minutes.

Switch off the flame and move the cooker to a cool place. Let it stand for another 15 - 20 minutes and you can slowly take the appam out of the cooker.

The water to rice ratio is quite important to have the right consistency on the batter. I usually store my jaggery melted and strained. Hence I ground the rice mixture with ½ cup of water and mixed 1 cup of semi-thick(a little lighter than maple syrup consistency) jaggery syrup into it.

The type and size of the pressure cooker also matters. It is preferable to use a short aluminum cooker with a wide mouth, but it will still work on any. I used a 3 liter steel cooker. Using a steel cooker might burn the bottom of the appam slightly (as you can see in mine). I just slit that part off before eating and the remaining was still yummy :)



Recipe Courtesy: Veena's Curry World

No comments:

Post a Comment