Ready for Adai ?

Dear Foodies,

The recipes are back again on this blog, Yayyyy !! So before my blog gets branded as another no-recipe food blog ;), lets get cooking, shall we ?

I really love dosa's and idli's, they are so easy to make and you can either go ahead with the whole side dishes charade or make do with some pickles and podi's in your pantry. Either way, they are a great breakfast, lunch or dinner. And our love for this is more than evident with the number of recipe variations that we get to see on the blogs.

Since I started cooking here, I've never tried making my own dosa batter from scratch. One main reason being I am scared to even try fermenting it, and another equally strong reason is I don't have a good blender :D So whenever I want to get the satisfaction of making dosa's from scratch I jump over to Vaishali's instant recipe, otherwise its the pesarattu and rava dosa that are my go-to dishes.

The other favorite of mine is the Adai....

Ingredients:

• 1 cup - Rice
• 1 cup - mixed dals -- more of chana dal & toor dal and a little moong/urad dal
• 3 nos - dried Red chillies or to taste
• A pinch of hing/asafoetida
• A sprig of curry leaves
• Salt to taste
• Oil for cooking the dosa - approx 2 Tbsp
  

Optional additions: 1" inch - ginger piece, a cup of drumstick leaves, Cilantro

Method:

1. Soak the rice, dals and red chillies in water for about 3 - 4 hrs. If I want it quicker I just microwave them for a few minutes to warm the water and reduce the soaking time to 1 -2 hrs.
2. Grind the soaking ingredients with the curry leaves and any or all of the optional ingredients to a coarse paste. The coarseness is what gives the adai the crisp texture.
3. Add salt to taste and the asafoetida and mix well. Heat a shallow, wide pan for making the dosa's and spread a little oil on the pan and get started with the adai's. (check here for pics )
4. The adai should be a little thicker than the normal dosa. To make it cook uniformly and also to make them extra crispy, make 1 or 2 holes at the center of the adai and add a drop of oil, this gives it the signature adai look.
5. Serve hot with red chilli pickle, kara podi (gunpowder ;) ), jaggery and yogurt to make a perfect meal. For some extra touch, my mom would also add a small dollop of home made butter on the warm adai, the white colored one...yummmm

In our house we were totally spoilt. There were always more than 2 accompaniments to any of these tiffin items. I would have this queue system to optimize the dosa/idli between all the side dishes :)) So if you ask me, all those items mentioned are compulsory not optional :D

You could also add some chopped onions while making the adai and sprinkle some kara podi and grated jaggery...(yup, you cannot have just one thing)


and roll them up for the to-go person :)

I also tried my hand at my mom's Sponge dosa recipe. Since my blender did not give me a very smooth paste, I had trouble getting it to ferment well, and ya its the ~hand~ too :( So I added a tiny pinch of baking soda create the sponge effect :))


And most of you would have figured it out, this one is for Srivalli's dosa mela.