Uppu Seedai

We are making Uppu Seedai. a Tamil Nadu specialty for this month's Indian Cooking Challenge. Valli gave us 2 recipes to choose from, one from Sharmi's blog and another from her friend's mother. These seedai are traditionally made for Gokulashtami. These crispy and crunchy rice flour balls are very addictive and we couldn't stop eating them.

The main concern with making this snack is the bursting of the seedai in the oil. Reasons could the moisture in the seedai before frying, seedai rolled too tight and any improperly ground particles in the flour. Luckily my seedai preparation went without any incident/ accident.

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Instant Vada (using Urad dal flour)

Ugadhi (Telugu New Year) is right around the corner (March 31, 2014) and I wanted to post some quick and easy dishes to make for the festival. If you are like me who forget to soak urad dal but still dream of making idlis/ dosas or vadas, then this post is right for you!! These vadas use urad dal flour instead of whole urad and they can be made in about 2~3hours which includes a brief resting period.

Apart from the forgetfulness, another reason for making these vadas using urad flour is that most of the American blenders are not powerful enough to grind the lentils without adding copious amounts of water. Adding water is OK for most of the recipes, but for vadas the batter needs to be very thick and smooth with little or no water added during grinding. So that's where the flour comes in very handy.

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