September 18, 2009

Pollavadai ~ Navarathri Special

Tomorrow, Navarathri begins. Its celebration time for the next 10 days. In my home, we follow the tradition of keeping golu. Evenings are busy with everyone visiting Golus in the neighborhood. Ladies visit only once to a house where as the children of the neighborhood are the privileged lot who visits all nine days,to all the houses where Golus are kept . The different kind of prasadoms make their dinner. I too had similar days during my childhood. There are four temples in our neighborhood. Prasadoms are distributed in all those temples after the night Aarti, during navarathri days, irrespective of whether it is a Devi temple or not. The first one to start was at the temple very near my house. After our golu visits, we proceed to temple hopping to collect prasadoms before it gets over. The last day at the temple, will be grand with as many as 8 prasadoms ranging from sundals, sweets like laddoo, mysurpa etc.

I am giving the recipe for Pollavadai, which is a popular Golu bhakshanam. Its similar to Thattai, but smaller in size.



You need
Rice flour - 11/2 cups
Chana dal - 1/4 cup
Tuvar dal - 1/4 cup
Urad dal - 1 tblspn
Red chilly - 3 nos
Hing powder - few shakes
Curry leaves - 2 stalks
Salt to taste
Oil to deep fry

Wash and soak the dals together in enough water for an hour. Drain. Grind to a coarse paste along wit red chilly, hing, curry leaves and salt. Don't add water. Mix in the rice flour to the ground dal mix and prepare the dough, similar to chappati dough. Take gooseberry/marble sized dough and press it down into flat thin discs with your fingers. You can use oiled ziplock covers or banana leaves. Meanwhile heat oil in a kadai. When the oil is smoking hot, slowly drop the flattened discs into the oil. Lightly press it down with the perforated ladle. The puffed discs will come up to the oil. Gently turn them and remove when it is golden brown. Drain on kitchen towels and store in airtight containers. This will stay crisp for a day or two unlike thattais. This is mostly made as an evening tea time snack and not for storing for a long period.


Happy Navarathri to you all. Enjoy the 9 days of festivity.


After my vacation, except for the Onam post, my blog is mainly dormant. Call it blogger's block or sheer laziness on my part, I somehow couldn't bring myself to blog. Finally the arrival of long festive days have brought me here. Hope to continue posting as usual. I had the pleasure of meeting Harini and her son during my vacation. True to her blog avatar, Sunshinemom, she indeed has a radiant personality.


11 comments:

  1. Pollavadai looks cripsy..Happy navarathiri dear..

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  2. Wow...looks yum and crisp....Happy Navarathiri to u and u r family....enjoy!

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  3. Hi! welcome back to blogging. The pollavadai have turned out crisp. happy navaratri to you too.

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  4. Thats lovely jayasree..sounds interesting..Great to know you met harini..must have been a good time catching up!

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  5. looks crisp and yum nice entry dear.

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  6. Happy navrathri Jayasree! I make arisi vadai usually. Amma has written the name pollal vadai but not the recipe in her notebook. Thank you for the recipe. Great to know about meeting a fellow blogger.

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  7. Happy navaratri to you, Jaya. Somehow, despite having done the rounds for several golus, i've never come across this vadai. Maybe i'll try it out this time....is it something that needs a lot of practice/trial runs???

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  8. happy navrathri..this is something new looks yumm..
    Do put your golu photo in one of your posts

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  9. Priya,KF, Pari thanks for the wishes.

    Valli, I had a lovely time with Harini.

    Lathakka, thanks. What is arisi vadai?

    Jayashree,I think its specific to Palakkad. Not quite sure about it. Not much of practise needed for this. After the first batch, you may have to make some quick fix to the dough if the vadais are not crispy.

    Sowmya, thanks. Have just posted the Golu photos.

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  10. Welcome back, I ve heard about it should be tasty too ! Happy Navarathri.

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  11. So good!, never tried anything like this, will give it a try sometime

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