VazhaiPoo Vadai ~ Banana Blossom fritters

Banana blossom/Vazhai poo is usually made into a pitlai or usli at home. Very rarely, I make vadai with these. I mainly cook the vazhai poo for its nutrients and I feel deep frying will not yield the same result.  But at times, you tend to throw all the nutrition and health benefits out of the window and decide to go for a deep fry indulgence.  This vadai is more popular in TamilNadu.

Yields - 12 nos

You need

• 1 medium sized banana flower - picked and finely chopped
• Chana dal / Kadalaparuppu - 1 cup
• Tuvar dal - 1 tblspn
• Red chill- 2 nos
• Saunf /Fennel seeds- 1 tspn
• Green chilli - 3 nos
• Curry leaves - few sprigs
• Turmeric - a pinch
• Salt to taste
• Oil to deep fry

 Method

 

Pick the florets, clean and chop them finely. Soak it in water mixed with buttermilk till you use it. Soak chana dal and tuvar dal for an hour. Drain.

Steam cook the chopped flower with a pinch of turmeric and salt for 10 minutes. You can microwave it for 5 minutes. Squeeze to remove extra water if any.

Grind the dal coarsely. Dry roast red chilli and saunf and powder it.   

Take a bowl. Add the ground dal, powdered red chilli and saunf, steamed banana flower, chopped green chilli, curry leaves and salt. You may not need to add water to prepare the batter. The moisture from dal and the flower will be  enough. Heat oil in a kadai. When hot, pinch lemon sized batter and pat into disc on your palm or greased plastic sheet or banana leaf. Slide into the hot oil and fry till it is brown and crisp.

 

 

 

Banana Blossom/Vazhai Poo - How to clean and a recipe -Vazhai Poo Pitla

All the parts of banana tree is useful in one way or the other- Bananas - raw or ripe, stem, flower, leaves,  strings taken out from the bark like for garland making. Banana blossom/flower has high nutritional value and is considered as an effective medicine for menstrual disorders. It relieves  painful menstruation and also helps in increasing the progesterone hormone there by reducing excess bleeding.

Though,many knows about the benefits of the flower, there is some reluctance when it comes to cooking them because of the cleaning work involved.  I don't mind the extra work and the resulting stain on my fingers and nails. While I was at Palakkad, I always made it to a point to cook banana stem or flower at least once in 10 days if not every week. But after moving to Pune, I did not find them initially. Later we discovered a Tamilian vegetable vendor, who is quite far the place we stay. Luckily, the shop is near to my husband's office. So I get them now not very frequently as I would have liked it to be.

Now on to the cleaning process. First oil your palm so that it doesn't stain your fingers.  Also keep a bowl of water with few teaspoons of buttermilk mixed in. The cleaned flowers will be added to this water to avoid discolouring. Also it helps to remove the stains in the flower. You can turmeric if you don't have buttermilk.

 

Remove the brown cover. You can find yellowish white florets inside. Pull the bunch out.

 

 

Take a flower and  slightly rub it between your fingers. You can see the stamens inside. There will be one which is very thick and has a black head. We call it 'Kallan' in Tamil. Pull that out. It has to be discarded. These hard ones will make the dish taste bitter.

 

 

 

 If you feel the outer covering very thick and plastic like, it can be discarded for first few layers. As you move to the inner layers, the outer covering of the flower will be soft.  Towards the innermost layers, the outer covering will be white and not very fibrous. At that stage, you can chop the remaining flower as it is. Take all the cleaned florets and chop it finely.

 

 

Vazhai poo vadai, paruppu usli are some of the recipes which can be made with this. I am sharing a pitlai using the flower. These flowers have a slight bitter taste to it. And cooking in tamarind, removes that bitterness.

  

Now on to the recipe

You need

• Finely chopped Banana flower - 1 cup, packed
• Tuvar dal - 1/2 cup
• Tamarind - lemon sized
• Turmeric - a pinch
• Salt to taste
• Grated coconut - 1/2 cup
• Curry leaves for garnish

 

To roast and grind

• Urad dal - 2 tspn
• Chana dal - 2 tspn
• Red chilly - 4 nos
• Hing - a tiny piece
• Oil - 1 tspn

 

To temper

• Oil - 1 tspn
• Mustard seeds - 1 tspn
• Red chilly - 1, broken into two

 

Method

 

Pressure cook tuvar dal till soft. Mash and keep it aside.  Soak tamarind in warm water for 10 minutes. Extract the pulp and add another cup of water. Take the tamarind water in a pot and add turmeric and salt to it. When the tamarind water starts boiling, add the chopped banana florets. Let it cook till the florets turn soft. Heat oil in a kadai. Add hing piece. When it is fried ,remove and add urad dal, chana dal. When it starts

browning, add the red chillies. When chillies change color, remove from fire. Cool and grind it along with the grated coconut to a smooth paste. Add water while grinding. If you are using hing powder, add it towards the end  else it will get burnt on roasting.

 

Add the cooked and mashed dal, ground coconut paste to the cooked tamarind mix. Adjust the salt and let it simmer for few minutes. Season with mustard seeds and red chillies and garnish with curry leaves.

 

Muringai Poo Kootu (Drumstick blossom and chana dal in coconut paste)

Some of the widely used flowers in daily cooking are vazhai poo (banana), vepam poo (neem) ,muringai poo (drumstick) and the like. I have cooked only with vazhai poo,  all these years. I have heard of vepam poo pachadi and rasam but never got access to vepam poo. Muringa poo is another one which I wanted to try. I hav a drumstick tree in my backyard. And no one will ever try to pick those flowers willingly since they will have to forego the drumsticks instead. Ever since I saw the post at Nirmala's, I wanted to give it a try. Few days back, when my maid was trying to pick the drumsticks on a top branch, the branch broke since drumstick tree is very fragile. And it had so much of flowers. Infact my maid felt bad about it. But the sight of my maid  with the bunch of flowers, brought a huge smile on my face. Without a delibrate attempt, i have got some flowers . I prepared kootu with the flowers the next day. Thanks Nirmala for inspiring me to try it.

 

You need

Muringai poo - 2 cups ( Use more if u can get)

Chana dal - 4 tblspn

Grated coconut - 1/4 cup

Red chilly - 1 nos

Cumin seeds - 1/2 tspn

Salt

Turmeric

Seasoning

Oil, mustard seeds, urad dal and red chilly, broken into two.

 

Method

 

Cook chana dal in pressure cooker till soft but firm. Wash the flowers and cook in 1/2 cup of water with salt and turmeric. When the flowers wither, add the cooked chana dal and let it simmer for few minutes.

Grind the grated coconut, red chilly and cumin to a smooth paste. Add little water while grinding. Add the ground paste to the cooking mix and bring to a boil.

Heat a seasoning ladle with a teaspoon of oil and season with mustard, urad dal and red chillies. Add it to the kootu. Serve with hot rice and sambhar.