Kara Boondi

I think it’s very rare to find people who doesn’t like Kara boondi; For some reason since childhood I am allergetic to besan flour and if I eat anything that’s made of besan flour, it makes me sick; So I haven’t had boondi until now; On the other hand, hubby loves Kara boondi like anything. While he is in deep sleep and if someone asks him what snack you would like to eat, he simply says “boondi”; that’s his fondness for boondi;

And now time has come to try my hand at making this wonderful Kara boondi to surprise and make hubby happy;

At first I thought this is a tough one to prepare and had second thoughts whether to give a try or not; But the simple recipe I got from my mother made it very easy; And per hubby, This tastes delicious; Thanks to Amma for her nice recipe;

 Ingredients:

1.    Chicke Pea flour/Besan flour – 1 cup

2.    Salt, to taste

3.    Chilli powder – ½ tbsp

4.    Curry leaves – 8 to 10

5.    Garlic cloves – 4, crush into small pieces

6.    Peanuts - handful

7.    Water

8.    Ghee or butter  - 2 tbsp

9.    Baking soda - pinch

10. Oil, for deep fry

Method:

1.    First step is to prepare the boondi batter which is critical to get proper boondi; Take flour into a bowl, add little salt, baking soda and mix well;

2.    Now add little water, combine it well and make sure no lumps; Then add some more water little by little and make sure you get slightly thin batter; It should be thinner than dosa batter we usually make;

3.    Add butter to the batter and stir it well; Adding this butter helps to get fine rounded boondi;

4.    Heat oil in a pan, keep boondi ladle over pan and drop batter into the ladle; Batter smoothly goes through the ladle holes into the oil;

5.    Fry the boondi till golden brown and transfer it to oil absorbent paper;

6.    Repeat the same process for remaining batter;

7.    Once you done with frying all boondi, in the same pan fry peanuts and transfer to a oil absorbent paper;

8.    Fry curry leaves and transfer to oil absorbent paper

9.    Now, in a small bowl take crushed garlic, chilli powder (per your spice level), salt and add ½ tbsp of hot oil (you can use the same oil that you used to fry the boondi); Mix well;

10. Then finally, take boondi into a bowl, add fried peanuts, curry leaves (crush them using your fingers) and the garlic mixture that you made; Mix all these well, adjust salt and spice level based on your taste; Yummy Kara boondi is ready to eat :)

11. Transfer Kara boondi into an air-tight container to keep it fresh and to retain the aroma that comes from garlic and curry leaves;

Notes:

1.    You can omit garlic from the preparation if you do not like; Instead you can directly add salt and chilli powder to the fried boondi;

2.    You can also add cashew nuts along with peanuts;