Recipe Fundas!-Simple,Tasty, Healthy Vegetarian recipes for a Vibrant Living!

Tawa Idli! Feeling bored amid Covid 19 lockdown? Do you have idli batter and idli podi, and some oil? Lets get started. Take a pan, put 4 tbsp of cooking oil or sesame oil. As the oil becomes hot, add a spoon full of  Idli chilli powder (also known as idli podi). Let it fry in the excess oil. Add a ladle of idli batter in the center and close the tawa with a lid. The corners will get crispier. Do not turn. After a while, your crispy tawa idli, that tastes like Idli in the top and crispy dosa on the other side will be ready. This does not need any side dish. Enjoy the below video of Tawa idli cooking by our son, Siddharth!

  This dish has its origin in Karnataka in India. I used Malabar Cucumber that has the Orange Color Skin for this recipe. Key Ingredients are only a few: 1. Rice- 1 cup 2. Jaggery-1/2 cup 3. Grated Cucumber- 1 cup 4. Cardamom powder- as per your taste 5. Banana/Plantain leaves to steam Soak the rice for about 1-2 hours. I used Idli rice, but Raw rice is also good. Peel and grate the cucumber. Extract the juice completely by squeezing and keep the juice aside. In a blender add the rice, jaggery and cardamom powder. Grind without adding water. To this mixture, add the squeezed cucumber first. Mix well. The batter should be of Idli batter consistency. Add cucumber juice to adjust the consistency. In an idli cooker, add water to the base first. Then, grease the banana leaves with ghee and put a ladle of batter in each pocket. Fold and steam for 20 minutes. This dish is served with hot ghee and is good for a breakfast.

 Easy idli that is fermented and needs no grinding. Ingredients 1.Idli Rava - 1cup 2.Sabudana - 1 cup 3.Curd - 2 cups 4.Salt to taste 4.Baking soda -1/4 tbsp (optional) Mix idli rice,sabudana,and yoghurt. Allow it to ferment overnight in a tall container with enough space for batter to rise Add water as per required consistency,salt and baking soda . Grease idli   plates with sesame oil. Pour batter and steam for ten minutes Serve with    your favourite chutney, sambar or podi.

The secret for soft idlies is the ingredients. 1.Idli rice - 4 cups 2.Fenugreek seeds - 2 tbsp 3.Urad dhal- 1 cup 4.Rice flakes ( Poha)-  1 cup Procedure: 1.Soak rice and fenugreek (methi/venthayam) together 2.Soak Urad dhal and rice flakes in separate bowls. All these should soak 5 hours. Rinse the ingredients only before grinding. Grind half of the rice and methi first for ten minutes. Then add remaining rice and rice flakes. Use wet grinder to grind. Add around 3/4 cup of water in multiple intervals ,few tbsps each 5.Take out the rice mixture. 6.Add urad dhal and grind it finely. You will need around half cup water added little by little 7.Grind urad dhal longer and that will give the best idlies 8.Mix the two batters. Add salt and mix well with hands multiple times 9.Split the mixture into two and store in two buckets having more than half space for the batter to rise. 10.Idlies can be made after greasing the idli moulds with sesame oil. Add idli batter int...

This is a famous variation of the usual idlies Ingredients: 1.Idli rice - 1 cup 2.Raw rice- 1 cup 3.Urad dhal- 3/4 cup 4.Fenugreek seeds - 1.5 tbsp Procedure: 1.Soak both rice together 2.Soak urad dhal and fenugreek also for few hours 3.Grind to a thick batter and let it ferment overnight 4. For sauting add 2 tbsp of freshly ground pepper corns,curry leaves,dry ginger powder in sesame oil or ghee Add to the batter and mix well 5.Grease the idli moulds and start steaming 6.Idlies will be ready in fifteen minutes. 

This is an idli recipe without rice as well. Helpful for controlling diabetes. Ingredients: 1.Saamai or Little Millet - 3 cups 2.Urad dhal - half cup 3.Fenugreek or Methi seeds- 3 tbsp Procedure: 1.Soak all ingredients separately for 5-6 hours. 2.Grind millets and fenugreek first after rinsing them some times 3.Add urad dhal and grind well 4.Add salt and let the batter ferment overnight. 5.Grease idli plates the following morning and fill the batter and steam for ten minutes. 6.Delicious Samai idlies are ready. This batter is good for crispy dosas but the batter tends to become sour after a day.

Soft idlies can be made using moong dhal too. Ingredients: Moong dhal - 2 cups Urad dhal- 1 cup Procedure: 1.Soak both dhals separately for 2-3 hours. 2.Grind to a fine batter 3.Add salt and mix the batter well 4.Let it ferment overnight 5.Grease idli moulds ,add batter and steam for ten minutes Hot idlies are ready. This batter is good for one day only.

Some foods are usually slow movers :) and I tried a combination that clicked. In our home, typically these are things like wheat rava and oats.  I have tried to make Oats Idli and Wheat Rava Idli separately but the blend created a magic and it was definitely rich in taste. 1. Broken wheat: 1 cup 2. Oats: 1/2 cup I soaked the two in about 2 cups of water and added a cup of fresh yoghurt. To this, I added a pinch of Eno salt. Then steamed this mixture in Idli plate for about 8 mins. This was a very healthy breakfast with no oil and it was truly fibre rich.

Most of us have moved to the cereal breakfasts... but why not try Oats Idli, a yummy variation of Oats? This actually was v.fast and is a simple recipe. For Sauting: Mustard seeds: 1/2 tbsp Channa dhal: 1/2 tbsp Green chillies-2 diced Curry leaves- few For the Idli batter: 1. Take 3 cups of Oats (Quaker) and dry roast for a few mins and grind it into a fine powder. 2. Take 1.5 cups of Wheat Rava (broken wheat) and dry roast this one also and grind into a fine powder. 3. Take 1 cup of yoghurt and mix well with a mixture of oats and wheat rava 4. Add 1 pinch of baking soda and add the sauted mixture and add little more water to get to a idli batter consistency. 5. Grease the idli plates with sesame oil, add this idli batter and steam for 7-10 minutes. This can be served with any chutneys. For the detailed list of chutneys, refer to my chutney section

Millet or Ragi has high nutritional value, than Rice. My mother used to buy millet grains, grind them and make halwa :)-. These days, Millet is being used by diabetic people. I tried this recipe for my dear mom, as she is also sweet (with diabetes). Ingredients needed: 1.Millet Flour- 3 cups 2. Urad dhal- 1 cup soaked for 2 hours Grind the urad dhal in wet grinder for 30 minutes. Soak the millet flour in water for 20 minutes and mix both urad dhal and millet flour. Leave aside the batter to ferment overnight and make idlies.

This is a nice variation of the usual idlies. Ragi is nutricious and we use Ragi frequently @ home. How to make Ragi Idli? 1. Ragi flour- 3 cups 2. Urad dhal- 1 cup Soak Urad dhal for about 3 hours in fridge and grind sprinking water occasionally. Once the urad dhal is grinded, add ragi flour and salt. Mix well so that there are no lumps. You can leave aside for fermenting or make idlies instantly. Grease idli plates with gingelly oil, add this batter and cook for around 20 mins in pressure cooker. This goes well with any chutney

1. Soak 4 cups of parboiled rice (Idli rice) with 5 tbsp of Fenugreek for 4 hours. 2. Grind the mixture and add salt. Leave aside for 10 hours. 3. Make idlies the normal way.

Ingredients: 1. Sooji or Rava -2 cups 2. Curd-1 cup 3. Channa dhal- 1 tbsp, curry leaves- 1 bunch 4. Baking soda- 1/2 tbsp. In a pan, add 1-tbsp of oil and roast the sooji. Mix sooji,adding curd and water so that there are no lumps. Add baking soda and salt. Saute with channa dhal and curry leaves. Leave aside for 20 mins and make idlis. This is a nice variation and can be prepared with less effort.

1.Soak 1 cup of Raw rice (Not Idli Rice!) in normal water for about 1 hour. 2.Strain the excess water and grind this coarsely in the blender and measure. 3.Now take half of this measure of urad dhal and soak and grind this. 4.Add dry ginger powder, curry leaves, asoefotida, cumin powder and pepper. In the next morning, you can use this batter to make Kanjeepuram idli. add 3 tbsp in the dough to get nice idlis. Note: These idlis will not be very white, but will taste good

This is my recipe for people living abroad, as we all get the same kind of parboiled idli rice and white Urad dhal. :)- 1. Soak 4 cups of parboiled idli rice in warm water for 4-5 hours. 2. Soak 1.75 cups of white ural dhal in water and place this in fridge for 5 hours. 3. Grind and rice and urad dhal one after other, separately in the blender (mixie). 4. Mix the ingredients by hand and add salt. 5. Leave the mixture in a tall vessel (allowing space for the batter to rise)overnight. 6. Next day, you would see that the mixture has risen and you can make best idlies. 7. If you are using the batter for a week, add 2-3 tbsps of gingelly oil in the batter also to get nice idlies. For those grinding in table top grinders: 1. Rice: 4 cups, Urad dhal- 1.5 cups only. Rest of the steps are the same. Sprinking water while urad dhal is getting grinded will make the idlies really soft. (Trade secret :)) Happy Idli days!!!