Dressed up Dhokla!

It's high time I get back to my blog :) Initially I was actually occupied with worldly matters, but I don't think I have an excuse now! I've just been out of touch with my little blog world out here! Can't wait to get started again!

I never knew the difference between Gujarati Khaman and Dhokla. To me there were yellow dhoklas and white dhoklas. I did discover in time that Khaman or my so called yellow dhokla is made with chickpea flour or ground bengal gram (chana daal). Where as the 'white' variety could be made with rice or sooji/rava/semolina and is called Dhokla :). Both of us prefer dhokla over Khaman for some undefined reason! Both are equally delicious! I have always used Gits instant mixes to make dhoklas but this time I tried making them with sooji. I got the basic recipe from Trupti's 'The Spice Who Loved Me'. A beautiful blog with a ton of great recipes. A great tutorial blog for someone like me who is still a novice at Gujarati cooking! This dhokla recipe is perfect, its as simple as it gets and the result is light, fluffy, absolutely delicious dhoklas. Thanks Trupti!

Dhokla
Ingredients:
Sooji/Semolina - 1 Cup
Besan/Chickpea flour - 1 Tbsp
Yogurt (preferably sour) - enough to bring everything together
Asafoetida (heeng) - a fat pinch
Turmeric (haldi) - a tiny pinch
Salt and Sugar to taste - don't skip the sugar, a tiny bit rounds off the flavors very well :)
Baking Powder - a pinch
Lemon juice - 2 tsp
Eno/Fruit Salt - 1 tsp

Method:
Mix everything except lemon juice and eno together to idli batter like consistency. Let stand for 10 mins. In the meanwhile heat water in a steamer. Grease plates for steaming the dhokla. I used two plates, you can use one if it is large enough to leave room for the dhoklas to rise. Just before steaming, mix lemon juice and eno to the batter and blend lightly using your hand. The batter will turn a little frothy. Pour in the steaming plates. I sprinkled red chile powder over the batter in one plate and freshly ground pepper on the other. Steam covered for 15 mins. Insert a fork and if it comes out clean, dhokla is ready. Remove plates from steamer and let cool for 5 mins.

Chutney -
Cilantro leaves - 1 Cup
Fresh mint leaves - a handful
Green chiles - 2
A tiny piece of ginger
Peanuts - 1 tbsp
Salt and lime juice to taste.

Grind everything together to a smooth chutney.

Assembling -
Remove one layer of dhokla on a plate and apply green chutney liberally. Cover with the other layer of dhokla.

Tempering -
Heat 2 tsp oil, as it warms add a tsp of mustard seeds (rai) and a slit green chile. When mustard begins to crackle, add a tsp of sesame seeds. Pour this mix over the dhokla and sprinkle chopped cilantro.



Cut the dhokla in square pieces and serve warm! Cold coffee made a great accompaniment to these dhoklas for a summer weekend breakfast! If you don't have time to make chutney, ketchup works very well too. You can spice up the ketchup with a dash of hot sauce for that extra kick :) These dhoklas are great even if you skip the whole layering business and just temper them with mustard and sesame seeds. We usually have dhoklas without any tempering - with just red chile or black pepper sprinkled on top. In that case, adding a little ginger-green chile paste to the batter (like Trupti did) would be a great idea!