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Wednesday, 16 April 2014

Medu Vada / Lentil Fritters / Lentil Savory Donuts

Medu Vada is a South Indian Snack or Side served as part of Lunch. It is made of urad dal and deep fried. They are made in the shape of donuts. Vadas are crispy on the outside and soft pillowy from inside. Vadas can be made with plain urad dal or you can add onions, ginger, green chilli and pepper to the batter and make spicy vadas. I like spicy version of Vadas over the plain ones. Onions add sweetness to the vadas and ground pepper give it a nice spice crunch. Vadas are served with coconut chutney and sambar. I made vadas for evening snack and we had it along with a cup of tea.



Ingredients


  • 1 Cup Urad Dal
  • 1 Medium Onion Chopped finely
  • 1 Inch Piece Ginger Chopped finely
  • 5 curry leaves chopped finely
  • 1 Tablespoon Chopped Cilantro Leaves
  • 1 Teaspoon finely chopped green chillies
  • 1 Teaspoon fresh ground Pepper
  • Salt to taste
  • a big pinch of Hing / Asafoetida
  • Oil for Deep frying
  • For shaping the Vadas : a zip lock bag, about 1/4 cup water in a bowl

Directions

1. Soak urad dal for 45 minutes in tap water. Wash and drain them completely. Keep the urad dal in freezer for 20 minutes. Keeping the urad dal in freezer helps in making fluffy vadas and also they absorb less oil during deep frying

2. Take the urad dal form the freezer and grind it to fine paste in a food processor. Add only 1 tablespoon or 2 tablespoons of Very Cold water during grinding. If you add more water, the batter will be runny and you wont be able to shape the vadas.

3. Transfer this batter to a big bowl. Add chopped onions, ginger, green chillies, curry leaves, cilantro leaves, salt, pepper and hing. Mix well using a spoon or hand. Batter is ready to be fried

                           

                            

4. In a wok heat oil for deep frying

5. Shaping the Vadas : You need zip lock bag and a bowl of water for shaping vadas. You can use any thick plastic sheet also. Apply little oil over the bag. Transfer a tablespoon of vada batter to the greased sheet. Make a hole in the center and shape them like donuts. Hold the sheet on your left hand. Dip your right hand in the bowl of water and make your right hand a little wet so that the batter wont stick to your hand and it will be easy to drop it in oil. Make sure you don't have too much water in your right hand. If you have too much water on right hand, it will splutter when you drop vadas in oil. Now carefully transfer vada from left hand sheet to the right hand. And from the right hand drop it in oil slowly and carefully. When you are dropping vadas, just behind and drop it close the oil. Please be extra cautious while dropping vadas in oil

                        


6. Shape vadas one by one and drop them in oil. You can drop 2 or 3 vadas at a time depending on the size of the wok and the quantity of oil used for deep frying. I used a small wok and very little oil. Hence fried two vadas at a time

                                 


7. Fry until the outside looks crispy and light golden. Flip side once and fry the other side too

8. Remove from oil and drain it on a paper towel

                                        

9. Serve hot with chutney and Sambar
 

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