Punjabi Samosa

Samosa is a popular street food in India. It is a fried savoury dish with potato filling and a crispy outer fried pastry covering.

 

Here is a 'no fail' recipe for the perfectly crispy outer covering of the samosa that stays crispy for hours. The filling is flavoured with dried pomegranate seeds and amchur powder. 

 

Traditionally samosas are served with green chutney and saunth chutney. I served them with hot chai as a evening snack. 

 

 

Recipe Source : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iIVJN0Yz1Y0

Ingredients

For Samosa

• 1 and 1/4 Cups of all purpose flour
• 2 and 1/2 Tablespoons of butter
• 1/2 Teaspoon Salt
• 1/2 Teaspoon Ajwain or carom seeds
• water to knead the dough

For the filling

• 3 Medium sized potatoes
• 1/4 Cup green peas
• 1 Tablespoon vegetable oil
• 1/2 Teaspoon Cumin Seeds
• 1 Teaspoon finely chopped ginger
• 1/2 Teaspoon coriander powder
• 1 Teaspoon Amchur powder
• 1/2 Teaspoon red chilli powder
• 1/2 Teaspoon garam masala ( original recipe calls for Punjabi garam masala. But I used the regular garam masala)
• 1 Teaspoon coriander seeds
• 1 Teaspoon dried pomegranate seeds
• 10 Cashew nuts ( optional)
• 5 Raisins ( optional)

Directions

1. Boil potatoes along with 1/2 teaspoon of salt until they are cooked through and easy to mash them. Drain water and let them cool
2. In a microwave safe bowl, add green peas along with 1 teaspoon of water and a pinch of salt and microwave on high for 1 minute. Drain water and set them aside
3. Prepare the samosa dough : In a large mixing bowl, add flour, ghee , salt and ajwain seeds. Using hands, combine everything together until the mixture resembles crumbs
4. Then start adding water little at a time and mix the dough until it comes together as a hard dough. The dough should not be soft like we knead for chapathi or roti. It should be harder than chapathi dough. Hence it is recommended to add water little at a time and bring together the dough with just enough water
5. Cover the dough with a wet kitchen towel and set aside
6. In a pan, dry roast coriander seeds and dried pomegranate seeds until you smell the aroma of roasted coriander seeds. Remove from the pan and cool. Then grind it to coarse powder
7. Prepare the filling : In a pan, heat vegetable oil. When the oil is hot, add cashew nuts and fry on low flame until the nuts are nice golden. Remove from the oil and drain on kitchen towel. Then fry raisins in the same pan and fry until they plum up. remove from oil and drain them on a kitchen towel
8. Add cumin seeds in the remaining oil. When they splutter, add ginger and fry for few seconds
9. Then add the mashed potatoes and give it a stir
10. Then add coriander powder, amchur powder, red chilli powder, garam masala and mix everything well
11. Add coarsely ground coriander and pomegranate powder and mix well. Season with salt
12. Add par boiled green peas , fried cashew nuts, raisins and mix it with the potato mixture. Samosa filling is ready
13. Shape the samosa : After 45 minutes, knead the dough once and divide them into 4 equal sized balls about a large lemon size. Roll each ball into a large thin circle. The rolled pastry should not be very thick and nor thin. If it is thick, it will not fried through and will be raw inside. If it is too thin, the filling might burst out while you deep fry                      
  a. Using a pizza cutter, cut through the center of the rolled samosa pastry

                           

                          

b. Work with one cut portion. On the straight edge of the pastry apply water with your fingertips. This is done to seal the dough. Now Hold the two edges of the watered side with your hands and bring them together to form a cone. Press gently through the watered edge to seal the cone

                        


c. Now you will a have cone to work with. Keep the cone in the rolling board and using a spoon fill the cone with  1 and 1/2 tablespoon of the potato filling we previously made

                                

                              

                             


d. We need to seal the mouth of this cone. For that , apply water around the circumference of the open cone mouth and press it gently to seal. Set aside

                               


                               

12. Follow the instructions and make samosa with the rest of the dough balls

                              


14. Once the samosas are done cover them with wet cloth , otherwise they might dry
15. Frying the samosas : It is very important to fry the samosas in appropriate oil temperature to get nice flaky golden crust. Heat oil in a pan / wok for deep frying the samosa. You need at least 3 inches of oil in the pan. 
16. When the oil gets warm,  gently slide in 2 samosas in the oil. Oil should be just warm and keep the flame on low. Oil should not be Hot. 
17. Once you drop the samosa in warm oil, you can notice bubbles starting to rise around the samosa edges. This is the right temperature
18. Fry the samosas in low flame for 5 minutes. Then increase the flame to medium and fry them for 10 minutes flipping sides once in a while. Let the samosas get fried on its own for 10 minutes. Do not rush through or disturb them
19. once they are nice golden, remove from oil and drain on kitchen towel
20. Fry remaining samosas in a batch of two
21. Serve hot with Green Chutney and imli chutney or with ketchup.