Puttu and Kadalai

This dish is a traditional Keralite dish served in most Malayali households as a healthy breakfast. Puttu is  steamed beaten rice and kadalai loosely translates to chickpea. This is a slight bent from the traditional dish as I have used beaten rice which is a MUCH more healthier option than normal rice.  The nutrition value of this dish is really high as it uses beaten rice and chickpea. There is also a sweet version of Puttu which is eaten with steamed banana.
This dish is easy to make and yummy to eat.

You will need:

For the Puttu
1. 4 cups thick Poha (beaten Rice)- available in all South Indian stores
2. One medium sized coconut-scraped
3. Salt

For the Kadalai
1. 1 cup black Chickpea, soaked and cooked.
2. 1 small potato, boiled
3. 1 onion-chopped
4. 1 tbsp of tamarind pulp
5. 1 tsp of pepper powder
6. 1 tbsp of dhania(coriander seeds) powder
7. 1 tsp of cumin seeds powder
8. 1/2 tsp of red chilli powder
9. 1 tsp of corn flour/rice flour for thickening
10. Jaggery- Just a pinch
11. Salt to taste

METHOD:
1. Dry-roast the poha on medium flame till crisp.
2. Run this in a mixer to a coarse powder. (It should feel like rava)
3. Transfer it to a bowl, and add an equal amount of coconut and salt.

4. Sprinkle water and mix it to a wet-sand consistency. (Note that water must NOT be poured, but sprinkled)
5. Set aside for minimum of an hour.
6. Keep sprinkling water every 15 minutes.

For the steaming:
1. The mixture has to be steamed to get the final Puttu. Traditionally, a puttu kuzhal is used (a picture of which I'm attaching). Put the mixture inside the kuzhal and steam for 20-25 minutes.

2. An alternative to this device is steaming it in a muslin cloth. For this, heat water in a cooker and place a steel colander inside the cooker.Now transfer the mixture into a muslin cloth and tie it up. Place this cloth-mixture inside the colander and steam for 20- 30 minutes.

Kadalai:
1. In a kadhai, add  a tsp of oil, add musturd and cumin seeds (jeera). Once it crackles, add curry leaves and onions. Fry till onions turn pink.
2. Add the tamarind paste and allow it to it to boil for a minute. To this add, cumin powder, pepper powder, red chilli powder and salt and a pinch of jaggery and boil for 2 minutes. Add the mashed potatos and the boiled chickpea.
3. Add enough water for required consistency and allow it to boil away for 10-15 minutes.
4. Towards the end, mix the rice flour in little water and pour it in and cook for another 5 minutes.

Serve hot.

Linking this to Kavi's Healthy Cooking Challenge and Smita's HCC. :-)