Simple things about life 2 (Pakora - Indian Snack)

One Delhi evening in monsoon (rainy) season, sitting in verandah with a cup of chai in one hand and garam-a-garam pakora (hot pakora) in the other, watching the rain fall ....feels like you are in heaven. I guess most of the Delhites who stay out of city now will feel nostalgic and I can see them going down the memory lane with a sweet smile on their face. The whole family sitting together, doing gup-shup (chatting), eating pakoras with chai and enjoying the rainfall.

So here I am with another great Indian snack Pakora and some people call it bhajji too, especailly in south. I will tell you quickly how to make a pakora so that people who don't know what exactly is a pakora can have some idea about it. You need to make a batter of besan (Black gram flour), with water, salt, turmeric, cumin seeds and their powder, coriander powder and leaves, bakind soda, chopped green chillies, red chilli powder, amchoor (Mango powder), Garam masala well...long list of ingredients, you can add some or skip some depending on your taste. Now, you can chop onions to make onion pakora or chop the things of which you want to make pakora and then dip them in the batter and deep fry them. Once they turn golden brown then take them out and serve them with either green chutney or tamarind chutney or just simply with chai.

You can make pakoras of many things. Usually, they are made of onions, potatoes, cauliflower, spinach, green chillies, brinjal, mixed vegetable, Paneer (Indian cottage cheese, something like tofu) and then there are bread pakoras.

Bread pakora can be made by cutting two slices of bread diagonally and then stuffing boiled and mashed potatoes with masala in between two half slices and then dipping them in besan batter and then deep frying them. You can also make a simple bread pakora by cutting the bread slice diagonally and then dipping it in batter and then finally deep frying it in oil until it turns golden brown.. Enjoy the pakora with any chutney and chai.

Well, actually you can make non veg pakora too. Machhi (Fish) pakora is very popular. But it's eaten with sliced onions, cabbage, radish and lemon juice with some chaat podwer or chilli powder sprinkled on fish pakora.

Here again we talked about another great and tasty Indian snack.

Again a word of caution, it's high in calories so watch while you are eating it or just eat as much as you want but don't forget to sweat it out the next day :)