Rotis and an Award!

I just received another award!! It's the good chat award from Cham of Spice Club. Thank you so much for thinking of me, dear! Our friendship started in the early days of our blogs. Cham, I still have some of the masala powder you sent me for arusuvai. I think of you every time I use it!

One other topic is about the Open Sesame event at Dining Hall. As you probably know, voting has started. If you liked my okra corn cakes, please log into Dining Hall and vote for me. To vote, click here. Thanks to all in advance!!

Coming to the food part of this post, I'm going to write about 2 rotis. One has been in my drafts for a while and the other is newer. They are dill-vegetable roti and spinach-corn roti.

Dill-Vegetable Roti:

This one came about when I was thinking about akki rotis I've had in the past. I don't know if it was the person who was making it or what, but I haven't been a fan of the texture of akki rotis that I've had to date. No offense to anyone! However, I love the flavor components involved and decided to change things around to my taste.

The result is a soft roti that is loaded with the goodness of vegetables and perfumed with the fragrance of fresh dill. It explodes with flavor and is a meal in and of itself!

Ingredients:

Whole wheat flour/atta - 2 cups
Fresh dill, chopped - 1/4 cup
Zucchini - 1 small, grated
Carrot - 1 medium, grated
Onion - 1 small, finely chopped
Green chillies - 4-5, or to taste, finely chopped
Cumin powder - 1 tsp
Salt to taste
Oil - 2 tsp
Warm water to mix dough

Method:

Mix the flour with oil and salt. Add all of the other ingredients with warm water to make a slightly stiff dough. It should be a little stiffer than normal chappathi dough. Allow the dough to rest for 15-30 minutes. Then, roll out using flour as required. The thickness will be a little thicker than chappathis. Fry on hot tava/griddle adding a few drops of oil until brown spots appear on both sides.

Tastes great hot, but reheats well. Enjoy on its own or with pickle/curds/side dish!


Spinach Corn Roti:


This one came out of a bit of randomness. I think I was still in a corny mood after making my okra corn cakes (excuse the pun!) and decided to try corn flour in a roti. I had some frozen spinach on hand and was able to throw these together. The taste was awesome, but these should definitely be eaten hot. They won't reheat well, so just keep that in mind.

Ingredients:

Corn flour - 1 cup
Whole wheat flour/atta - 1 cup
Frozen spinach - 1/2 cup (I didn't squeeze it dry)
Green chillies - 4-5 or to taste, chopped
Garlic - 2 cloves, grated
Ginger - 1/2 inch piece, grated
Chilli powder - 1 tsp, or to taste
Cumin powder - 1/2 tsp
Amchur (dried mango) powder - a pinch, optional
Salt to taste
Oil - 2 tsp to mix into the dough
Warm water

Method:

Mix the oil and salt into the flours. Now, add the remaining ingredients except water. Toss to combine and add enough warm water to make a slightly stiff dough. Allow to rest for about 30 minutes. At this point, I wasn't able to roll the rotis out, so I just took balls of dough and patted them out with my hand as thin as possible. Then, place them on a heated tava/griddle and drizzle a few drops of oil. Cook until you get brown spots on both sides and serve hot.

These came out pretty thick, so the texture was a bit different, but still tasted great! They were good on their own, but even better with a little bit of South Indian style mixed veg pickle!

Needless to say, these are both off to Srivalli for her roti mela. I'm also sending the following previously posted rotis:

Garlic-Avocado Rotis
Methi Rotis

Garlic Avocado Roti

So, I was going through the usual, "What do I make for dinner tonight???" turmoil last night. I was thinking about what I had in the fridge because I realllllly didn't want to have to go shopping in the freezing cold. I suddenly remembered seeing a reference to avocado parathas on Maheshwari's blog a while ago. I had some avocados so I thought that would be a good use for them. Then, I had a seemingly crazy thought... Being the garlic fiend that I am, I thought, "Why not add a ton of garlic and make them into garlic avocado rotis?" The results, my friends were delicioso! So much so that I'm sending this over to Sunita of Sunita's world for her think spice event with the theme of gaaaaaaaarlic!


Ingredients:

Avocado - 1 medium, mashed with fork or potato masher
Garlic - 5 cloves
Green chillies - 4, or to taste
Cumin powder - 1/2 tsp
Garam masala (optional) - 1/2 tsp (I didn't use this here)
Salt to taste
Whole wheat flour (atta) - 2 cups

Method:

1. Crush garlic and green chillies in mortar and pestle or mixie. Mix this with mashed avocado in a medium bowl.

2. Add atta, cumin powder, garam masala (if using), and salt to avocado mixture. Mix well, adding very little water, if needed. In all likelihood, you'll either not need water or require maybe a couple of tablespoons. So, be careful! :)

3. Heat tava/griddle on medium heat.

4. Now, break off small lemon size balls of dough and roll out (slightly thicker than chappathi) using a little bit of flour.

5. Drizzle a few drops of oil on the tava and place rolled out roti on it.

6. Fry until bubbles form and the roti has brown spots on the side touching the tava. Turn over and cook until brown spots form on the other side.

7. Enjoy hot with pickle, curds, raita, etc.!

You really don't even need anything to accompany this (in my opinion) because the garlicky spicy flavor is just amazing. One more look...:

Methi Roti/Paratha

So, this is a simple recipe for methi roti. This is one that I've been eating for a long time. Amma and I used to make it together a lot at home. Made this one for dinner last night and was really awesome! It's good especially if you're bored of making the same old chappathi!

Ingredients:

Methi leaves (vendheya keerai)- 1 medium to large bunch
Atta flour - 2 cups
Tomatoes - 1 medium, chopped
Cumin powder - 3/4 tsp
Green chillies - 4
Chilli powder - to taste
Salt - to taste
Oil or ghee
Warm water - enough to mix dough
Maida/all purpose flour - for rolling

Method:

1. Cut and clean the methi leaves. Heat a skillet with small amount of oil or ghee. Add methi leaves, green chillies, tomatoes, jeera powder, chilli powder, and salt all at once. Fry until the methi leaves have wilted and the tomatoes have softened. Keep the heat high to evaporate all the water that escapes. Cool the mixture.

2. Now, take the cooled methi mixture in a bowl. Add atta flour to that. Mix the dough by slowly adding small quantities of warm water. The dough should be a little loose, like for chappathi. Add a little more oil, if the dough gets too sticky. Let the dough rest for about 30 minutes.

3. After the dough has rested, take small balls of the dough and roll them out into round rotis using little maida flour. They should be rolled out to about the thickness of chappathi.

4. Place the roti on warm tava and sprinkle little oil around it. Once it bubbles a little, turn over and cook the other side. Add little more oil if needed. Enjoy warm with sweet lime pickle, curds, raita, or any other side dish you like!

We ate this with kovakkai kari that I made from a Sun TV cooking segment. See the recipe here on Kribha's site. Enjoy, guys!