Dahi Bhalla/Bhalle (White Lentil dumplings in yogurt sauce – not deep fried)

Which do you think is the challenging meal of the day? I think it is snacks that too when you have to make a different snack every day for hungry kids back from school and at the same time not to indulge on sinful ones. In my quest to make not so sinful snacks, I modify some of the recipes and try to make it little guilt free and this is one such one. If you are familiar with Indian cuisine, this bhalla/bhalle is a slightly jazzed up version of the South Indian Thayir vadai. If you are not familiar with Indian cuisine Soaked and ground white lentil dumplings are deep fried and soaked in yogurt pepped up with red chili powder, tangy and sweet chutneys. Even though I seriously don’t have anything against fried snacks, I normally stay away from fried food because I either use coconut oil or organic clarified butter(for sweets) for deep frying. These are slightly calorie dense and are also pretty expensive, so I try to find alternate methods like pan frying or baking. I used the Aebleskiver pan/ appam pam/ appe pan the magic utensil I love the most to pan fry this instead of deep frying. Very easy to put together if you have the basic ingredients in hand and serves as a quick snack or even as a gluten free party appetizer. If you haven’t tried this out before do try it and let me know how you liked it.

Preparation Time – 20 to 30 Minutes

Cooking Time – 20 to 30 Minutes

Serves – Makes around 24

Ingredients

Urad Dal – 1 Cups

Salt – 1 Tsp or to taste

Raisins – 48

Cashews – 24(Toasted and split into half)

Oil – 2 Tbsp

Water – 3 to 4 Cups

For the yogurt sauce

Yogurt – Around 3 to 4 Cups

Black salt  - 1/2 Tsp or to taste

Mint chutney  - 2 Tbsp or to taste

Sweet date and tamarind chutney – 2 Tbsp or to taste

Kashmiri chili powder – 2 Tsp or to taste

Roasted cumin powder - 2 teaspoons

Chat masala powder – 1/2 Tsp

Fresh coriander leaves,chopped - 2 tablespoons

Ginger,cut into thin strips 1 inch piece – 1 Tbsp

Method

1) Rinse and drain urad dal and soak it in water just covering an inch over  the surface for 2-3 hours. Now drain the water and reserve the excess water. Add little by little of the reserved water and grind into a smooth paste adding salt and keep it aside.

2) Heat the appam pan and once it is hot add few drops of oil in each of the groove and pour batter till 3/4 of the groove and insert two raisins and  the half piece cashew and cover and cook on one side.

3) Now flip and cook the other side. Take this out of the pan and repeat the steps for the rest of the batter. Once all the vadas/appam/bhallas what ever you call is done. Heat another wide mouthed pan and boil the water. Once the water comes to rolling boil. Put the bhallas in hot water and leave it for 2 minutes.

4) Remove the bhallas and set it aside to cool as they will be little hot to touch. Once they are cool enough to handle, squeeze out the excess water and set the bhallas aside.

5) Now add the salt, chat masala to the yogurt and whisk it without any lumps. Place the bhallas in individual serving bowls or in a place and pour the yogurt mixture over it. Top it with red chili powder, roasted cumin powder, ginger pieces, chopped cilantro and the sweet & spicy chutney and serve.

Note – You can also substitute half of the urad dal with mung dal as mung is a superior lentil than urad as far as nutrition is concerned.

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