Bikaneri bhujia

Moth bean flour with the gram flour, which is why it is crunchier than sev.

Vegan.

Ingredients

• 250 g moth bean flour, moth dal ground fine
• 150 g gram flour
• 1 teaspoon ground cloves
• 2 teaspoons ground black pepper
• 1 teaspoon ground cardamom
• 1/2 teaspoon ground mace
• 1 1/2 teaspoons chilli powder
• 2 teaspoons salt
• 3 tablespoons oil, into the dough
• about 180 ml water
• oil for deep frying

Method

1. MOTH BEAN FLOUR WITH THE GRAM FLOUR, WHICH IS WHY IT IS CRUNCHIER THAN SEV. Its article names the bean botanically and then makes exactly that comparison: it is PREPARED BY USING VIGNA ACONITIFOLIA, GRAM FLOUR AND SPICES, is LIGHT YELLOW IN COLOUR, and CLOSELY RESEMBLES SEV IN APPEARANCE, BUT IS CRUNCHIER AND MORE STRONGLY FLAVOURED. Sev is gram flour alone. Vigna aconitifolia is the moth bean, and it is what makes the difference the article describes.
2. SO THE PROPORTION MATTERS MORE THAN ANY SPICE IN IT. Two hundred and fifty grams of moth flour to a hundred and fifty of gram is enough for the moth to lead. Reverse them and you have made a strongly spiced sev.
3. GRIND THE MOTH DAL YOURSELF IF YOU CANNOT BUY THE FLOUR. Whole moth beans in a spice grinder, then sieved. It is a small bean and grinds easily, and the flour goes stale fast, which is why it is worth doing fresh.
4. THE SPICING IS WARM RATHER THAN HOT, AND THAT IS THE OTHER HALF OF STRONGLY FLAVOURED. Cloves, pepper, cardamom and mace, with the chilli well behind them. This is not a chilli snack.
5. RUB THE OIL IN, THEN MAKE A STIFF DOUGH WITH AS LITTLE WATER AS IT TAKES. Stiffer than a sev batter: this is pressed, not poured.
6. PRESS IT THROUGH THE COARSEST PLATE YOU HAVE, DIRECTLY INTO THE OIL. A sev press with the largest holes, moved in circles over medium-hot oil so the strands fall separately. Thick strands are the point -- fine ones give you sev.
7. FRY UNTIL THE BUBBLING STOPS, THEN BREAK IT UP WHEN COLD. Two or three minutes a batch. Lifted out while it still fizzes it stays chewy in the middle.
8. IT IS A PROTECTED NAME AS WELL AS A SNACK, which its article records at length: the first batch was made in 1877 during the reign of Maharaja Shri Dungar Singh, the trade employs around 2.5 million people in villages around Bikaner, and in September 2010 the Indian Patent Office confirmed geographical indication rights for the name to local manufacturers.

Our own recipe. This one was written for this site rather than taken from anywhere, so there is no source to point you at. The quantities and the order of the steps are choices, not the only way to do it.

Filed under India · All recipes