Manda Pitha

A steamed rice-flour shell around a coconut filling, and a fried semolina one in the west.

Vegetarian, but not vegan — contains dairy (chhena).

Ingredients

• 300 g rice flour
• 400 ml water
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 200 g coconut, grated
• 60 g moong dal, roasted and coarsely ground
• 150 g jaggery, grated
• 100 g chhena
• 1 teaspoon black pepper, coarsely ground

Method

1. A STEAMED RICE-FLOUR SHELL AROUND A COCONUT FILLING, AND A FRIED SEMOLINA ONE IN THE WEST. Its article gives both: the outer covering is steamed rice flour and the filling is coconut, moong, jaggery, black pepper and chhena -- while in western parts of Odisha the shell is made of suji and it is DEEP FRIED instead of steamed. Those are two different sweets under one name and the page will not blend them. Steamed rice flour is pale, soft and slightly sticky; a fried semolina shell is golden and crisp. Below is the steamed one, with the western form after it.
2. THE NAME IS ABOUT PUTTING THINGS DOWN. Its article derives manda from the Odia mandeiba, to place or to put, for the action of putting the rice dough into warm water.
3. THE SHELL DOUGH IS MADE WITH BOILING WATER. Bring the water and salt to the boil, take it off, beat in the rice flour all at once, cover for five minutes and then knead it warm until smooth. Cold water gives a dough that cracks when you shape it.
4. IT IS KNEADED WHILE IT IS TOO HOT TO BE COMFORTABLE. That is what makes it elastic. Let it cool first and it crumbles.
5. THE FILLING IS COOKED DOWN BEFORE IT GOES IN. Coconut, ground roasted moong, jaggery, chhena and the pepper in a dry pan for six or seven minutes until the jaggery has melted and the mixture holds together in a lump.
6. THE SHELLS ARE PRESSED OUT BY HAND, NOT ROLLED. A ball of dough flattened in the palm into a cup, filling in, edges brought up and pinched shut. Pinch hard -- a seam that opens in the steamer loses the filling into the water.
7. THEY ARE STEAMED FIFTEEN TO TWENTY MINUTES. The shell goes from chalky white to translucent, which is how you know.
8. FOR THE WESTERN FORM, SWAP THE SHELL AND FRY IT. 300 g fine semolina worked with 60 g ghee and enough warm water to make a stiff dough, rested half an hour, filled the same way and deep-fried at a moderate heat until golden. It keeps for days, which the steamed one does not.
9. ITS ARTICLE PLACES IT BESIDE TWO OTHER SWEETS. Modak and kozhakkattai -- the same idea of a steamed shell round a sweet coconut filling, reached separately.

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