What is Pav bhaji?

Pav Bhaji is a popular street food where the a mixture of vegetables are cooked using a mixture of spices. The vegetables are are steamed and then tempered with spices, mashed and served with soft buttered bread rolls. This is a great dish to serve with a salad when you are entertaining but don’t want to spend too much time in the kitchen.

.Pau Bhajis a dish I  got introduced to  by my husband who used to enjoy this when he was studying in Mumbai. Pau means bread and bhaji is the name given to the spicy curry which accompanies the bread. Apparently, this dish got invented in Mumbai because factory workers wanted a light and quick meal during their lunch break.

A lot of the Indian grocery shops carry boxes or packets of ready made pau bhaji masala but I use my own blend of spices.  Lots of the recipes I have looked up seem to use a lot of potatoes. As this dish is eaten with bread, I didn’t want to have too many carbs so I have tried to use lots of vegetables and just one small potato for my pav bhaji.

Ingredients for 4 servings

• • 1 potato
  • 4 -5 cups of mixed frozen vegetables (baby carrots,sweetcorn, peas, beans, cauliflower and beans)
  • handful of soya beans
  • 1 cup of pasatta ( or you can used tinned or fresh tomatoes)
  • 1 tablespoon of tomato puree ( you won’t need the puree if you are using pasata)
  • 2 tablespoons cooking oil
  • 1 teaspoon cumin seeds
  • 1 tablespoon of blended ginger, garlic and green chilies mixture
  • 1 teaspoon salt
  • 1 teaspoon turmeric
  • 1 teaspoon dhana jiru (mixture of coriander and cumin powders)
  • 1 teaspoon garam masala
  • 1 tablespoon of jaggery (or you can use brown sugar or any artificial sweetener)
  • 1 tablespoon lemon

For the garnishing your Pav Bhaji Recipe when serving:

• • 1 finely chopped and stir fried onion
  • Fresh coriander (unfortunately I had run out so had to do without coriander).

Method:

1. Wash and chop the potato into very small cubes and add it to the frozen vegetables.

2.  Add just enough water to cover the vegetables and cook them until they are soft.

3. Using a sieve remove all the water from the vegetables.  Save the water to add to the bhaji if it looks too dry.

4. Heat 2 tablespoons of oil and add in the cumin seeds. Once they are brown, add all the vegetables and mix so that the oil coats the vegetables.

5. Add the salt, turmeric, dhana jiru and the ginger garlic and chilly mixture.   Add acup of pasata, the lemon juice and jaggery (or sugar or sweetener). Finally add the  garam masala.

6.  Stir and cook for 5 minutes.  After cooking your bhaji for 10 minutes, it will look like a mixed vegetable curry.

7.  Using a Potato masher, mash the bhaji but  don’t mash them if you  don’t like your vegetables too mashed. Once mashed, cook this for 2-3 minutes more .

8.  Garnish the  Pav bhaji with fried onions and coriander  hot with toasted bread rolls.

9.  You can serve the bread and bhaji separately or bhaji can be served on top of the bread rolls.

if you have got the Instant Pot, you may wish to try this recipe for Pav bhaji  which is much quicker.

Here are more Street food recipes for you to try out:

• Vegan wraps with potato and cheese filling
• Somasa Chaat with Yogurt – Indian Snack Food
• Potato Pies with Homemade Mango Chutney

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