Farari bateta vada (Gluten free crispy potato rolls)

There are certain days and months, Hindus fast. The upcoming festival of Navratri is one of those festivals when people may be fasting.   The fast is not compulsory but recently more and more people seem to fast either for health reasons are religious reasons. Whatever the reason, on the days Hindus fast, there is a list of foods that they are “allowed” to eat. The list – often referred to as farali food – includes all the fruits and nuts, milk and milk products including yogurt. It also includes potatoes, sweet potatoes, cassava, tapiaco, ragigara, Morio and amaranth etc…. In fact, the sumptuous delicacies you can eat in place of everyday food makes you feel that you are having a feast because of the variety you can make.

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This month, I was able to buy a ready mixed farali atta which is actually a gluten free flour made from Rajagro (Amaranth), Samo (Buckwheat), Singoda (Water chestnuts)  and Sago (Topiaco) . Having this flour has meant that I can try out a lot more recipes. When I was growing up such ready mixed flours were not available and our farari dishes were mostly potato, cassava or banana based. My list of the most popular farari dishes from my blog are listed here.

This recipe is new for me.I have made bateta vada using chick pea flour batter but chick pea flour is not allowed during fasting so I made the batter using the farari atta – which as I mentioned before contains Rajagro (Amaranth), Samo (Buckwheat), Singoda (Water chestnuts)  and Sago (Topiaco).  These potato vadas are made with minimum spice so I have given the mixture a slight tempering to bring out the flavours.

Ingredients

1. Transfer the boiled potatoes and green chilies and ginger into a mixing bowl.  Add the salt, pepper, coriander and lemon juice to the potato mixture.

2.  Now prepare a tempering to give extra flavour to the filling,  Heat 2 tablespoons of oil in a wok and add in the cumin seeds. Once the seeds go brown, add the potato mixture, the raisins and half the sesame seeds.  Cook the mixture on medium heat for 3 minutes.  Cooking the mixture blends in all the spices and the raisins gives a sweetness to the potato mixture to balance out the lemon juice. once cooked, allow the mixture to cool.

3. Whilst the mixture is cooling, prepare a batter by mixing half a cup of water to a cup of the farari atta.  Add in the rest of the sesame seeds plus salt and pepper to taste.  Stir it well.  The batter should not be too thick or too thin.  It should coat the potato balls without dripping too much.  Farari Atta batter does look a bit darker than the usual batter but that’s fine as these flours are always a bit dark compared to plain flour.

4. Once the mixture is cool, make 12-15 equal size balls and  put the oil in a wok to heat.

5.To test that the oil is ready for frying, drop a  small amount of batter in the oil.  If it rises up quickly, the oil is ready for frying.  Lower the heat and dip one potato ball at a time into the batter, either using your hands or a spoon, and transfer it slowly into the oil to fry.  Fry until they are crispy. Keep adjusting the heat to ensure that the potato balls get cooked perfectly.  Serve these hot with a sweet coconut and yogurt dip or the  mango and coriander dip with a hint of chili.

My favourite farali/farari dishes  are:

Farari kachoris  – These are Spicy Coconut and Nuts Stuffed in Mashed Potatoes

Farari bateta nu shak – This is a simple potato curry which has nuts and cumin seeds.

Farari Sambharo – This is a stir fry with sweet potatoes and chilies

My list of  Top  farari recipes can be found here.

NOT FASTING and fancy authentic bateta vadas?  the recipe is here. 

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