Aloo parathas

It’s comfort food. But a lot of people I know are turned off by assuming that there’s a lot of effort involved. That it takes too long. That its hard to roll. But guess what? Its none of that. Aloo parathas are a great variety of Indian bread and you can just as easily replace the aloo (potato) with any other filling of your choice (think onions, garlic, cabbage or cauliflower). Here’s a first look.

Aloo parathas, fresh from the griddle.

How?

Well, I am not going to go into the details. The method is pretty similar to most Indian bread varieties. But the way my mom makes this is by boiling potatoes separately, seasoning them separately and then individually rolling a small ball of the potato filling into each ball of paratha dough. I find this method tedious and have as usual found a shortcut. I boil the potatoes, mash them and then mix them directly into the dough and blend everything with adequate amount of salt and spice, turmeric and other seasoning that I want. I then let it sit for about 2 hours to soak in all the flavour. And then when I roll them, they roll out as easy as anything else and then it’s just about adding a wee bit of oil on the griddle and cooking both sides as required. Easy-peasy!

Serve hot with chutney, pickle or daal or good old' raita. Anything works!

And so there you have it.. easy, simple, tasty and very filling – aloo parathas. Bon Appetit!

Protein powerhouse: Tofu parathas

As vegetarians in France, we have to grab the olive branch to any decent ingredient out there, which is out of the ordinary. And tofu is definitely one of those ingredients we are going to pick up only outside of India. I mean when paneer is so vastly available, who’s going to pick tofu? Well, not me. But I chanced upon this really fresh, home-made tofu supplied to us by our cafeteria manager lady (she is Vietnamese) and I took a kilo (that means you are likely to be receiving tofu recipes for a few days).  And so, I made a dish I’ve made many times in the past but have only been lazy to blog about – Tofu parathas.

Pictured here with Aloo Matar.

The other reason I like making tofu parathas  is that I face the perpetual problem of making the really bland ingredient taste interesting. And I came up with a couple of recipes before. You can see them here. As for this recipe, because it’s so ordinary, I am not making any hue and cry of it.

Stated simply, knead in the tofu (about 300g) with your hands to about 2.5 cups of atta. Make a smooth dough, adding 1 tablespoon of oil, salt-to-taste, a pinch of turmeric powder, red chili powder and dhania-jeera powder and sufficient water to knead into a soft, non-sticky dough (similar to chapathi dough). Let it sit for about an hour and roll out like chapathis but tava-fry them like parathas (without exposing to the naked flame). And this is a particularly good dish because the blandness of the tofu is masked by the typical blandness associated with the savoury Indian bread varieties and the side-dish is what spices it up. Plus, all that protein! So, no waiting.. Bon Appétit!

PS: The Aloo Matar was truly divine. If anyone needs a recipe, holler!

Malabar-style parathas

Ok by that I mean the layered parathas… something like the frozen Deeps brand parathas. For the uninitiated, parathas are amongst the most popular Indian flat-bread variety and are omnipresent on the menus of Indian restaurants. For a while now, I seemed to be making only chapathis or theplas. So I thought it would make a nice change to make parathas instead. And soon I was tempted into trying the round layered variety, typical of the restaurants and so I set about making it…
Ingredients

Wheat flour (atta)	2 cups
Salt	to taste
Sugar	1 tsp
Milk	200ml
Water	Warm – 1/2 – 3/4 cup
Oil	as required

How
1. Mix the salt and sugar into the flour and knead into a smooth, slightly-sticky dough by adding all of the milk and the required amount of water. Knead for at least 4-5 minutes till there are absolutely no lumps whatsoever and it reaches uniform consistency (it should be like chapathi consistency).
2. Cover with a damp wet cloth and set aside for 10 minutes. This is for the dough to soak in all it’s moisture and get ready.
3. Take dough roughly the size of a large lemon or a mid-size tomato (more than you would for chapathi) and using a rolling-pin, spread it into a mid-sized chapathi of sorts. Meanwhile place an iron skillet on medium-high to cook your parathas.
4. Pour 1/2 tsp of oil in the center of the chapathi and spread it all over the surface with the tips of your fingers.
5. Fold the chapathi making it a “fan'” of sorts as shown in the Picture A. What you should be doing here is folding the oiled part into itself while keeping the dry bottom of the chapathi on the outside.
6. Now pinch one end of this long folded chapathi and make into a spiral as shown in Picture B.
7. Flatten it on either side and make it ready to be rolled again. Look at Picture C.

8. Roll out again like a chapathi. This remains surprisingly dry for the oil has all blended into the layers that you have just created. Look at the faint spiral visible in Picture D.
9. Put this dough on the hot skillet and add a 1/2 tsp of oil around its sides and spread it all over the paratha as it cooks. Holding your ladles or a cup on the paratha cooks it evenly and browns it evenly as well.
Tip:Alternately, you can choose to freeze your own parathas at this stage when they are rolled out and ready to cook. This is a big time-saver for those time-crunch days .
10. Cook on both sides till browned evenly and voilà, there’s your layer paratha… the layers come up as you cook the paratha and even more as you eat it. You can choose to add a drop of butter on top and spread it for a richer taste. But for the health-conscious, stop right here!
Serve with curd/subji or dal for a sumptuous meal. Pictured here with tadka dal and onions. Enjoy!
Bon Appétit!