Instant Pohe Chivda

Instant Chivda is a very simple Maharashtrian snacks recipe. I planned to make a video of my recipes, since it's festival season I thought of starting with a simple festive recipe which could be useful for people. The things that came immediately into my mind was Chivda. As we already know there are various ways of preparing chivda, a savory snack ex: using flattened rice, murmura, bundi / sev mixture, sabudana chivda to name few. I have already posted the recipe for Pohe Chivda earlier that was using thin poha. This recipe is using the same poha that we use for making kanda pohe and can be prepared easily with all the available ingredients in your kitchen.

Misal Pav Recipe

Misal Pav is most famous Maharashtrian dish - a street food. 'Misal' means mixture in Marathi and pav is the bun / bread roll which is served along with the mixture. Misal is a spicy curry which is generally prepared using sprouts and served with Farsan (a snack made from besan) / sev topping along with finely chopped onion, coriander and a lemon slice. Misal Pav is usually served as a breakfast dish but is all-time available in most of the Maharashtrian hotels and can be served as lunch time menu, evening snack. There are various kinds of Misal pav available  which are usually named based on the locality they are served  (for ex: Nashik Misal, Kolhapuri Misal, Puneri Misal etc..) and the taste slightly varies based on the spices used in the particular region. You can say 'Kolhapuri Misal' to be one of the spiciest. 

    In Bangalore it's very difficult to find the Farsan that we usually get in Maharashtra, so I usually get the Farsan from my native and sometimes my dad sends it via parcel. Just today morning I got a parcel of Farsan mixture, bun pav, sev and he had reminded me yesterday to soak the Matki which I could use it for preparing Misal today ; That's so kind of him. I am really blessed to have such caring parents! 

I prepare this recipe in very simple way. It's easy and quick. Let's go through the procedure.

Instant Dhokla

Dhokla!!! is one of my favorite since childhood. I remember when we used to go to Sangli a place in Maharashtra for Diwali shopping my mom used to buy it for us. It was just for Rs.3  a packet with 6-7 small Dhokla's with fried Mirchi. It used to taste awesome, in fact its still available now. might the prize is increased to 10 or so. That was "The Dhokla" taste that I ever have in my mind. If we google now, there are many ways of preparing it! using Rava (Semolina), curd, etc etc.. The one that I prepare is using very minimal number of ingredients, its instant and all you need is Besan peeth (Gram flour) and a Eno packet as main ingredients, the rest of all are available in every kitchen.  I haven't tried the Dhokla yet with Semolina or with curd, will surely try someday :). Here is the procedure on how preparing this simple instant "Dhokla".

 

Chivda Recipe

Chivda is most famous tea time snack in India in fact more famous in Maharashtra. It is prepared in large quantity by my mum during the festival season like Diwali/Dasara. When I was small and used to stay in hostel for studies, I remember my mom used to prepare laddoo and chivda and pack for me. Even now she gives whenever I return from my native :). I used to think preparing it  is a very big task since the quantity she would prepare would be large! but don't think so that its too difficult. We can prepare in small quantities with easily available set of ingredients. There are different forms of Murmure (flattened rice in marathi) available in the market like kanda pohe type, or the typical Maharashtrian ones which are little puffy. I am using the thin flattened rice that is usually used for preparing Kanda Pohe. We will see below steps on how it can be prepared.

Palak Pakoda

Crispy Palak/spinach Pakodas in this chilly weather is a wonderful combination. I always had a thought of preparing the palak pakodas but again the mission of shedding weight always kept me away from this..
But this day I could not resist as I had palak in my kitchen and luckily had got some free time, so came up with these crispy pakodas. This is not time consuming at all, just needs maximum of half an hour. Addition of rice flour made the pakodas crispy.

Kothimbir Mutka / Vadi

Coriander is called as Kothimbir in Marathi. Coriander can also be used to prepare recipes other than for garnishing. Coriander is said to be good for cleaning skin disorders and mouth ulcers.
     Kothimbir vadi /mutka is the most healthiest recipe that can be prepared out of coriander, it’s typical snacks of Maharashtra. This recipe was taught to me by my sister when I had been to my native for the holidays. She lives in core Maharashtra region (Nasik) and knows lot about cooking, I still have to learn many more things from her