A blessed journey with Ayah’s Kozhakattais

Aug 16

It’s that time of the year again! Pillaiyaar Chathurthi, also known as Vinayakar / Ganesh Chathurthi, is in a few days – the festival that celebrates the birth of the elephant headed God, the destroyer of obstacles. While the Muthiah household did celebrate the festival, it was only many years later, as a young post-grad student in Bombay (now Mumbai), that I realised how big of a deal it was in some parts of India. I believe it is the most celebrated event in Western India and, every year, millions of people congregate to pray to the benevolent God and later to immerse the idols, big and small, in the waters of the Arabian sea. The belief is that they are thanking him for his blessings and sending him on his way to his abode in Mount Kailash. Read more about the festival here.

Chathurthi at the Muthiah household meant a cute little clay idol of Pillaiyaar, bought at the teeming markets in Mylapore, that took pride of place in our prayer room for three days before being immersed in the waters at Elliott’s Beach in Besant Nagar. This was, of course, in the days before the environmental concerns over water pollution. Ayah made a different prasadam (food offering) on each day - vadai one day, sundal (tempered chick peas) on another, but always, always, the offering on the last day was sweet and savoury udaitha arisi kozhakattai, also known as upma kozhakattai or pidi kozhakattai (dumplings made with broken rice, pronounced kolakattai with a hard, tongue twisting L, a sound only heard in South Indian languages). Somewhere along the way, convenience won, and Ayah abandoned the overt tradition of celebrating the idol, but the kozhakattai prasadam continued.

Also on the list of prasadams was vilambalam (wood apple), a fruit known to be a favourite with the elephants, and with me as well. Popular in Sri Lanka, the land of Aiyah’s heart, and often made into jams and juices, it was not readily available in Madras; and even when it was, it was incredibly hard to get a good one because, regardless of how good the woody outer shell looked, they were often under ripe and astringent or overripe and mouldy on the inside. So, every Chathurthi, which seemed to be the only time they were available in Madras, I looked forward to cracking open the hard shell of this deceptive looking fruit. If it were ripened perfectly, and you managed to get past the rather putrid look and strong smell of the pulp inside, it was akin to ambrosia, especially when sweetened with a bit of sugar or jaggery. Unfortunately, it’s been ages since I’ve had the fruit - it’s rather rare in Singapore, and in any case, I wouldn’t have a clue how to pick a good one. I’ve heard people say shake it and if it rattles, it’s ready to eat - I haven’t had much luck though… Or another way, apparently, is to bounce it on floor - if it bounces its not ready, but then I’m not sure what the shopkeepers would think of such bouncing! Read more about this fruit here.

I digress though. Back to the kozhakattais, which meant more to Ayah than just as Chathurthi prasadam. She was a reluctant traveller who was happiest at home in Madras. However, having married her daughters off overseas, she had to frequently deal with air travel and the terrible vegetarian food she was served. To counter that, every journey she undertook was accompanied by a dabba (box) of her favourite kozhakattais (the savoury version) and podi to ensure that she never starved on these trips. It’s simple and easy to digest, great food for the journey, she would say. Aiyah, the adventurer, on the other hand, never ordered a special meal because he wanted to savour what the Chef (inasmuch as airlines had Chefs in those days?!) had to offer!

The apprentice breezed through this recipe as it was rather simple to make, except for copious amounts of tears shed while mincing onions and some scalded fingers from shaping the hot mixture, but I’m happy to report he has survived his scars of war and is back in business. With that, we wish you a very happy Pillaiyaar Chathurthi with Ayah’s kozhakattais. Read on for the recipe of the savoury version. If you’d like to make the sweet version, click here.

Uppu Kozhakattai (Savoury Rice Dumpling) Recipe

Ingredients:

1 cup raw rice, washed, drained and dried for at least 8 hours
3 cups boiling water (rice to water ratio is 1 : 3 cups)
1 small onion, minced
1 fresh green / red chilli, minced (increase to 2 if you like it more spicy)
5-6 curry leaves minced
Salt to taste (~ 1.5 teaspoons)

Optional: 3 tablespoons of grated coconut

For tempering:

2 tablespoon vegetable oil
1 tsp mustard seeds (rai / kadugu)
1 tsp split urad dal (black gram dal / ulundam paruppu)
1 dry red chilli, broken
¼ tsp of Asafoetida (hing / perungayam) or a couple of squeezes of Asafoetida powder

Method:

1. Use a blender or a food processor to coarsely grind the washed and dried rice (make sure the rice is completely dry). The texture should be that of a coarse rava (semolina).

1 cup raw rice, washed, drained and dried for at least 8 hours

Optional: Sieve the ground rice to remove the fine flour – the texture of the kozhakattai will be grainier, which is what the traditional recipe calls for. I don’t do this because its additional effort, but if you do, and are wondering what to do with the fine sieved rice flour, it can be used later to thicken gravies.

2. Heat up the oil in a thick bottomed pan and add the mustard seeds and urad dal. Once the mustard seeds pop and the urad dal is light golden, add the red chilli, stir for a few seconds and add the asafoetida.

3. Next add the minced green chilli and curry leaves, and fry till the skin of the chilli blisters. Then add the minced onions. Fry till onions are translucent.

1 small onion, minced
1 fresh green / red chilli, minced (increase to 2 if you like it more spicy)
5-6 curry leaves minced

Note: If you don’t like onions, you can omit them. The taste will differ, but it will still taste good.

4. Add the broken rice to the pan, stir till the raw aroma is gone and the mixture looks a bit clumpy, about a minute or so.

5. Measure the boiling water, add the salt to the water and pour into the rice. This will splatter and bubble up so stand back while doing this step. Stir quickly so the bottom does not catch. Cover the pan and cook. Keep an eye on it and stir occasionally to ensure it doesn’t get burnt. Cook for about 8 minutes. The rice will be about 3/4th cooked.

3 cups boiling water (rice to water ratio is 1 : 3 cups)
Salt to taste (~ 1.5 teaspoons)

6. If adding coconut, add it in at this stage and mix in.

Optional: 3 tablespoons of grated coconut

7. Take the pan off the flame and let it cool slightly. Do not cool too much else it will be hard to roll the balls.

8. Rolling the kozhakattais:

i) Set up your rolling station. First take some water in a bowl, next the pan with the Kozhakattai mixture and finally a parchment lined metal plate to arrange the Kozhakattais.

ii) Dip your hand in the water (this will help in picking up the hot mixture).

iii) Then with the wet, but clean hands, pick up a lemon sized portion of the Kozhakattai mixture and roll into a ball or an oval shape. Watch the below video to see how it’s done.

Apprentice Note: Do use the water to wet your hands before rolling to protect your hands from being scalded!

iv) Arrange on the plate without the sides touching. If you’re going to be using a regular steamer (like the bamboo / Chinese steamers), then line the metal plate with parchment paper before arranging the balls on it.

9. Steam the Kozhakattais in batches for 8 minutes a batch. If using an idli steamer to do this, then arrange the balls on the idli plate, cover and steam. If using a regular steamer to do this, use a clean cloth towel to tie up the cover of the steamer – this is to stop the condensation dripping onto the balls and making them soggy. Once steamed, remove and serve hot with podi.

Note:

These can be stored in the refrigerator for a 2-3 days. To reheat, steam them again for a few minutes.

If you’d like to try out the sweet version of these kozhakattais, click here.