Cauliflower and potato pakoras

Cauliflower and potato pakoras

Many years ago, a friend recommended I join Twitter to share my food blog. For many years, I enjoyed being there and sharing my various thoughts, news, and other stuff. One thing I did was post "cooking threads" setting out dishes I was cooking, with ingredients, instructions and photos. This pakora recipe was originally one of my cooking threads. Sadly, for *reasons* Twitter isn't such a nice place any more, and therefore I am rescuing this old recipe thread and sharing it here as a blog post. 

 

 

Serves 2 as a light lunch or 3-4 as a side dish

 

Ingredients

 

1 large potato, peeled

Half of a cauliflower, cut into florets

3 cloves of garlic

1”/2.5cm piece of ginger (use the thicker part of the rhizome)

Half a teaspoon of Chaat Masala (you could also use Garam Masala or Kitchen King)

Freshly ground black pepper

Half a teaspoon of salt

1 red or green finger (or birds eye) chilli, very finely diced (deseeded if you prefer)

1 cup (240 ml) gram flour (besan/ chick pea flour)

Water – please see instructions below – from 120 to 180 to a limit of 240 ml

2 tbsp cornflour

Ground nut or Rapeseed oil for frying

Optional (to serve): Mango chutney, chilli chutney, coriander chutney,  tamarind sauce, Freshly ground black pepper, Amchoor.

 

Variations:

 

For extra crunch/crispiness, leave out the cornflour and add a little finely ground semolina. If you don't have cornflour, either substitute with rice flour or leave it out altogether.

 

Some people might want to add a little bicarbonate of soda to add a little air to the batter. I don't do this, and neither does my Mum. But feel free to experiment. Another way of adding air to the batter (which isn’t authentic, but would work) would be to use either fizzy water (good) or beer (even better) as you might for Tempura batter.

 

Other vegetable suggestions: - Onion - Bhindi (ladies' fingers)  - Courgette - Aubergine - Bell pepper - Chilli - Lau (bottle gourd) – Spinach leaves.

 

If you like bitter flavours and want to try something really different, you could try Karela or bitter gourd. No need to take the seeds out.

 

Method

 

1. Finely grate three cloves of peeled garlic and a peeled 1" piece of ginger. Add to a jug or bowl, with half a teaspoon of Chaat Masala, a touch of freshly ground black pepper, half a teaspoon of salt and a very finely chopped chilli.

 

2. Add a cup of gram flour (besan) and a couple of tablespoons of cornflour and mix well.

 

3. Slowly add water, starting with half a cup, working up to three quarters of a cup (maximum one cup), mixing as you go until you have a batter the consistency of double cream. Your batter is ready.

 

Pakora batter

 

4. Parboil your potato for 10 minutes, drain and run cold water to arrest the cooking. Slice into thin slices. Then coat in batter. (If you slice and then parboil, you will have to dry the slices before battering to ensure the batter sticks.)

 

5. Cut up half a cauliflower into florets and parboil for 4 minutes. Drain well and either dry off or give it a spin in a salad spinner. Get them as dry as you can to get maximum batter cling.

 

6. In a wok or karhai, heat up either rapeseed oil or groundnut oil (about 2" of oil will be ample).

 

7. Coat the veggies in the batter, batch by batch. Fry until golden brown, again, batch by batch. Don't overcrowd the pan or the oil will become too cool. Fish out with a slotted spoon or wire spoon.

 

8. Try to get rid of excess oil by drying on kitchen paper. 

 

 

 

9. Season well. Serve with Indian chutney or sauce: Mango chutney, chilli chutney, coriander chutney or tamarind sauce. For extra zing, you could sprinkle a little Amchoor.

 

Potato pakoras, seasoned generously

 

10. Enjoy as a snack or lunch, or as an accompaniment to your favourite Indian. Pakistani or Bangladeshi dishes. 

 

 

Cauliflower and potato pakoras

Vegetable pakoras with Premier Inn Purple Sauce

Premier Inn is a well known chain of hotels promising good quality accommodation at a reasonable price. If you are able to time your booking well, this is absolutely the case. I have stayed at their establishments and been an utterly happy camper. One particular occasion when I was teaching in Leeds springs to mind, where the level of comfort and service I received was over and above the “budget” tag often applied to Premier Inn, in my view unfairly.

Premier Inn wants to provide good food on top of its agenda of good value and good service. As a result, it is seeking to revolutionise breakfast dining. It has therefore launched its own bespoke condiment: Premier Inn Purple Sauce. It has been available since this Summer, with a view to reviewing its success and perhaps launching nationally through sales in supermarkets. 

So what on earth is “Purple Sauce”? Well, if you know your rock and roll, you would know that purple is as regal and cool today as it has been in Roman times. Purple Rain and Purple Haze resonate and rock hard, proving that the aubergine hue will always live long in people’s imagination. I confess it is my favourite colour and I wear it often. I do hope they will make this sauce generally available as it is a brilliant alternative to ketchup or HP sauce. 

Premier Inn Purple Sauce has been invented by Ed Baines. Ed Baines is a chef who trained with the much esteemed Anton Mosimann at The Dorchester, going on to work with Simon Hopkinson at Bibendum and at The River Café with Ruth Rogers and the late Rose Gray. He now runs Randall & Aubin, his flagship restaurant. He has written two cook books; Best Of British and Entertain.  

The Premier Inn Purple Sauce contains blackberry, cracked black pepper, crushed chillies, cider vinegar, toasted cumin and smoked salt. It is made of natural ingredients with no artificial colours or flavourings. It is also suitable for vegetarians. You can read more about it here: http://www.premierinn.com/en/news/news_category/purple-sauce.html

The Purple Sauce naturally goes well with a cooked breakfast; bacon and sausages benefit from its sweet, sour and spicy tang. But I wanted to try something more tea-time. In India, tea time doesn’t involve cake or cucumber sandwiches. It involves steamed lentil cake (khaman/dhokla), samosas or pakoras. The Purple sauce flavourings of chilli, cumin and black pepper lends itself to Indian food and in particular, Indian snacks.

Since I have no talent for baking cakes and you all know how to make cucumber sandwiches already, I have decided to share my recipe for vegetable pakoras with you. Perfect with Premier Inn Purple Sauce. 

Vegetable Pakoras

Serves 2-3 as a snack

Ingredients

2 cloves garlic, crushed
2 teaspoons ginger paste
1 small onion, quartered lengthways and thinly sliced
½ courgette, peeled and cut into julienne
¼ small cauliflower (2 handfuls) cut into small dice
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon turmeric
½ teaspoon garam masala
Freshly ground black pepper
2 finely chopped chillis
1 tablespoon coriander, finely chopped
6 tablespoons chick pea (gram) flour
3 tablespoons cold pressed rapeseed oil or groundnut (peanut) oil
Premier Inn Purple Sauce, to serve

Method

1. Prepare all the vegetables as described above. Place in a non-metallic container. Add the salt, turmeric, garam masala, garlic, ginger paste, black pepper and chilli and mix well. Leave for half an hour for the flavours to combine and for the salt to draw moisture out of the vegetables. 

2. Add the coriander leaf and mix well.

3. Sieve the chick pea flour. 

4. Add half the chick pea flour, mix well. Then add half of what remains and mix well. You may not need to add all 6 tablespoons of the flour. Keep adding, mixing as you go. When it starts to get sticky and gluey, and holds together well, then you know you have made the mixture for the pakoras.

5. Heat the oil in a frying pan.

6. Add the pakora mix in dollops. You will be able to make 5-6 good sized pakoras using the amount of mix. 

7. Fry for 5 minutes or until brown on one side. Then turn over. Do not turn over until the base is solid or the pakoras may fall apart.

8. Fry for another 4-5 minutes until brown on the opposite side. 

9. Put onto kitchen roll to absorb any excess cooking oil.

10. Serve at once with Premier Inn Purple Sauce. 

Alternative sauce ideas:

If you like your Indian food mild, use Sweet Mango chutney, just like you find in your local curry house. 

If you want to try something tangy, sour and authentic, try Tamarind chutney, Nizami make a very nice Tamarind chutney.

Mr Todiwala’s also make great chutneys and pickles.

Snigdha would like to thank Premier Inn for sending a sample of their Purple Sauce for testing purposes. Snigdha has received no incentive, financial or otherwise for this blog post.