Thagathe Soppina Vada/Cassia Tora Fritters:

Thagathe soppu is nothing but Cassia Tora or Senna Tora in English. It mainly grows as a weed in open grounds or road side in Rainy season. It is a very useful plant and mostly ignored by all. Leaves of this plant are not only used as a medicine; its seeds are also used widely in Ayurveda.

In our coastal belt, we do prepare lots of delicacies from its young leaves and this vade or fritters is one among them. These fritters are served as a snack or as a starter for lunch/dinner. This monsoon delicacy is also called dangar in Konkani. 

Ingredients:

Dosa rice – ¾ cup

Toor dal – 2 tablespoons

Dried red chillies – 5 – 8 ( Byadagi)

Salt

Hing – generous pinch

Tamarind – ½ tsp

Coconut – ½ cup

Chopped greens – 1 to 2 cups ( as needed)

Chopped onion – 1

Method:

– Wash and Soak rice and dal for 3 hours.

-Roast red chillies, chop onions , Clean the leaves, remove stalks, wash thoroughly ,chop the leaves and keep it ready.

– At first grind coconut, hing, salt, red chillies in to paste.

– To this, add soaked rice and dal mix, grind this into a small rava consistency by adding very little water.

– Remove from the mixer grinder, add chopped leaves , onion and mix thoroughly. 

-Heat oil in a small kadai. When it is hot, take bite size of batter and pat a little in your palm and deep fry.
-Serve this as a side dish with Dal – Rice or Rasam and rice.
 

Note: If you don’t have access to Cassia Tora leaves, instead you can use chopped Moringa or Methi or fenugreek leaves as well.

 

Bonda Soup:

I am a hard-core fan of “Bonda Soup”. It is very soothing to have in winter evenings.  Usually this is an after lunch snack at most of the Darshini’s in Bangalore.

Bonda soup is nothing but Fried Black gram dal fritters or uddina vada which is soaked in Ginger and pepper flavoured dal.

bonda

 

For this, we have to make Bonda at first:

Ingredients:

Urad dal – 1 cup

Salt

Green chilli -1

Coconut pieces – 1 table spoon

Curry leaves – 1 spring.

Method:

-Soak Urad dal for 1 to 2 hours. Grind this smoothly by adding little by little water at interval. Add salt.

-Batter should be smooth and fine. Usage of grinder will yield perfect batter. If you are using mixer grinder, you can use chilled water for grinding, so that batter will not become hot while grinding.

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– Add chopped curry leaves, green chilli and coconut bits.

-Keep oil in a kadai, for deep frying.

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-When oil becomes hot, make small round bonda’s, fry this in a medium heat and keep it ready.

Next we are making the Soup.

Ingredients:

Toor dal – ½ cup

Green gram/Moong dal – ½ cup

Green chillies -2

Ginger – 1” piece

Salt

Hing – ½ tea spoon

Turmeric – ½ tea spoon

Curry leaves – 1 spring

Cumin – 1 teaspoon

Black pepper – 1 teaspoon

Seasoning: Ghee – 1 teaspoon, mustard – 1 teaspoon, Cumin – ½ teaspoon, Red chilli -1, curry leaves – 1 spring.

Method:

  • Take both the dals ,Wash and cook this in a cooker

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-Cool completely and churn this cooked dal by using hand blender or mixer jar.

-Now Take one vessel ,pour this dal, add salt ,turmeric ,one spring curry leaves ,hing ,chopped green chillies ,ginger juveniles.

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-Take one pestle and mortar, crush pepper and cumin and add this powder too.

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-Boil it nicely, until green chillies are cooked.

-Add seasoning by putting ghee, mustard, cumin, red chilli and curry leaves.

bonda-soup

 

-Now Soup is ready.-To serve, you should take one serving bowl; Keep couple of Bonda’s and pour one or two ladle full of Soup, garnish with coriander leaves, and serve.