Home » Appetizers & starters, Lunchbox bites, Salads and dressings, stuffy delights/Indian flat breads, Veggies/curries

Recipes | Bejar Rotis with spinach papad curry and kachumbar – Appreciating small things in life..

14 July 2016 4 Comments

Recipes | Bejar Rotis with spinach papad curry and kachumbar

“We tend to forget that happiness doesn’t come as a result of getting something we don’t have, but rather of recognizing and appreciating what we do have.” ~ Frederick Keonig

Reminiscing good old days, appreciating small things in life and connecting with beautiful people, keeps me happy…always.

Sunday lunches have been a big affair since childhood. Mom would decide the menu a day before and start prepping for the dishes early in the morning. Though the menu would be a simple Indian meal with a dessert to go with it, but eating together made us try new food without making fuss and helped creating a feeling of belonging.

And I am trying to keep the Sunday lunch tradition on at my home. I cooked a rustic meal from Rajasthan last weekend to let my children get a taste of regional cuisine. Bejar rotis, methidana-papad subji, kachumbar and a vegetable pulao , just in case.

Bejar or bejad rotis are multi-grain flatbread from Rajasthan. Traditionally hand-pound Pearl millet or bajra flour is used to prepare these bejar rotis, but many household recipes use whole-wheat flour, chickpea flour and a few herbs & spices are also added in it to give different flavor & texture to these rustic flat breads. Much similar to this Bajra roti I posted sometime back.

I replaced finger millet or ragi with bajra and paired these rotis with a traditional curry and was quite apprehensive about my children liking this simple regional food. Well, Ragi rotis and kachumber was given quick thumbs up but their palate could not get accustomed to the unusual methidana-papad curry taste. 

Coming back to the blogging scene, I received a call from Preethi, a popular Indian brand a few days back. They wanted to send their new electric cooker to me to try at home. Their electric cooker looks very trendy and attractive but then, I already have two rice cookers which I often use for cooking and did not feel the need to stock one another electric gadget at home.

The representative from the brand then suggested two different products – a Turbo chop and a multi utility kettle.

It was a coincidence that I received these two special gifts just before my birthday, I could not have asked for a better gift than this!

Some beautiful perks of food blogging I say  🙂

Recipes | Bejar Rotis with spinach papad curry and kachumbar

I have a food processor with me which does pretty good job but there are times I need a portable chopper which I can carry to my photo shoots. And this mini Turbo chop is quite handy.

I like the one touch operation of the Turbo chop, it can grind, chop and puree vegetables, fruits and greens in minutes. Just fill the jar with small pieces of vegetables, press lightly and your job is done.

Check the product details here.

Recipes | Bejar Rotis with spinach papad curry and kachumbar

There are certain recipes which I try to avoid cooking at home as it requires quite a lot of prepping the vegetables. Vegetables momos, spring rolls, Indian kuchumber and many stuffed parathas require finely shredded vegetables and takes a lot of time to do it manually.

And this is where I find this Turbo chop very useful. Its easy to use and very easy to clean and maintain.

Chopping carrots and cabbage for making momos at home was a breeze. With just a few rapid churns the vegetables were finely shredded.

I started experimenting with grating radish and other vegetables for making stuffed parathas and thinking about recipes that require a lot of chopping and dicing such as fried rice, vegetable cutlets, salas and the like.

With this Turbo chop, the prep work is no longer a time-consuming affair.

     1. Kachumbar or Indian Salsa

Recipes | Bejar Rotis with spinach papad curry and kachumbar

Kachumbar is a very popular Indian salad which is normally served as a garnish to roasted papad or as an accompaniment to the meal. A colourful Kachumbar  can give a welcome freshness to any Indian meal.

Ingredients;

(serve 3)

  • 2 tomatoes
  • 1 carrot
  • 1 onion
  • 1 cucumber
  • 1 tsp. olive oil or sesame oil
  • ½ tsp. black pepper powder
  • ½ tsp. roasted cumin powder
  • ½ tsp. lemon juice or vinegar
  • Fresh coriander leaves to garnish
  • Salt to taste

Recipes | Bejar Rotis with spinach papad curry and kachumbar

Method; Wash and roughly chop tomatoes, onion, cucumber and carrot into large chunks. Add them into small batches in the chopper and chop finely.

Take out the finely shredded vegetables in a bowl, add rest of the ingredients for Kachumbar in it and combine well.

Refrigerate the Kachumbar till it is served.

You can use the same Kachumbar to make a many other healthy recipes such as sandwich, stuffed flat bread, uttapam, momos or spring rolls.

2. PapadMethidana curry in Spinach gravy 

Recipes | Bejar Rotis with spinach papad curry and kachumbar

There is a dry methi dana – papad subji posted on Lite Bite already, but this curry has a gravy made with spinach puree and has a different taste from that of the dry version.

Ingredients;

(serve 3)

  • ½  cup spinach puree
  • ¼ cup fenugreek seeds
  • ½ cup yogurt
  • Handful of raisins (optional)
  • 4-5 small poppadum
  • 2 tbsp. oil
  • Salt to taste
  • Water as required

Spices;

  • 2 tsp. coriander powder
  • 1 tsp. red chilly powder
  • 1 tsp mustard seeds
  • ½ tsp. turmeric powder
  • ½ tsp. cumin powder
  •  A pinch asafetida powder

Method; Roughly break poppadums into one inch square pieces.

Wash and soak fenugreek seeds (methidana) overnight or for an hour in plian water.

In a bowl add yogurt, one cup of water, raisins, red chilly powder, coriander powder, cumin powder, salt in it and whisk it well with a whisker or fork.

Recipes | Bejar Rotis with spinach papad curry and kachumbar

The Armour multi-utility kettle is also very handy to heat water and add it to the curry, rice, steam vegetables or to knead atta which can reduce cooking time quite considerably. It boils water in just 4 minutes and has a separate steamer bowl and steamer tray which can be used to steam vegetables or cook porridge such as oats in a jiffy.

Recipes | Bejar Rotis with spinach papad curry and kachumbar

I steamed spinach leaves in the steamer bowl for a few minutes and pureed it.
Recipes | Bejar Rotis with spinach papad curry and kachumbar
Heat oil in a kadai and splutter mustard seeds and asafoetida powder in it.

Add spinach puree, soaked and drained fenugreek seeds and sauté it for 1-2 minutes on medium heat.

Add yogurt mixture in the kadai and let it simmer on low heat until the oil separates from the yogurt.

Add poppadum pieces in the last, cook for another 1-2 minutes and remove it from the fame.

Garnish with coriander leaves if you like and serve hot with bejar rotis or any other Indian flatbread.

3. Bejar roti with Ragi flour

Recipes | Bejar Rotis with spinach papad curry and kachumbar

Traditionally Bejar rotis are made with bajra flour (pearl millet) in Rajasthan and is eaten during the winter season with kadhi or lesun chutney. As Ragi is quite frequently available in my city, I often replace bajra flour with it. If you have never tasted millet before then you might find these flatbread slightly off your taste buds.

Ingredients;

(make 5-6 rotis)

  • 2 cups Finger millet flour
  • 4 tbsp. Pearl millet flour
  • 2 tbsp. Chickpea flour
  • Warm water as required
  • Salt as required

Method; Bring water to a boil and add salt in it.

Add all the ingredients in a large bowl, pour hot water in it and knead into a semi-hard dough. Use a ladle to knead the dough if you feel it hot to handle the dough.

Let it rest for 20-30 minutes.

Pinch small lemon sized dough and roll into a ball.

Take two plastic sheets, place the dough in between it and roll it lightly to make a circle.

Heat a griddle and cook the rotis on both the sides.

Smear a little ghee and serve these hot Ragi bejar rotis with the curry and kachumbar.

You can search for the English & Hindi names of various foods and ingredients used in the recipe in Glossary.

Notes;

  1. Ginger-garlic paste gives another dimension to the papad curry.
  2. Try this dry version of methidana-papad curry.
  3. Garam masala could be added at the end to the curry for more flavors.
  4. You can avoid raisins if you don’t like sweet taste in your curry.
  5. Use the freshest ingredients to make the Kachumbar recipe.
  6. Choose your own variety of vegetables to make Kachumbar
  7. Use other spices and herbs  such as mint leaves, red chilly powder, green chilly or chilly flakes in Kachumbar recipe.
  8. Grated fresh coconut adds a wonderful texture and flavor to the kachumbar recipe.
  9. Replace ragi or finger millet flour with bajra or pearl millet to make the traditional bejar rotis.

....

Follow Me on Pinterest instagram-logo-icon-2

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...

4 Comments »

  • Noodlehead said:

    This looks so inviting! Bonue is it’s all so healthy. I’m trying to incorporate more Ragi in our meals so this roti recipe is perfect.

    I was wondering if you need to fry the poppadums before adding it to the curry? Will add this combo to the coming week’s menu. Thanks so much for sharing 🙂

  • sanjeeta kk said:

    @Noodlehead No, you can add the poppadums in the gravy without frying. Just make sure not to overcook as they tend to disintegrate quickly.

  • Lakshmi said:

    What a simple and wholesome meal!

  • Prash said:

    Great, I tried this recipe and came out very well and tasty.

Leave your response!

Add your comment below, or trackback from your own site. You can also subscribe to these comments via RSS.

Be nice. Keep it clean. Stay on topic. No spam.

© 2009-2020 Lite Bite