Cholafali

Here’s another traditional yet simple Diwali farsaan recipe.

To make cholafali you’ll need

1. Besan (Gram flour) – 3 cups
2. Urad dal flour – 1 1/3 cups
3. Oil for deep frying
4. Soda bicarbonate – a pinch or 1/2 tsp
4. Salt
5. Chilly powder
6. Rock salt

Add the soda and salt to half a cup of boiling water. Once the water is cool, mix both the besan and urad dal flours and knead it into a tight dough using the boiled and cooled water. You can add regular water as required to knead a tight dough. I used roughly a cup of water in all including the 1/2 cup of boiled and cooled water. Now punch and flatten the dough using a pestle. Knead it back into a ball. Punch the dough similarly for about 4-5 times and you’re good to go.

The punching process makes the dough nice and soft and is absolutely essential for that perfect thin, crisp and puffed up cholafalis. It also calls for some serious muscle power. So if you can make it a friends and family event, it is far easier. For large scale cholafali making at home, the dough used to be sandwiched between two large, clean and dry plastic sheets and kept on the floor. Then women actually walked on it and punched the dough with their heels!!!

Keep the dough wrapped under a clean cotton cloth. Pinch out lemon sized balls and roll them out as thin as you can (thinner than fulka rotis). While rolling it out, keep flipping it and dust it with urad flour as required to prevent it from sticking. Remember the thinner you roll them out the crunchier they’ll turn out to be. Since the dough is stiff, the rolling out too takes more power compared to the regular rotis prepared from soft dough. spread out an old bedsheet/saree/cotton dupatta in two layers. As you finish making the cholafali rotis, keep them covered inside the two folds of a bedsheet. Once all the rotis are rolled out, put one roti on an inverted thali and cut it into thin long strips using a knife or a pizza cutter. Deep fry in medium hot oil till they get a slight colour change. As you fry out one batch, sprinkle the masala (salt, chilly pdr, rock salt mixture) on that batch instantly. This way the masala sticks to it. While you fry the next batch, transfer the previous batch into a large container and so on.

Related posts:

1. Aloo paratha Aloo parathas are our favourites for weekends. It is a...
2. Gulab jamuns Yo! Today it's gulab jamun time, my favouritest dessert...
3. Chana dal ~ Diwali special snack Today is Vakbaras and the Diwali marathon has officially...
4. Ghughra Ghughra is one of the traditional mithai prepared during...
5. Lemon Rice A very dear friend from Coorg who's now a...

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.