Adai is the south Indian version of cheela and is full of proteins and health! A mixture of lentils and rice ensure this is one super balanced and healthy dish to have!
I am on a roll today! After the Onion Vetha Kuzhambu recipe, here is another Tam dish – Adai. I have always relished adai whenever I have eaten it. In fact, I love all kind of cheelas and dosas and have many featured on my blog already. This one is so healthy and loaded with protein, I have always wanted to make it. So when the other day I was having a chat with Nandita of Saffron trail on Twitter, she led me to a recipe on her blog to make the same. With a brief guideline on how to make it, I created a mix of my own dals and created my own Adai. It was delicious, crisp and everyone at home loved it.
Adai is a unique dish. It is the perfect balance between carbs and proteins. The recipe of adai differs from house to house, actually. A bit of that dal extra or this dal less, and the entire taste changes. Some people add pepper to the adai batter, some people add fenugreek, some people add ginger to it. Every adai has a unique taste and texture to it! Some people make the batter really thick, and then pat it with their hands to shape it on the tawa and add loads of oil to it, and shallow fry it. Some make it really thin and crisp. Did you know people eat adai with jaggery and some folks love eating it with white butter?
Eat it with anything really, it is one dish which is a perfect option for breakfast, lunch or dinner! I can eat it any time of the day. All it needs is a bit of soaking time for the dals and rice and you have the perfect meal option with you 🙂
Adai
Ingredients
- 1/2 cup moong dal of green
- 1/2 cup masoor dal
- 1/2 cup urad dal spilt black (with chilka)
- 1/2 cup channa dal
- 1/2 cup toor dal
- 1/2 cup rice
Apart from this you will need
- 3 green chillies more depending on how spicy you want your adai to be
- 2 dry red chillies
- 5 curry leaves approximately
- to taste salt
Instructions
- Wash and soak all the dals in sufficient water overnight, then next morning wash the dals again to drain all the grime.
- Add rest of the ingredients, apart from oil and grind to a coarse mixture, don;t over grind it, This is just my humble opinion that it tastes much better if the batter is not over ground.
- Heat a non-stick pan, take a ladle full of batter and spread it circularly to make a dosa. Spread 1 tsp of oil all around the adai. Cook it till browned flip and cook the other side.
- Serve hot with any chutney u prefer, we had ours with a thin tomato chutney and mint-coriander chutney.
- Yummy and healthy isnt it?
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