Besan Chila is an Indian high protein gram flour crepe which is also known as a tomato omelette in certain parts of the country! Eat it with some chutney and sauce and your day is perfect!
Years ago, new in the city of Bangalore, I walked into Sukh Sagar and a little bored of eating the idly and dosa on a daily basis, I got very excited with one particular menu item called “Tomato Omelette”. I adore eggs, the kitchen wasn’t still set and I was missing my eggs, so I ordered the Tomato Omelette instantly. That Sukh Sagar was a pure vegetarian joint didn’t even occur to me at that point. Well, you can say that the desire to eat eggs overpowered everything else. And then after a wait of 6 minutes, dreaming of omelette with tomatoes and chilly (in my mind masala omelette), toasted white bread and tomato ketchup, I came face to face with the reality of what I had ordered. Tomato Omelette was nothing but BESAN CHILA. I think I even asked the waiter, but where are the eggs?It is purely cheating, if you ask me 😉
Don’t get me wrong, I love my besan chila but it’s not an omelette. The other day, we had this discussion on twitter as well. I saw an eggless omelette somewhere and got reminded of those days and turns out a lot of people feel the same as I do. But I was reminded of the besan chila that day and even though it does not have eggs, it is still an excellent high protein breakfast, especially for vegetarians.
Here is a recipe to make it at home, call it Besan Chila or Tomato Omelette, the fact is that it is delicious! My mom makes an even more exotic version of this with some paneer stuffing and trust me, it is so amazing to eat!
Besan Cheela (Tomato Omelette)
Ingredients
- 1 cup besan (Gram flour)
- 1/4 tsp ajwain
- 1 tsp chili powder red
- 1 tsp coriander powder
- 1/4 tsp garam masala
- to taste salt
- 1 - 2 Green chili , chopped
- 2 tomato finely chopped
- 1 onion finely chopped
- 2 tbsps coriander leaves
- 1/4 cup yogurt
- 1 and 1/2 cups water
Instructions
- Take besan, ajwain, red chili powder, coriander powder, garam masala and salt in a bowl and mix well.
- Add chopped onions, tomatoes and coriander to the above and mix well till the vegetables are coated with besan. You can add more vegetables to this, like carrots, spinach, methi etc to make it even healthier.
- Mix in the yoghurt and little water at a time and make lump free batter.
- Heat a non stick tawa on medium heat. Once hot drizzle about 1/2 tsp of oil. Once oil is hot, pour a ladle of batter and spread it to make a round shape like you would pour a dosa. Let the cheela gets cook on one side about 2 minutes or till gets golden brown. Flip and cook the other side as well
- Repeat for all the batter. Serve hot with green chutney or ketchup.
Notes
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