Project Poori

Before I jumped in with Vada Pav, this thought stuck me today morning as to why I cannot make poori at home . A phone call to my off-shore consultant and discussions followed. The key outcome was the advice to knead the dough more than what you do for chapathi and make it soft. Also I was told you have to fry it in full flame and really hot oil. My previous misadventures with hot oil did make me a bit nervous, but I was confident I could pull it off.

Spoke to my on-shore consultant during the day and was told that dough needs to be hard, only then would pooris come out well. 180 degree phase opposition between consultants !! Not entirely un-expected. ( It is a bit like Kimi Raikkonen and Luis Hamilton are unlikely to take the same driving lines in an F1 course. Why ? Because each has their own distinct way of getting the maximum performance out of the car. I am more of a Sakon Yamamoto when it comes to cooking :-( ). Finally I decided to take the middle path, neither hard, nor too soft :-)

After all the kneading and rolling, I started frying them on full flame. The first 3-4 came out like stiff papads, very crispy. I hate it when pooris are this crispy. S.O.S call to on-shore consultant followed. Got the suggestion that I was probably over-frying them. Good tip, started taking them out a bit sooner and suddenly things were a whole lot better !! The aloo curry was 2-3 days old and was showing every sign of going bad, just was too lazy to cook more curry. So managed with it for the time being ;-)

I am getting pretty happy with the slow expansion of my range. Future projects in mind including baking buns and cookies.