Channa-Batura

Master chef continues his foray into north Indian dishes with a massively successful attempt on Channa-Batura.

A picture is worth a thousand words, so have a look at my master pieces below !! 

Making of batura is not very tough. I took 1.5 cup maida, 1/2 cup curd, half tea spoon of baking powder , some hot water and kneaded the dough just as for chapathi. Most recipes mentioned using baking soda. Baking soda is sodium bicarbonate and I did not have it in stock. Checked the ingredients of baking powder, it also contained sodium bicarbonate, so figured not much harm can come from using it. In fact I have no idea if baking soda and baking powder are the same !!

I kept aside the dough for close to 2 hours, again most recipes recommend 8 hours. [ I can rarely plan cooking that much in advance :) ] I figured the disadvantage of keeping for a shorter time is that dough would not ferment well. Now what impact that has on taste is unknown to me

I did not make the white channa as that is not something that I cook or stock. So I made black channa curry instead, with a tinge of coconut milk added at the end.

Tasted quite nice. I'll let the admiring world add another feather to my cap :)

Gosh, soon I will have so many feathers that people may mistake me for a bird !!