Falafel

My first try on Falafel was here in Doha where we used to carry this "fast food" wrapped in a pita bread while watching movies in Cinema Hall. I fell in love with this snack the very first time i tasted it. Falafel balls can be eaten alone as a snack or as a sandwich topped with salad, pickled vegetables, hot sauce and tahina. I was eagerly wanting to try this snack at home. But the problem was tahina. I was really not confident how would this tahina turn out if tried at home as I am not a great fan of sesame seeds. Then after a long hunt, i found this ready-made tahina paste at the grocery.

There are lots of recipes to this particular snack but i found this recipe at Namratha's blog -
Finger licking Food which tempted me to make this dish the moment I read it and I am really happy that I gave it a try. I have done minor changes here and there as I did not have few ingredients like oregano but still it was great to taste.

Ingredients:

Dried chickpeas or garbanzo beans - 1 cup
baking powder - 1 tsp
onion - 1 medium, chopped
garlic - 4 cloves, smashed
cumin powder -1 tsp
coriander powder - 1 tsp
Red chilli powder - 1 tsp
pepper powder - ½ tsp
Coriander leaves - one handfull
salt to taste
Breadcrumbs for binding

Method:
Soak the dried chickpeas overnight or slightly more. Rinse and drain.
Blend all the ingredients except bread crumbs to a coarse paste. Refrigerate for a while to get firm balls. Shape the blended and refrigerated mixture into nice round balls and arrange these balls in a single layer in an air tight container and freeze them in advance if using for a party or just deep fry these balls on medium flame till golden brown. Serve hot with Hummus, Yogurt dip and Pita bread.

This savoury snack and Vegetable Cutlet goes for the EFM - Savouries hosted by Srilekha at Me and My Kitchen

Charmuri mixture

Snacking!!! who doesn't love to? Being health conscious these days i try to make healthy snacks and this charmuri mixture is healthy and heavenly!! charmuri is called Puffed rice/mandakki.

Ingredients:

charmuri - 2 cups
oil - 1tbsp (preferably coconut oil but any oil will do)
garlic - 10 cloves(garlic lovers can add more and garlic haters can omit this and use mustard instead
peanuts - 1/2 cup
Roasted gram/ huri kadle - 1/4 cup
Whole red chillies - 2
turmeric powder - 1/4 tsp

Heat oil in a wide pan or kadai. Add crushed garlic cloves and fry till light brown, now add peanuts, roasted gram and whole red chillies and fry till the peanuts are roasted well. Now add turmeric, mix well. Finally add puffed rice and mix well till the puffed rice is all yellow!! sprinkle salt to taste and let cool. Store in an airtight container.