Category: Fasting Recipes, Festive Recipes, Snack, Sweets, Traditional
Cuisine: Tamilnadu
Yields: 4 Servings Difficulty: Difficult Prep Time: 20 Mins Cook Time: 30 Mins Total Time: 50 Mins
Vella Seedai is one of the mandatory deep-fried South- Indian Snack during Krishna Jayanthi. It is one underrated snack because of the labor it goes into making this and also the risk it involves preparing it. Yes, it requires an immense amount of skill and practice to making this most delicious Vella seedai. The proportion of rice flour to Urad dal and Jaggery powder, the right consistency of the rice flour and the other ingredients that go into the seedai all matters for this Vella seedai. Do refer to the notes section for tips and tricks that I have penned up for a burst-free seedai. Try this Vella Seedai to please Lord Krishna on his happy birthday! 🙂
Ingredients
Adjust Servings
Instructions
- Choose the right rice flour for the seedai. If available, use Idiyappam or kozhukaatai that is available in store.
- Dry roast the rice flour in the medium flame until golden brown or the vapor comes off. It took me exactly 4 mins to achieve this consistency. Let it cool down.
- Sieve roasted rice flour and Urad dal flour thoroughly to form a fine powder.
- Add sesame seeds, grated coconut, and softened butter.
- In a pan, add half a cup of jaggery powder and add two tablespoon of water to form a syrup consistency. Strain them and add to the flour. Add a little amount of water at a time and knead them to a dough.
- Roll them in-between your greased fingers to form an irregular ball-shaped seedai. Poke a small hole.
- Drop Seedai to hot oil along the sides in small batches. Cook both sides and once it turns golden brown, drain off to a paper towel.
Notes
- The first step to achieve a perfect vella seedai is to choose the right rice flour. Idiyappam Flour or Kozhukattai flour is a good option for this. If these are not available, roast the rice flour till it gets light brown.
- Next is the Jaggery consistency. The key is to dissolve the jaggery to achieve syrup-like consistency. We are not aiming for any string consistency.
- Many people use small tidbits of coconut pieces to the seedai. I prefer to use grated coconut for this to avoid any bursting of seedai while cooking.
- Do not add more water to combine seedai dough. This will result in seedai getting dissolved in oil.
- Roll the Seedai to irregular balls. It is absolutely fine to see cracks on it. Use a fork to poke holes to it.
- The right temperature of cooking oil is an important one. Too cold oil will result in seedai getting dispersed in Oil. Too hot oil will result in outer side cooked and Inside being still raw.
- Finally cook seedai in small batches. Drop-in two or three seedais along the sides until you are comfortable in cooking more numbers.