Recent Posts
- Caramelised Banana-Peanut Butter Ice Cream (Vegan)
- A no-machine Coffee Ice Cream and Ice Cream Basics
- Life’s about to get dangerous.
- Trashy Tuesdays
- Quinoa and Roasted Pepper Salad
- The proof is in the licking … and H2Ope for Haiti.
- Frozen Yumminess
- 100% Whole Wheat No-Knead Sandwich Loaf
- Workplace Harassment
- Chana Masala / Chole (Chickpea Curry)
-
Admin
Apr
8
Horse Gram Cocktail Fritters (Kulith Vade)
April 8, 2009 |
My wily mama may have called them “beef croquettes”. Let me explain.
I was the dream child. Didn’t care much for sweets, loved veggies, especially the bitter ones like bittergourd and fenugreek, made no fuss about eating anything made at home. Then, when I was six or so, all hell broke loose.
I started going to a daycare type of place. The lady there made the most incredible kind of food and was like a mother figure to me. She fed me whatever she fed her kids, and they were things I’d never eaten before - fish, chicken, mutton (goat), beef and pork. My mom was raised vegetarian and cooked and ate only vegetarian. I came home from daycare and declared that I didn’t want dinner or breakfast the next morning. I would wait until lunch the next day ‘cos I liked only that lady’s food.
My mom wondered why and I told her I would eat the “nice” food at “aunty’s place”.
“We don’t eat meat at home,” my mom patiently explained.
“But dad eats it,” I replied.
“Only outside the house,” she said.
I said, “Fine. Then I want that aunty to adopt me. I like her food.”
For many days after that, I would take my lunchbox to school and bring it untouched to the daycare lady’s house. I would then eat what she had cooked. So my mom made a deal with her. She started paying her for my meals as well. And she started learning how to cook meat.
She befriended a fishmonger who would cut and clean fish and even give her recipes. My mom started eating fish and chicken. Then I become totally insufferable. I decided I loved fish, didn’t care for chicken and adored mutton, beef and spicy pork sausages from Goa.
Those days, one couldn’t buy frozen meat from the store. One had to go to the butcher - where one would be greeted by hanging carcasses. That was hard for my poor mom to stomach. So she made up a story.
“Hindus don’t eat beef,” she said.
“The daycare aunty has a big temple in her house with all the gods and goddesses. She eats beef and everything else,” I replied. True. ‘Cos the daycare lady was from Kerala and she cooked and ate everything that moved. By now, I’d even eaten frogs’ legs. Many Keralite Hindus eat all kinds of meat.
My mom registered that and said, “Well, some Hindus regard cows as sacred.”
“Why?”, I asked.
“‘Cos they give us milk,” she said.
“But I’ve been to the tabela (dairy farm) and the milk we get is buffalo milk. Why is the buffalo not sacred?” I asked.
“I have no idea,” my mom said.
“Listen mom, I have decided that I don’t want to be a Hindu, ‘cos I love beef”, I declared.
My mom decided that cooking beef was easier than arguing with a bratty six-year-old, so she struck a deal with a neighbour to buy meat for her when she went to the butcher.
She cooked fish or meat at least twice a week, but once in a while, I suspect, she tried to pull a fast one. She made things that looked and tasted like lentil fritters (vadas) sometimes and called them “beef croquettes”. I would eat everything on my plate as long as it had one item with “beef” or “mutton” or “pork” or “fish” in its name. I have a strong hunch that many of the items she passed off as “non-veg” were actually vegetarian.
Horse gram: Dried and Sprouted
Macrotyloma uniflorum, Gahat (Uttarakhand), Kollu (Tamil) Ulavalu (Telugu), Kulith (Marathi), Hurali (Kanada), Kulath, Kulthi (Konkani), Kollu/Muthira (Malayalam).
Horse gram is used as food in India and also as fodder for horses and cattle. In South India, it is consumed for medicinal purposes - to help fight jaundice, iron deficiencies, arthritis and obesity. It’s regular peasant fare in Maharashtra and Karnataka, with the beans used to make a warm salad (usal/kosambari) and the liquid used to cook them flavoured into a delicious soup (saar).
J’s been away traveling for a while now and I’m too lazy to make two dishes while cooking for myself. So I ground up some sprouts with some seasonings to make fritters for dinner. Much like these Lentil Fritters (Parippu Vadas). You can make these with any soaked or sprouted beans/lentils.
**Kidney beans, cannellini beans, hyacinth beans and soybeans (soaked and/or sprouted) need to be boiled for at least 10 minutes to neutralise the toxins they contain before being made into fritters.
I used my cast iron aebleskiver (appam) pan as usual.
HORSE GRAM COCKTAIL FRITTERS
(Makes 20-21 cocktail vadas)
1 cup horse gram soaked for 8 hours, drained and left to sprout for another day.
**the measurement is before soaking. simply soaked horse gram would also work
2 tbsps chopped red onion/shallots
2 to 3 chopped serrano or Thai bird chillies
1 tsp chopped ginger
1.5 tbsps brown rice flour
**optional. it makes them crisper
2 cloves chopped garlic
salt to taste
1/4 cup loosely packed cilantro
1/3 tsp each ground cumin and coriander
2 tsps lime juice
3.5 tbsps vegetable oil
1. Separate out 1/3 of the lentils. Pulse everything (except the cilantro and salt) to a coarse paste in a blender adding no water, or as little as possible.
2. Add the remaining lentils and blend a little more until 2/3 of the mixture is almost smooth and the remaining 1/3 is coarse. Add the cilantro and salt.
3. Heat oil in the appam / aebleskiver pan on medium-high - with about 1.5 tsps vegetable oil per slot. You can also deep fry this in a regular pan with 2 to 3 cups of oil.
4. Gently drop heaped teaspoons of the lentil mixture into the oil.
5. Fry until golden brown on one side (about 3 minutes), then using a skewer or fork, gently turn them over.
6. Fry till golden brown on the other side, remove and put on paper towels to drain.
7. For the second and third batches, reduce the heat to medium-low.
8. If you let them sit on the paper towel for about 5 minutes after frying, they will crispen further.
I got three batches fritters - 21 in all, and didn’t add any extra oil after the first round. Even though the oil had dried up by the third round, they toasted to a crisp texture.
These are great as they are, as “falafels” in pita, or in a sandwich.
Today’s dinner. Horse Gram Cocktail Fritters with Cilantro Chutney, Sweet Chilli Garlic Sauce and Tamarind-Date Chutney.
These cocktail fritters go to
Courtney @ Coco Cooks for My Legume Love Affair: Starters and Desserts.
and
Srivalli @ Cooking 4 All Seasons for Monthly Mingle: Kids’ Lunches.
POST-DINNER EXERCISE
I recently downloaded the album AVIAL from Amazon by Malayalam rock band Avial. Hook it up to speakers and enjoy some explosive bass guitar.
I don’t even like rock music, but this band I totally dig. They take folk songs and set them to modern tunes.
This song’s called Adu Pambe (Sway Snake). The audio and video are not totally in sync. Eat your fritters and try to sway like a snake (like the lead singer). 
I did.
The lyrics are from an old folk song by Pambatti Siddar. The ‘Snake’ here is a metaphor for the human mind.
nAthar muDi mEl irukkum nAgap-pAmbE
naccup- paiyai vaittirukkum nalla pAmbE
pAtALattirk-kUDip-pOghum paikoL pAmbE
pADip-pADi ninru viLaiyADu pAmbEvaLai pughum pOdEdalai vAngum pAmbE
maNDalamiTTuDal vaLai vaNNam pAmbE
taLaikkanji ninriDum sattiyap-pAmbE
taiayeDuttE nI viLaiyADu pAmbEkuTramaTra shivanukku kuNDalamAnAi
kUrum tirumAlinukkuk-kuDaiyimAnAi
kaTraikkuzhal pArvatikkuk-kankaNamAnAi
karavAmal uLam kaLittu Adu pADu pAmbEmaNDalattait-tAngu migha vallamai koNDAi
mAyanukkp-paDukkaikku vaNNap-pAyumAnAi
kaNDa paDai naDungiDak-kATSiyum peTrAi
kaNNE sheviyAghak-koNDAi ADu pAmbEcandiranai sUriyanait-tAvit-tINDinAi
shankaranukku AbaraNam tAnum AghinAi
mantratukk-aDangiyE maNDalamiTTAi
vaLaindu vaLaindu ninrADum pAmbE
The original lyrics are in Tamil. Can someone please translate them to English for me?
Update: Got the translation. Thanks, Nirmala.
See y’all next week.
- bee
adu pambe, avial band, Chillies/Peppers, Cilantro/Coriander Leaves, coriander, cumin, fritters, Garlic, Ginger, horse gram, Lemon/Lime, Lentils, Onion/Shallot, rice flour, Sprouts, vegan recipes, vegetarian recipes
fritters are totally awesome, your mom was a genius!
the band rocks!
Bee, Your mom sounds so patient and loving. I went through phases like that myself. Vegan, then no, vegetarian, fish only..haha. Lovely post:)
Love to you sweety
hey, that is quite the turn around from being a rebellious non-vegetarian to a vegetarian. Errr..the rebellious still stays right?
Loved the idea of making the kulith vada in the appe pan. Now that you mention that it tastes like beef…you have me very curious.
Oh, these must have been great. We use this in our vethe kuzahmbu sometimes. I myself haven’t tried it. Waiting for my appe pan to come
My mom in law is bringing them out of love, though I could’ve ordered 
Bee, the fritters look great. And I loved your story. You were a handful for a six year old! Hope Jai is traveling safely.
Oh…the music. That’s music? It’s going to warp the minds of the youth and hail the end-times! And you eating beef as a child. Oh, too much for one day. I need to lie down now.
[puts his head up] And a deep-fried dinner?!
Anonymous on April 12, 2009 1:35 am is me.I can now see the pictures fine.
Many thanks to you:)
Rashmi
I have used horse gram the same way and they taste awesome.
Well, there was a point when my college friends used to mix spoons from their non-veg dishes with mine and I used to freak out! Now here in US, its inevitable! I still cant forget the time during our visit to Alaska, diners in our table (its was a cottage type accomodation), they had the huge king crabs and i couldnt eat even a bit yet pretend as if nothing happened!
Guess I am used to all that now - cos how else can I explain me enjoying a hearty easter dinner (my dish veggie though) along with Oxtails “aroma” wafting just next to my hand
Good post Bee
and also it was great ’seeing ‘ you in your previous post! Now we all have something more to imagine how Bee looks like 
Wow…I actually see 2 very strong women here. How a pure veg mom would actually buy and learn to cook meat for her child…Mom does go out of bounds for her children!! Another strong woman is that child who loved meat can convert to a vegan!!
Now you must do another post about how you turned yourself around too.
Wow! I didn’t know you could make fritters with this gram. Looks so good!
I love your mom - how she let you be yourself and not tried to change you.. and also raised you strong enough to voice your opinion like that at 6 yrs.
I too agree with DK with “seeing you” in the earlier post. I couldn’t stop picturing you dance for the song.
Kollu is also supposed to help with weight loss. In tamil there is a saying “Kozhuthavanukku kollu ilaichavanukku ellu” which means plumpy people (like me) can eat kollu to get rid of excess fat and skinny (like you) people can include sesame seeds in their diet to put some weight. But another school of thought is that one should not eat kollu regularly because it heats body.
Thats a great post bee…I can understand how much your mom must have gone through…my daughter keeps pestering me to eat chicken because I tell her that its healthy for her. She questions why I don’t eat when its healthy,…guess its difficult other ways too…
I was able to visit your site only now..after my last mail..:(
hey this is so cool… btw u have amazing pics on your site… may i know which camera?
canon 300d and canon 5d mark II
Hi Bee,
Just tried this recipe today. Tasted great. Thanks for a guilt-free recipe for enjoying vadas!
[...] 1 tbsp each sunflower seeds and walnuts, 1 oz. unsweetened soymilk. 1.5 cups sauteed sprouted horse gram with mint, fennel and [...]