Idli - Urid Sannas

Tuesday, 24 March 2009 07:10 Other Regions - South Indian

Ingredients

Quantity	Measure	Ingredients	Description
Half	Kilogram	Dhal, Urid	For grinding
Half	Kilogram	Rice, Boiled	Also called "ukda" chawal
Half	Kilogram	Rice, Raw	Also called "Surai" rice
A	Little	Salt	to taste

Method

Clean, wash and soak separately, rice and dhal for two hours. Grind separately. Mix the ground batter together well, adding salt to taste and some water if necessary. The batter should not be very thick. Tie the mouth of the vessel with a thick cloth, and keep aside for ferment for about two hours. Urid Dhal is the fermentor. Keep water to boil in a thondor, (a special Mangalorean vessel, for steaming) to the level of the perforated central plate. Now a days, you can use a deep pressure cooker, with Idli receptors, available in the market. When the batter has risen, pour a little into small metal saucers, their inner surface brushed with oil with the finger tips and batter filled to half their depth. Place these saucers, on the central plate of the thondor, after the water has started to boil and close it.

Steam for fifteen minutes or till quite cooked. Remove the saucers and place them downwards on a clean table, and spread a wet cloth dipped in cold water, over them and cool them well or cool them in any other way. When cooled remove the Sannas by prying them out with your fingers. As the first set is getting cooled, fill the second set of metal saucers with the batter and steam accordingly. Steam each time as many as the thondor holds.

Note: to ferment batter, instead of urid or yeast, non vegetarians, use toddy which is a fermented liquid taken from the fruit of the palm tree.. For batter of about one and half kilograms of rice, about half or three quarter bottle of toddy is used.