Bharwa Paneer Pakodi

Bangalore is cool and it drizzles almost every evening,,, it feels like monsoon has already arrived. And if there is something which everyone associates with monsoon in India, its garma garam pakodas.. So one such cool evening, I decided to surprise my hubby with pakodas,,, paneer pakodas,, sounds interesting, wait for the next part, stuffed paneer pakodas (stuffed cottage cheese fritters)

They are adapted from cook called as pure and simple by Viddu Mittal. Its a nice simple vegetarian cook book which explains step by step procedures for normal Indian cooking, its great help for someone learning to make Indian cuisine for the first time.

Ingredients:

• 500 gm paneer
• oil (for deep frying)

Stuffing:

• 1 ½ tsp ginger paste
• 1 ½ tsp garlic paste
• 1 ½ tsp green chilli paste
• 3 tsp coriander paste
• ½ tsp chaat powder
• ½ tsp salt
• ½ tsp jeera powder

Batter

• 1 cup besan (gram flour)
• ½ tsp baking powder
• ½ tsp salt
• ½ tsp chilli powder
• water (about ½ cup)

Method

• Cut the paneer slab into 6 pieces and slice each piece into two, so that you can sandwich the stuffing in between these slices and dip them in batter and deep fry to make 6 paneer pakodies.
• Mix all the ingredients for stuffing and make thick paste.
• Make the batter which is semi thick in consistency, so that the batter forms a thick crispy coating over the paneer...
• Stuff the stuffing in between two slices of paneer and dip them in the batter and deep fry paneer pakodies till golden brown in color and crispy..The oil should be medium hot..
• Once fried, keep the pakodies on tissue paper to soak all the excess oil,
• Serve cutting the pakodies in two halves and sprinkle with chaat masala.
• Serve with tomato sauce and green chutney