Idli/Dosa Pancake Experiments – South Indian Cuisine

My work colleague is from South India. I was telling him about my pancake creations and he said that I should try some Indian pancakes. We got chatting about them and the different ingredients and it sounded like good fun. These aren’t protein pancakes by any shape or form. Although they have lentils in they are mostly carb with a tiny bit of protein. However, you can definitely enjoy them with a chicken curry or Tandoori Chicken Tikka to up the protein count.

Idli with coconut chutney

As this was all totally new to me I researched a lot of recipes.Idli are like little steamed buns and Dosa are larger pancakes like crepes. My colleague confirmed that I could use the same “batter” for my Idli and Dosas so I set to work. Making it was quite fun and reminded me of when someone gave me a sour dough mix called “Herman” for me to grow, use, and pass on. You first rinse and soak the rice and lentils. Next you blend the rice and dal (separately) with water, mix them together, and then leave them in a warm place to ferment and rise.

Soaking the urid dal (left) and rice (right) separately

After leaving to ferment, little air bubbles will be visible in the mixture

The quantity of rice to urid dal is quite easy to get the hang of. It’s 1 part lentils to 4 parts rice so 1 cup rice + 1/4 cup urid dal or 100g rice to 25g Urid Dal. Recipes on the web are quite mixed about which rice to use. My first attempt was with basmati rice. The Idli were nice, but the Dosa batter just wasn’t right. I couldn’t get the pancake to expand to the edge of the pan. My colleague suggested using some really cheap supermarked value/essential/economy rice. The cheapest possible, e.g. Tesco Everyday Essentials long grain rice for 45p a bag rather than basmati. I then tried two different mixes the next time around: For one of them the rice part was 1/2 cup cheap long grain + 1/2 cup parboiled rice (the pouches of rice that you can microwave for 2 mins and serve). The other mix was 1 cup cheap long grain rice.

The mix with the parboiled rice resulted in wetter idli and less crispy, thicker dosa. This wasn’t what I wanted. The mix with just the cheap long grain made nice, dense idli and thin and crispy dosa so I decided that that was the mix I was sticking with.

Masala dosa (stuffed dosa)

Plain idli and stuffed idli (Same stuffing as the dosa above)

I managed to get my dosa to stretch to the edge of the pan too so it was perfect! So here is my final recipe…

Idli/Dosa Batter

Ingredients:
1 cup uncooked cheap long grain rice (+ 1 cup cold water)
¼ cup Urad dal (1 cup cold water)
¼ tsp Fenugreek seeds
Salt (to taste)

Method to make the batter:

1. Rinse rice in a bowl and Fenugreek seeds + Urid Dal in another bowl. Rinse really well with lots of water changes and rub the grains together.
2. Soak the rice in 1 cup of water. Soak Urad Dal + Fenugreek seeds in 1 cup of water in separate bowls with cold water for 4 hours
3. Drain both but save the water in individual bowls.
4. Blend the Dal with ¼ cup of its reserved water. Blend until smooth and gradually add more water. You need 3 x water to Dal (so ¼ cup dal needs ¾ cup water). You should end up with a really smooth paste.
5. Transfer into a big bowl.
6. Add rice to blender adding water as needed (approx ¼ cup total – you don’t add much water to the rice). Blend (pulse) until slightly coarse. The rice shouldn’t be as smooth as the dal. If you feel it with your fingertips you should feel little grains.
7. Add rice to same bowl as dal with some salt and mix well.
8. Cover with tea towel and place in warm spot (the airing cupboard where our water heater stands is where I put mine) for 8-10 hours.
9. After it’s been left to ferment, stir the fermented batter and you should see little air bubbles. Your batter is ready!

Method to make Idli:

To make Idli, you can use an egg poacher pan like this one (you can get special idli steamers, but my egg poacher pan does the same thing).

1. Fill the pan with water as if you’re poaching eggs and allow to boil.
2. Spray the 4 cups with oil and put around 2 tablespoons of batter in each cup, they won’t reach the top like eggs do.
3. Put the lid on and leave to steam for 4-5 minutes. They are done when the top of the Idli is firm.
4. Wet a spoon and use it to scoop the Idli from the cups. Serve dipped in coconut chutney, mango chutney is very nice with them too. This is a nice recipe for coocnut chutney. I add a little granualted sweetener as well to mine though.

Method to make stuffed Idli:

1. Repeat the normal Idli method, but instead of putting 2 tablespoons of batter in the cups, add one tablespoon and steam for a minute or so to ensure it’s a bit solid.
2. Add the filling (e.g. potato-based saag aloo, curry, chutney, etc.) then add another tablespoon of batter to the top.
3. Replace the lid and continue to steam for another 4-5 minutes

Method to make dosa:

1. Add a little water to your batter mix. Not too much, just enough for it to pour into the pan and coat the bottom.
2. Heat a non-stick frying pan on a low heat with a few sprays of oil.
3. Take a big ladle of the batter and add to the pan. Move the pan around to reach the sides and use the base of your spoon to help spread the batter to the edges. If you don’t have enough batter in the pan, add a little more any bits that are missing and it’ll fuse together. Cook for a few minutes on that side before flipping and cooking the other side.
4. You can then either fill the pancake with a mix or cut it into quarters and dip in a chutney. For mine, I make a filling using potato, chicken, onion and spices. You could also add spinach, peas or any other veggies that you like. It’s quite a dry mix, rather than a saucy curry or dal. I follow this recipe, but add chicken and extra veg.