Onion bahji, mushroom pakora & chicken tika pakora

[Geezah]

I got home from work to an empty house so decided to make some finger food..



Appologies for the crap phone pic but my daughter has swanned off with the digi.

[solarsplace]

Hi Geezah

What did you have with them? some dips or some curry sauce?

Never made Pakoras myself, is there any particular recipe you use, I must admit I very much like the sound of mushroom Pakoras.

Also, sigh... yes kid do have a habit of just 'swanning off' with things! - that thing you left on the table the night before is no longer there.... sigh.

Thanks

[Geezah]

I just made them cause I was bored and wanted to improve my previous recipe (and a few at work asked for some samples to taste cause they get sick of hearing me gloat)

I used the same batter mix for the bahji's and the pakora, just used corriander seeds in the bahji and  cumin seeds in the pakora.


Ingredients

140g gram flour
1tsp salt
1/2 tsp garam masala
1/2 tsp all purpose spice mix
1tsp ground cumin
1tsp ground turmeric
1tsp bicarbonate of soda
1tsp chilli powder
2tsp lemon juice
2tbsp vegetable or groundnut oil, plus enough for deep-frying
2-8tbsp water
2 onions, thinly sliced
2tsp coriander or cumin seeds, lightly crushed


Method
Sift the gram flour, salt, cumin, turmeric, bicarbonate of soda, garam masala, seasoning and chilli powder into a large bowl.
Mix in the lemon juice and oil and then very gradually stir in just enough water to form a thick batter. Now mix in the onions and the crushed coriander/cumin seeds.
Allow the onions to 'sweat' in the batter for 1/2 hr before cooking. Mix well as the batter thins down.

Heat enough oil for deep-frying in a wok or deep-fat fryer until it reaches 170C.
Without overcrowding the pan, drop in spoonfuls of the onion mixture and fry for 2 minutes. Then use tongs to flip the bhajis over and continue frying for a further 2 minutes or until golden brown.

Immediately remove the bhajis from the oil and allow to cool.
Heat oil back up to 190c and fry the bhajis again for 30 seconds or so to crisp them up and lose the oil in them.
shake em dry and roll em on a kitchen towel.
Enjoy!

[curryhell]

I could munch on some of them right now.  Not too unlike the ones i make.  The crowd at work love em, but they prefer my samosas. They just don't realise how much time and effort goes into samosa making and cooking though.  So they just have to make do with the onion bhajis ;D.  So what's in the pakoras Geezah?

[Geezah]

In my pakora...
whole baby button mushrooms rolled around in a dish with pataks tikka paste, dipped into a shlightly thinner batter mix and fried twice like the bahji.
My std pre cooked chicken tikka pieces in same batter mix, or if i'm really lazy a packet of frozen chicken tika pieces from iceland.

I also add a spoon of pataks to my onions before adding them to the batter as they look so pale and unloved.