Poha Cutlet
Getting your kids to eat some healthy home made snack is always a top priority for most moms, don’t you all agree? Right from early childhood, Neha always preferred to eat something freshly made at home by me rather than store bought snacks or biscuits. So, I am used to making something hot and yummy for her when she is back from school. Her tiffin is always in big demand among her friends and she ends up distributing more than half of what she takes for lunch. This leaves her really hungry by the time she reaches home at around 4 pm. So, most of the days, I keep something ready for her. These healthy shallow friedcutlets are one such snack which I often make for her. Some other snacks that she gets to eat are bread upma, sandwich, kuzhi paniyaram, once in a month instant noodles, at times cornflakes with milk, Kesari, rava upma, spicy poha, cutlets, mini parathas etc.
Also known as flattened rice, it’s a very famous street food in Indore, commonly called as Indori Poha. In Maharashtra too, it’s a very common breakfast/snack item in all household and restaurants. To make it more nutritious, we can add boiled potatoes, sprouts, roasted peanuts. In kerala, we often make “avil nanachadhu” which is a a very simple dish made by mixing soaked red or white avil, sugar/jaggery, grated coconut and little milk. A more elaborate variety called “avil vilayichadhu” is made with roasted red poha with thick jaggery syrup and grated coconut. It is flavoured with cardamom powder and at times roasted cumin powder. At times, we add pieces of ripe bananas to it.
Ingredients:
- Poha/flattened rice 1 cup
- Salt to taste
- Onion 1
- Green chilies 2-3
- Fresh bread Crumbs 1-2 tbsp
- Coriander leaves 2-3 sprigs
- Curd 1 tbsp
- Chat masala 1 tsp
- Dried bread crumbs 1-2 tbsp
- Refined oil 1-2 tbsp
Method:
- Soak the poha in water for 2-3 minutes. Drain and keep aside.
- Chop the onion, green chilies and coriander leaves finely.
- Place the soaked poha in a big mixing bowl add the chopped onion, green chilies, coriander leaves, salt, chat masala, curd and fresh bread crumbs.
- Knead and form a dough. If the mixture appears too dry add more curd or sprinkle some water. If it’s too moist, add more bread crumbs.
- Make equal sized balls from the dough.
- Flatten these balls in your palm and roll in the dried bread crumbs.
- Refrigerate these cutlets for atleast half an hour.
- Now either deep fry these in medium hot oil till it’s golden on both sides. Or shallow fry these in an iron skillet till it’s done.
- Serve it hot with any dip or chutney or sauce. I have made a simple dip by mixing tomato sauce, Sriracha sauce, a spoon of finely chopped onion and spring onion greens.
Notes:
- You can add one boiled and mashed potato to the mixture for a better taste.
- Fresh bread crumbs can be substituted with rice flour or cornflour. But I prefer to use fresh bread crumbs (from my home made bread). Moreover, I feel that cornflour gives it a raw flour taste. So I always minimise use of cornflour in my dishes.
- One to two tablespoons of grated paneer can also be added.
- You can add finely chopped garlic and ginger too.
- The deep fried ones taste better than shallow fried ones, but I always prefer to shallow fry my cutlets and kebabs.
