Daal Bati

As the spring continues to be cold and rainy, and the sunshine seems to be lost in the clouds, I needed something more hot and yummy to brighten the day up. What better than this favourite from my childhood, which was a regular on cold and rainy days...but beware, this is a calorie bomb, and just does not taste the same without a real lot of ghee.

Daal Bati is one of the most famous Rajasthani dishes - and there are many variations on the ways of making it as well as on fillings - dried fruits, gram flour, cottage cheese, Khoya (milk thickened until it reaches a cheesy consistency - for more details see here) etc.

The two most common ways of making the Bati is a tandoor or boiled and then fried in ghee. Well, I did not have a tandoor available, and the thought of deep frying the baatis in ghee (in addition to the ghee added later) made my hair stand on end, so I went with the third alternative - baking them in the oven. Obviously, the taste and texture varies slightly between the tandoor, fried and baked varieties.

The Daal I normally use for Daal-Bati is a special mix of five lentil sorts - toor, chana, moong, yellow moong and urad. The mixture as well as the spices used lend the Daal a very different and rich flavour.

Ingredients

For the bati

1 1/2 cup - whole wheat flour (atta)

3 tbsp - ghee (clarified butter)

2 tbsp - cream

a pinch of salt

a pinch of sugar

a generous pinch of bicarbonate of soda

milk to knead the dough

Method

1. Mix together the flour, salt, sugar and bicarbonate of soda in a bowl. Add the ghee and cream into the flour mixture and rub till it resembles bread crumbs.
2. Make a stiff dough using some milk.
3. Divide the dough into five portions and shape them into small balls. Press the bati's slightly with the thumb on the top. 
4. Preheat the oven to 200 degree C
5. Place the bati's on the lined baking tray and place the tray in the center of the preheated oven and bake for approx 30 minutes or until done. 

For the daal

1/4 cup - split pigeon pea (toor/arhar daal)

1/4 cup - split bengal gram ( chana daal)

1/4 cup - green gram (sabut moong )

1/4 cup - split green gram skinless (moong daal)

2 tbsp - split black gram skinless (urad daal)

3-4 - cloves

3-4 - green cardamom

2 - bayleaves

a generous pinch of asafoetida (hing)

1/4 tsp + 1/4 tsp - turmeric powder (haldi)

1/4 tsp + 1/4 tsp - red chilli powder (adjust according to your taste)

1/4 tsp + 1/4 tsp - cumin seeds

1/2 tsp -  dried mango powder (amchur)

1/2 tsp - garam masala

1/4 tsp - sugar

1/4 tsp - dried fenugreek leaves (kasuri methi)

1 tbsp - ghee 

lemon juice (according to your taste)

salt to taste

Method 

1. Wash and soak daals in some water for 2-3 hrs. Then drain and boil the daals in 2 1/2 cups of water with salt, haldi, mirchi and cumin seeds and cook until done. 
2. Heat ghee in a pan. Add hing, cumin seeds, cloves, cardamoms and bayleaves. When cumin seeds start to splutter, add haldi, mirchi and the boiled daal and cook for 7-8 minutes.  Add the amchur, garam masala, sugar, kasuri methi and salt and cook again for a couple of minutes (add water if required)
3. Add lemon juice and serve hot.

Our favourite way of eating the daal bati is crushing the batis while still hot into coarse chunks, and adding a generous sprinkling of castor sugar and a very generous dollop of ghee. 

Am off for a long weekend, so will see you on Monday again.

Enjoy!