Bitter gourd fry

Ingredients: 

1. Bitter gourd – ½ kg

2. Turmeric powder – ½ tsp.

3. Chilli powder – 1 tsp.

4. Gram flour (Besan) – 1 tbsp.

5. Sugar – 1 tsp.

6. Coconut oil – 1 tsp.

7. Curry leaves 

8. Monosodium glutamate (ajinomoto) – 1 pinch (only if you prefer)

9. Salt to taste

10. Oil to deep fry (whichever you prefer)

Method:
Deseed the bitter gourds and cut them into 1 inch pieces. Wash and dry the pieces thoroughly. Mix all the ingredients from 1-9 well and marinate for some time.
Heat oil in a frying pan and deep fry.

Note:
You can add/decrease the chilli powder, sugar and salt to suit your taste and the variety of bitter gourds available to you.   

Meen Varuthathu (Fish fry)

This dish has almost the same ingredients (and method) as one of our earlier posts Mathi Varuthathu, except for the fish used. Here we have used Neymeen/Seer fish.

Poori masala

Pooris
Ingredients:
Wheat flour
Maida
Salt to taste
Butter/ghee/oil
Milk (optional)

Method:
Take a glass each of wheat flour and maida. Mix salt, 1 tsp butter/ghee/oil and 1 tbsp milk (optional). Knead into a soft dough, roll into small balls, flatten into small circles, and deep fry in hot oil.

Masala
Ingredients:

Potatoes - 1 cup, mashed
Onions - 1 large, sliced
Green chillies - 2/3, slit
Ginger - 1 inch piece, cut into small pieces
Turmeric powder - half tsp
Chilli powder - half tsp
Curry leaves
Salt to taste
Sugar - a pinch (optional)
Water - according to the thickness of gravy you need.
Oil - 1/2 tbsps

Method:

Heat oil in a frying pan. Add the mustard seeds. When they crackle, add urad dal, red chillies and 1/2 curry leaves. Then add onions, green chillies, ginger, and 1/2 curry leaves. Saute well. When the onions turn transparent, add potatoes, turmeric powder, chilli powder, salt and sugar. Mix well. Add water and boil for 5 minutes.

Postscript:
1) Our measures for the poori dough maybe different from yours. :D
2) My grandfather used to call this masala 'podimas'. We do the same when we serve it with dosas! :D

Parippu vada

Ingredients:

Parippu (Toor dal) - 1 cup
Red chillies - 2/3
Shallots - 5/6, finely sliced
Ginger - 1 small piece, finely chopped
Green chillies - 1/2, finely chopped
Curry leaves
Oil 

Method:
Soak the parippu and the red chillies for 4-5 hours. Grind into a coarse batter. Add the other ingredients and mix well.
Roll the batter into small balls and then flatten into small circles and lay them on a greased plate or paper (check picture).

Heat oil in a frying pan. Deep fry until golden brown.

Simple bajji or fritters

Banana pepper fritters/mulaga bajji

Slit banana peppers in the middle.
Mix gram dal, chilli powder, rice powder (a little), asafoetida powder, red chilli flakes, salt, a little monosodium glutamate and sugar (both only if you prefer) into a batter of medium consistency using water.

Dip the slit banana peppers in the batter and fry in a pan of hot oil.

Other fritters

As you know, fritters can be made out of literally anything. We also made them with bread, and onion and green chillies.
Serve with any kind of chutney (my brother made a peanuts, coconut, chilli powder and salt blend) or sauce.