Chennai foodies welcome rains with hot snacks, chai

The rains paint a shade of green across my farmhouse in Vettaikaranpudur and it’s the perfect time to munch on freshly made apple chips — it tastes amazing with tea. One needs to slice some red, juicy apples and arrange them on a baking tray. Preheat the oven to 200 degrees and bake for an hour. Then, turn the apples to the other side and bake for another hour. These can be dusted with cinnamon powder and brown sugar or other spices like nut-meg.

A cup of maida along with a tablespoon of melted ghee, ¼ tsp of ajwain (carom seeds), ½ tsp cumin seeds, chilli powder and freshly ground black pepper must be combined in a bowl. Knead it into a dough using sufficient water, divide the dough into equal portions and roll out each of them into four-inch circles. Prick the mathri with a fork on the surface and pinch the edges to form patters like you would a pie. Then, deep-fry it on oil. I make a homemade Schezwan dip to go with this or dip it into sweet mango achar.

Soak four cups of pulungal rice in water for two hours. Then, grind a cup of roasted grams into powder. Mix the soaked rice with red chillies, salt and asafoetida and grind it until it has a soft texture. Add to this mixture the powdered roasted gram powder and mix well by hand. To make things a little more fun, you can add a few drops of red food colouring to the batter. It should then be put into moulds (pakoda puliyura achu) and directly squeezed into hot oil for deep-frying. This tastes delicious with a dip — add cheese to boiling milk and let it condense for few minutes.