Recipe- Go Healthy With Rava Kichadi

You know what I think is the most challenging part about food blogging? It’s being able to click what you cook before is disappears from the bowl! Seriously I have lost count on the number of dishes that I made, wrote down everything and then we ate it for dinner. I couldn’t click it! But then sometimes you desperately want to share something even if that means clicking pictures of leftovers, yes like this Rava Kichadi.

Kichadi in Hindi means a mix of everything, it’s a one pot meal made usually with rice, lentils and veggies and has a mushy texture. This version of kichadi is made with fine semolina [rava/sooji] and lots of veggies. It’s total comfort food and mom would always make this for me whenever I wanted to eat something light and nice. Actually mom would make rava upma which is very similar to this recipe except that upma is more grainier and has also less oil/ghee. Regardless both are easy to make and very flavorful.

Ingredients

1 cup rava or sooji [fine semolina]
4 cups boiling water
7-8 cashews broken
1 onion thinly sliced
1 to mato thinly sliced
½ cup peas frozen
½ cup carrots frozen
1.5 teaspoons finely chopped ginger
1 teaspoon lemon juice
¼ teaspoon turmeric powder
1 green chili finely chopped
? teaspoon hing [asafoetida]
7-8 curry leaves
½ tablespoon urad dal dhuli [split black gram without skin]
½ tablespoon chana dal [split bengal gram]
1 teaspoon mustard seeds
1 tablespoon oil
1.5 tablespoons ghee [clarified butter]
¼ teaspoon red chili powder
salt to taste

Method

* Start by soaking urad dal and chana dal in enough water for around 20-30 minutes. This will ensure that the lentils stay soft and nice while cooking.

* In a pan on medium heat, add 1/2 tablespoon of ghee. Once hot, add broken cashew nuts to it. Saute till they turn light golden brown, set aside.

* In the same pan now add rava/sooji (semolina) and start roasting it stirring continuously.

* After few minutes, around 6-7 the rava will change color and you will also get a nice aroma, at this stage remove from pan and set aside. Be very careful while roasting semolina because it can burn quickly once hot.

* In another pan on medium heat, add 1 tablespoon ghee and 1 tablespoon oil. Once hot, add mustard seeds and wait till they start popping up.

* Then add hing, chana dal, urad dal and curry leaves. Saute till the lentils start turning light golden and then add the chopped ginger. Saute till ginger starts turning golden.

* Meanwhile on another stove, put a pan on medium-high heat with 4 cups of water. We are going to boil this water and add to the rava later on.

* Add sliced onions and cook till onions turn translucent and there's no raw smell.

* Then add sliced tomatoes, chopped carrots and peas (I used frozen carrot and peas and put them in warm water for 5 minutes before adding to the pan].

* Cook the veggies for 2 minutes, you don't really want tomatoes to turn mushy, they should just turn soft because veggies will cook more once we add the boiling water.

* Add salt, red chili powder, turmeric powder and mix till well combined.

* Now add 4 cups of boiling water [that we had kept earlier to boil].

* Start adding the roasted rava slowly into the mixture, stirring continuously as you mix. There shouldn't be any lumps.

* Keep stirring till rava absorbs all the water.

* Now cover with a lid and let it simmer on medium-low heat for 7-8 minutes.

* Open the lid, squeeze in the lemon juice and garnish with roasted cashew nuts and chopped cilantro.

* Serve hot with sambhar and chutney on the side.