{"id":15711,"date":"2013-08-30T21:58:04","date_gmt":"2013-08-31T01:58:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thasneen.com\/cooking\/?p=15711"},"modified":"2016-05-25T21:46:07","modified_gmt":"2016-05-26T01:46:07","slug":"dhokla-gujarati-snack-steamed-savory-gram-floursemolina-cake","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thasneen.com\/cooking\/dhokla-gujarati-snack-steamed-savory-gram-floursemolina-cake\/","title":{"rendered":"Dhokla – Gujarati Snack – Steamed Savory Gram flour\/Semolina Cake"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"easy<\/p>\n

A savory cake: it’s spongy, it’s extremely soft and it’s delicious; a popular Gujarati snack…<\/p>\n

How did the thought of making dhokla hit me??? Last weekend, I’d watched Hum dil de chuke sanam hindi movie, one of the sensational movies of Aishwarya Rai and Salman Khan. That movie was released in 1999, it was a blockbuster hit and I watched it right away. After almost 14 years, I watched it again. I do love watching some of my favorite movies that I’d seen when I was a kid\/teenager, brings back a lot of warm memories. In this movie, Salman khan eat a lot of dhokla, in fact he was forcibly fed by Aishwarya’s family. That’s when I made up my mind to try dhokla.<\/p>\n

Dhokla is a popular Gujarati snack, it’s basically steamed savory gram flour\/semolina cake. I have never tried dhokla nor have I made it before. I haven’t seen this snack at any Indian restaurants here, so the only way I had to taste this snack is by making it in my kitchen all by myself. Well, literally anything can be made in our kitchen, so it’s much easier to make it rather than wait for it.<\/p>\n

There are a few versions of dhokla, the batter can be made with just besan\/gram flour or a combination of besan and semolina can be added. Yogurt is added to make the batter and is allowed to ferment for a few hours. It’s made savory by adding green chilies, ginger and other spices. The batter is poured into a cake pan and steam cooked till it’s cooked well. One main and final step is to make a tempering using mustard seeds, curry leaves and green chilies, pour the tempering over the cooked dhokla. The dhokla is then cut into squares and served along with mint chutney or cilantro chutney.<\/p>\n

I used the green chilies plucked from my garden, could it get any better???<\/p>\n

\"green<\/p>\n

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I would relate this to Idli, a famous South Indian breakfast dish. Both are made out of fermented batter and have a spongy soft texture. I really loved the spongy texture of dhokla. The batter should have the right constituency, not too thick nor too flowing, I would say this is the key for making soft dhoklas.<\/p>\n

Dhokla Cooking video<\/strong><\/h3>\n