#588 Making Chaat even more healthy

 Making Chaat even more healthy

This blog post is part of ‘Blogaberry Dazzle’ hosted by Cindy D’Silva and Noor Anand Chawla

A few days ago, I published a recipe for Chaat that I prepared for my guests at home.

In this article, I am going to present some alternative healthy substitutes that I experimented with for the above dish, without compromising the taste of the Chaat.

I replaced Kidney beans with chickpeas and potatoes with sweet potatoes. So, I prepared a dough made up of mashed overnight-soaked and boiled chickpeas, boiled sweet potatoes, rice flour, cumin powder, and gave them the shape of Tikkis.

To prepare Tikkis from the above dough, scoop some balls from the dough and flatten them a bit. You can, then, put them in a refrigerator for 15 minutes to stabilize their shape.

Tikkis: The image has been taken by the Author from her kitchen

Traditionally, Tikkis are made from potatoes, and I added chickpeas to provide protein intake to the body.

I replaced the potato with sweet potato because

• Sweet potato has a significant amount of fiber that slows down the absorption of sugar in the bloodstream.
• It has a low glycemic index that causes a low spike in blood sugar

Then put these Tikkis on a pan with ghee, shallow fry them until they turn a bit golden. Then flatten them a bit more and fry them with some more ghee on until they become crispy.

The picture of Tikkis after being removed from the pan; picture taken by the Author from her kitchen

After Tikkis are removed from the pan, it’s time to assemble condiments to enhance their taste. You can serve them with Chhole curry, green chutney(coriander, chilly, and mint), peanuts, sweet chutney(tamarind and jaggery/brown sugar), chopped onion, and coriander.

The image has been taken by the Author from her kitchen

I never miss the chance to experiment with the healthy version of traditional dishes. It not only connects me to my roots and tradition but also makes me guilt-free while consuming them.

© All Rights Reserved!
 Swati Sarangi,
 18.06.2025  
You can support my work through Buy Me a Coffee.

P.s: This post is a part of #BlogchatterFoodFest hosted by blogchatter.

 

#587 Tarla

 Tarla

The image has been downloaded by the Author from Google Images

Recently, on my way home, in flight, I watched Tarla. It was a long international flight, and movies, as entertainment, came to my rescue.The movie is a biopic, acted by Huma Quereshi, made on Indian Chef and Author of several cookbooks and cast of various cooking shows, Tarla Dalaal.

Hailing from Pune, Tarla, after completing her studies, was in the process of getting married through an arranged marriage setup when her parents started searching for a suitable partner for her.

Inspired by a female Professor at her university, she wanted to achieve something in her life and was not so keen on marriage. When she told her mother her desire to do something big in her life, like all other Indian mothers, she was permitted to pursue her ambitions after marriage.

When her marriage proposal progressed with Nalin Dalaal, who as a Chemical Engineer, working as a Quality Engineer, in a reputed firm of India, she shared her desire with him who said that he would support her.

Being a vegetarian, she didn’t like her husband eating non-veg cuisines and started experimenting with making vegetarian dishes as tasty as non-vegetarian ones.

It all began when her neighbour sent her daughter to her to train her to cook, to get married. She would often advise her neighbour’s daughter to use her cooking skills to impress her in-laws to get the permission to do what she likes.

Photo by Nadine Primeau on Unsplash

At the marriage reception of her neighbour’s daughter, Tarla got requests from many mothers of daughters who wanted their daughters to get trained by her to fix their marriages.

Then came the idea of starting a cooking class at her home. She faced the backlash of other men of her society who felt she shouldn’t continue her classes in her home, as it was causing trouble to them.

With the shutdown of her cooking class, her husband suggested that she write a cookbook that would reach millions of women interested in cooking. On being rejected by the editor she approached to publish her book, her husband became the editor and publisher of her cookbook.

On seeing the failure of her book, she decided to sell off all the books to the raddiwaala. On finding her recipe being recreated in one of the restaurants she visited for dinner with her family, she decided to market her book through the raddiwaala, whose work was to collect rags from the houses of people.

Her book became best bestseller and she was invited to join the success party of her book launch, where a producer of a TV show met her and invited her to her office. She discussed how she wanted to cast Tarla in a TV show that would be aired on National Television.

In her journey, Tarla faced a lot of challenges. She juggled between taking care of her family and a demanding career. Her husband faced the loss of his job and insecurities due to the growing popularity of his wife, eventually securing one because of how supportive he was to his wife’s career.

The image has been downloaded by the Author from Google Images

Tarla decided to give up on the TV show as her family life suffered because of her absence. As a gesture of love and appreciation, she received a lot of letters from her readers and viewers.

The last scene shows how her husband comes forward to resolve the insecurities and indifference between them, and the movie ends on a happy note.

I wish every woman to pursue what they want to do in their lives, even after marriage, because ambition has no gender. Unlike the movie, neither every partner nor the household of in-laws is supportive of the ambition of a woman after marriage. Her desires or ambitions get choked in the chains of daily household responsibilities as if her ambitions are secondary with respect to her husband’s or children’s.

This movie is inspirational, not just for women but for men. If men, just like Nalin Dalaal, willingly share the household responsibilities by making women less burdened, and more enthusiastic about pursuing their ambitions, every household will bring the hidden Tarla to the limelight.

© All Rights Reserved!

Swati Sarangi,

17.06.2025

You can support my work through Buy Me a Coffee.

P.s: This post is a part of #BlogchatterFoodFest hosted by blogchatter.