Road Side Kalan Recipe | Coimbatore style kalan recipe

Rottu kadai kalan recipe Tamil style. Coimbatore road side kalan recipe. Popular street food recipe. Kovai style kalan recipe with step by step pictures. How to prepare Rottu kadai Kaalan Masala / Roadside Mushroom Masala recipe. Recipe made with mushrooms and cabbage.

This is the legendary street food recipe from my Coimbatore called the rottu kadai kalan. Kalan is mushrooms. Though the name says kalan, its made with a combination of cabbage and mushrooms. The cabbage adds a nice volume to the dish as well as flavour. Some of the shops in Coimbatore make it exclusively with cabbage but call it as kalan. Yeah, we are like that only. This is my version of my favorite rottu kadai kalan.

Here is how to do Road Side Kalan Recipe | Coimbatore style kalan recipe

First we will make the pakodas for the Road Side Kalan Recipe | Coimbatore style kalan
Wash and clean the cabbage. Remove the core from the cabbage and slice thin. Finely chop the mushrooms. Set aside.

Take a big bowl and add in the chopped mushrooms and cabbage. Add in the maida, corn flour, salt, chilli powder and turmeric powder.

Mix everything well. Bruise the vegetables lightly by slightly rubbing them between the palms. Set aside for 20 minutes. DO NOT ADD ANY WATER. Both mushrooms and cabbage contains a lot of water. The salt that we added will help in getting some of the moisture out. That will be more than enough to wet the flour and make a cohesive batter.
Note: One mistake people do is to add water to make the batter. This will make the pakodas soggy. Its important to keep the moisture level as low as possible to get incredibly crispy pakodas.

After 20 minutes, the vegetable mixture would be wet due to all the natural juices that have come out during the rest. Mix well and set aside. The volume of the veggies would have shrinked due to wilting.

Heat oil in a kadai / pan until hot. The oil can be nice and hot as the veggies have a ton of moisture and takes a long time to cook. Take small pieces of the batter and drop it gently in oil. Just take random shapes and place it in oil. But let the pieces be small. After adding them to oil, do not touch or move with a spatula for the first two minutes. The pakodas will break if moved before it is set. Just leave it in oil and go away for a couple of minutes.

After adding the batter to the oil, it will be very bubbly. These pakodas take time to cook as cabbages have a lot of water in them. Each batch will take roughly about three plus minutes. The bubbles should have subsided considerably and that is an indication that the pakodas are done.

Once the bubbles in oil have subsided and the pakodas are nice and brown, remove from oil and drain on paper towels.

Now we will make the masala / gravy for the Road Side Kalan Recipe | Coimbatore style kalan .
We will need to make a masala paste for the gravy. Here is what you will need.

Take all the ingredients listed under masala paste in a mixie. Add half a cup of water and grind to a fine paste. Set aside.

Take a heavy flat pan and add in the oil and curry leaves. Add in the finely chopped onions.

Saute for a few minutes till the onions are soft. Add in the ground masala.

Wash the mixie with half a cup of water and add it to the pan. Add in the salt. Remember that the pakodas are also salted. Add the salt cautiously. We can adjust the seasoning later if need be. Add in the south Indian curry masala powder and Kashmiri red chilli powder. If you do not have curry masala powder, add in store bought south Indian style chicken masala / mutton masala powder. The Kashmiri chilli powder will give a nice colour to the gravy.

Cook for 5-6 minutes till all the spices are fully cooked and streaks of oil start appearing on top of the gravy.

Make a corn starch slurry by adding a teaspoon of corn flour to a cup of water (240ml). Mix well.

Add the slurry to the gravy. Let it come to a simmer. We are looking for a thin gravy as the gravy will instantly thicken up once the pakodas are added. Adjust the gravy consistency by adding little water if necessary.

Add in a teaspoon of sugar. The sugar balances out. This is truly optional but I like to add sugar as it nicely rounds out the taste of the gravy.

Add in juice of a lime.

Add in the pakodas and toss well in the gravy to coat.

Remove from heat and finish it with a generous sprinkle of coriander leaves.

The mushroom masala tastes good served hot. If you have guests coming, get the pakodas and the gravy ready. Just heat the gravy and add in the pakodas at the last. Serve the rottu kadai kalan with a sprinkling of shredded carrots, onions, coriander leaves, little bit of green chillies and lime wedges. Road Side Kalan Recipe | Coimbatore style kalan is ready.

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