When I resided in Mysore, I used to eagerly wait for Sankranti so that I can get ellu bella from my friends and neighbours. Each and every house has their own version of this snack and we used to get so many packs of ellu bella from friends during the festival. Usually ellu bella is accompanied with sakkare achhu. My friend Archana used to prepare sakkare achhu at home. Once I tried preparing it and it turned out to be a disaster. But ellu bella is very easy to make. There is not so much cooking involved except for roasting peanuts and sesame seeds. Just mix together all ingredients and you get this flavourful snack which you can go on munching any time of the day. After we moved from Mysore I completely forgot about this. When I was going through blogs recently I saw some posts on this ellu bella and it made me nostalgic. So for this Pongal I made ellu bella and thoroughly enjoyed it. Achu vellam must be used for this snack. As I didn't have it in my pantry, I used the regular vellam and had a hard time cutting it to cubes. Achu vellam is firmer than the usual vellam and can be cut into cubes much easily compared to the vellam. So if you are preparing it buy achu vellam and try it out.
Ingredients:
Dried Coconut/ Copra-50 gm / 1/2 cup
Jaggery/ Achu Vellam-100 gm/ 1/2 cup
Peanuts-100 gm / 1/2 cup
White Sesame Seeds-3 tbs
Roasted Gram/ Porikadalai/ pottukadalai-1/2 cup
Procedure:
1. Dry roast sesame seeds until slightly brown. When they start popping transfer to a plate and allow it to cool.
2. Dry roast peanuts until nicely browned. Roast it on medium flame so that the peanuts are not burned.
3. Transfer to a plate and allow it to cool.
4. When cool, rub it with your fingers to loosen the skin. Remove the skin by gently blowing air on the peanuts.
5. Break the peanut into half.
6. Cut vellam into small cubes.
7. Peel the dark skin of copra and cut it into small cubes.
8. Now add all the ingredients in a bowl and gently mix.
9. Store in airtight jar and enjoy.
Peel copra and cut into cubes.
Roast peanuts until brown.
Crush it between your fingers.
Remove skin from all the peanuts.
Gently blow air and remove the skin.
Roast white sesame seeds.
Cube jaggery.
Add all the ingredients and mix.
Share and enjoy!!
Labels: COCONUT, FESTIVAL, JAGGERY, KARNATAKA SPECIAL, PEANUT, SESAME SEEDS, SNACKS, SWEETS
