Today is the first day of Blogging Marathon #30 Week 2. I have selected dallying with dumplings as the theme. As per Wiki, dumplings are cooked balls of dough. They are based on flour, potatoes and bread. They may be either boiled, steamed, fried or baked. They may be stuffed with fillings or the dough is simply spiced before cooking the dumpling. Dumpling may also be sweet or savoury. So the Indian dishes which fall under dumplings are kozhukkattai, koftas, samosas and so on. Today I wanted to try out this turkish snack which is a fried stuffed dumpling. The original dish is meat based. I converted it to a vegetarian dish by substituting ground meat with crumbled paneer. The outer cover is made with bulgur wheat and the filling is made with crumbled paneer. The addition of hot water to bulgur wheat is a very important step in the preparation. If the water is more you will end up with a loose dough and if it is less then the dough will crumble. As I don't get bulgur wheat here, I substituted it with cracked wheat. Prepare the filling first so that at the time of preparation it will cool down. I saw this recipe in Fox Traveller's Food Safari. It tastes best when served with a wedge of lime. As I didn't have it I really missed its tanginess.
Ingredients:
Makes 6 Koftes
For The Dough:
Cracked Wheat-1/2 cup
Crumbled Paneer-1/3 cup
Semolina/ Sooji-2-3 tbs
Red Chilly Powder-1/2 tsp
Salt-to taste
Hot Water-1/2 cup
For The Filling:
Crumbled Paneer-2/3 cup
Black Raisins-2 tbs
Oil-1 tsp
Onion-1
Red Chilly Powder-1/2 tsp
Coriander Leaves-2 tbs
Salt to taste
Oil-To Deep Fry
Lemon Wedge To Serve
Procedure:
For The Filling:
1. Heat oil and add onions.
2. Saute until transparent.
3. Add paneer and saute until slightly brown.
4. Add the raisins, salt, red chilly powder and saute for a minute.
5. Add coriander leaves, mix and remove from flame.
6. Set it aside to cool.
For The Dough:
1. In a bowl add water to wheat, cover and set it aside for 15 minutes.
2. When the wheat has absorbed water and has become soft, add in paneer, sooji, salt and red chilly powder.
3. Let it sit for another 5 minutes.
4. Keep on kneading the dough for 5 minutes until it becomes soft.
5. If you feel that the dough is very loose, then add some bread crumbs.
6. When the dough is soft and little sticky, divide it into 6 equal portions.
7. Shape each portion into a disc, place 1/6th of the filling inside it and cover it to make a ball. Then shape it into an elongated kofta.
8. Heat oil and deep fry the koftas until nicely browned.
9. Serve it with a salad and lemon wedge.
Take the wheat in a bowl.
Add hot water.
After 15 minutes, add the other ingredients.
Mix to form a soft dough.
Divide it into 6 equal parts.
Keep the filling ready.
Make a disc and place the filling in the centre.
Carefully close the edges and make a ball.
Shape it into oval koftas.
Deep fry until brown.
Serve and enjoy!!!
Check out the Blogging Marathon page for the other Blogging Marathoners doing BM#30Labels: Blogging Marathon, CRACKED WHEAT, PANEER, SAVORY, SNACKS, TURKISH
