I have a very interesting story regarding how I have learnt to prepare these Pyaaz ke pakode/onion bhajji. After my marriage I came to Chennai with my husband and here I got introduced to the word bhajji. In North India ‘bhajji’ word is not used for any kind of pakode. Bhajji is South Indian term for pakoda and compared to North India, in South there are a big variety of bhajjis.
After staying 10 months in Chennai we went to Jamaica. There was an Indian restaurant named Akbar. As an appetizer pyaaz ke pakode/onion bhajji used to be served. It was less oily, and unlike onion pakode, crispy fried slices of onions were wrapped with less flour. We had enjoyed them thoroughly and I always wondered how do they manage to use such less flour and have every slice separate without getting stuck with each other. I tried to replicate at home but failed miserably.
Three years later when when we were settled down in Bangalore, Manish and I were watching Sanjeev Kapoor’s food show on TV and there he was cooking the same onion bhajji!!! We both jumped with joy to see the whole process and next weekend this onion bhajji was part of our breakfast!!!!
There is one more post based on onions in the blog. if you are interested, can take a look… Pyaaz ka paratha (Indian flat bread, stuffed with roasted onion)
Ingredients :
Vertically chopped onion slices
Oil for frying
Gram flour
salt as per taste
Process :
Peel onions and wash them nicely. Chop them vertically in long stripes.
You really need to chop a lot of onions here so take help from your family members…
Add salt as per your taste in these chopped onion and mix nicely. Let these salted onions rest for 20-30 minutes.
During this resting period salt will melt and onions will be wet.
Now start sprinkling gram flour (besan) 1 tbsp at a time over these wet salty onion. We are not going to add water here, so use gram flour wisely that it gets wrapped around with wet onions.
Heat oil in a deep wok on medium flame and fry these onions. As there is less flour wrapped around onions, pakodas/bhajjis wouldn’t absorb much oil during frying.
Serve hot pyaaz ke karare pakode/onion bhajji with your choice of chutney or sauce!!!
