Baked Biscuit Pockets - Healthier version of the traditional Biscuit Roti

Few days ago, while on a chat with my cousin, she told me that she tried her hands on biscuit roti. That reminded me the yummy taste of it and was tempted to make it myself. Being a bit health conscious, my mind went on to try the traditional  biscuit roti with a twist. And here came the Baked Biscuit Pockets.:)

Ingredients:

For the Crust:

Maida - 3 tbsp
Wheat Flour - 3 tbsp
Semolina(Rava) - 2 tbsp
Kasuri Methi - 1 tbsp
Dhaniya-Jeera Powder - 1 tspn
Chilly Powder - 1/2 tspn
Extra Virgin Olive Oil - 1 tbsp
Salt

For the filling:
Extra Virgin Olive Oil
Mustard seeds - 1 tsp
Red Chilli - 1 or 2
Curry Leaves - 12-15
Urad Dal - 1 and 1/2 tbsp
Semolina(Rava) - 3 tbsp
Gram Flour(Besan) - 1 tbsp
Dry grated Coconut - 1 tbsp
Red Chilly Powder as per taste
Finely Powdered Sugar as per taste
Salt as per taste

1. Knead a soft dough with the ingredients mentioned in for the crust with warm oil.
2. Let the dough rest for an hour.
3. Grind together red chilies and Urad dal to make a powder (Don't make a fine power if you like the crunchiness of urad dal in the mouth)
3. In a non stick pan, take a teaspoon of oil to heat.
4. Add mustard seeds. When the seeds start to splutter, put in the curry leaves by cutting them roughly with hand.
5. Add the ground urad dal-chilly mixture and saute till you get the aroma coming.
6. Add besan and saute for sometime.
7. Now add the rava and grated coconut and saute till rava changes its colour to light brown.
8. At this point add salt and chilli powder as per the taste.
9. Let this mixture cool down completely and then add the finely powdered sugar.
10. Preheat oven to 425 for 20 mins
11. Roll the dough in square (whatever shapes you want the pockets in), fill in the mixture and fold the layer to cover the pockets. Please take care that there is no multiple layer of the dough to avoid the pockets from becoming very hard.
12. Brush the pockets with olive oil on both the sides and bake for 20 mins (10 mins each side) on 350.
The time might vary, depending on the thickness of the pocket layer.
13. Baked Biscuit Pockets are ready to eat :)

Back to the roots with Surnali :)

After posts on the western foods..I come back to my Indian roots but with a twist :)
Here,I post the recipe of healthier version of Surnali made with brown rice.
We, South Indians can guarantee that we will not die hungry, we are blessed with treasure of various mouthwatering dishes. We can make Dosa out of everything which would turn out yummy. One such type of Dosa is Surnali.
Surnali can be made both sweet and non-sweet version. Considering my husbands sweet tooth,I recently made the sweet version of surnali but with a twist. I made surnali with brown rice instead of the usual white rice.

Brown Rice - 2 Cups
Cucumber - 1 grated
Jaggery - 1/4 cup grated
Poha (Flattened Rice) - a handful
Salt - As per taste.

1. Soak rice for 2 hours.
2. Grind the rice along with poha,cucumber and jaggery.
3. Add salt.
4. Let the batter rest and ferment for atleast 7-8 hours.
5. Once the batter is fermented, you can make soft, yummy sweet dosa
called surnali :)

Yummy Shevai!

Which Konkani would not like "Tandlachi Pilleli Shevai"? And being a hardcore Konkani, Shevai has been my favorite since childhood :) Memories take me to remember my stay at my mhave's (aunts) place during vacation and she would have prepared for making shevai for the next day breakfast and yet ask me what would I want for breakfast? She knew I would always come up with only one answer that is "Shevai" :)
Even after marriage, my hunger for Shevai has always been fulfilled by my parents and in-laws by either preparing it themselves or getting those from the Mangalore stores. 
Though such a huge fan, I had never tried making it myself, thanks to its tedious procedure :)
I was quite delighted when my father-in-law gave me a very simple recipe for making shevai.
Never done in India, I found the so called mahurat of making Shevai in USA :). So,here comes recipe from my F.I.L for Tandlachi Shevai

Rice Four - 2 Cups
Water - 3 cups
Salt - As per taste
Oil - 2 teaspoon

The above quantity is enough to make 6 bhaatti(set) of Shevai

The quantity of water would be 1 and 1/2 times of the rice flour. We do not use coconut in any form in this recipe.
1. Bring water to boil.
2. Add salt and oil to the water.
3. Once water boils, switch off the gas.
4. Now slowly add rice flour to the water. See to it that no lumps are formed.
5. Place the steamer to preheat it.
6. Once the mixture comes to a dough consistency, it will be a bit sticky,make small balls of the dough and place in the steamer.
7. Steam these balls for apprx 15-20mins.
8. Keep you Shevai maker(daante) ready. Place the steamed rice balls in the maker and make shevai.

Your yummy, easy to make shevai is ready to eat.
Shevai can be relished with spicy rasam or sambaar..but I simpy
love it with coconut oil and appe-middi nonche.. ;)

I did not have Shevai maker so used the Chakli maker with the Shev making blade.
Take care that the Shevai should me made while the rice balls are hot, once they cool down, it becomes very difficult  to make Shevai.