Munthiri Kothu is unique festival sweet from Kanyakumari District for Christmas.First I came to know about this sweet through my x-office collegue.When I heard the name, first I thought its a rich sweet made with whole bunch of cashews(as we call cashews as mundhiri in tamil) so asked her for the recipe.Somehow it got missed last year too, so this year I browsed around for the recipe and found that it is more like our seeyam the main difference being green gram dal stuffing.Hubby is not fond of green gram dal so had only one,but I loved it so much.The crispy outside with a crunchy sweet inside, it tasted so good, glad that I tried it.
I was also looking for some traditional christmas recipes to post this year and this was an apt choice.I made the green gram dal and coconut mixture alone the previous night itself then morning mixed everything,shaped into balls and deep fried it because with the lil boy aside cant manago to do everything at one go :)
I was also looking for some traditional christmas recipes to post this year and this was an apt choice.I made the green gram dal and coconut mixture alone the previous night itself then morning mixed everything,shaped into balls and deep fried it because with the lil boy aside cant manago to do everything at one go :)
Munthiri Kothu Recipe
Preparation Time:10 minutes | Cooking Time : 15 mins | Makes:8
Recipe Category: Main | Recipe Cuisine: South Indian | Reference: yummyoyummy
Recipe Category: Main | Recipe Cuisine: South Indian | Reference: yummyoyummy
Whole Green Gram Dal - 1/2 cup
Jaggery - 1/3 cup
Coconut - 1/2 cup grated
Cardamom - 1
Oil - to deep fry
For the batter:
Homemade Rice Flour - 1/3 cupTurmeric Powder - 1/4 tsp
Salt - to taste
Water - as needed
Method:
- Soak jaggery in warm water(till immersing level) , crush it well. Then heat it up until it is slightly thick (no string consistency needs to be checked).Strain and keep aside.(I made more than above mentioned quantity for storing purpose).
- Dry roast green gram till golden brown.Cool down then tranfer to mixer.
- Grind it to a coarse(rice rava texture) mixture,Set aside.Dry roast coconut till golden brown,Set aside to cool.
- Grind it once.Now in a mixing bowl, add both the mixtures along with cardamom powder.Mix well.
- Take jaggery syrup in a pan and heat it up, when its thick honey like in consistency, add green gram and coconut mixture and switch off.Slowly mix it up.
- Keep mixing till the jaggery syrup is coated well.When its still warm make small lemon sized balls.Set aside for atleast 30mins.
- Meanwhile make the outer coating batter.In a mixing bowl take rice flour along with turmeric powder and salt.Add water little by little to form a smooth batter slightly thinner than idli batter consistency.
- Take a ball dip in the batter, roll it so that the batter coats on all sides.Heat oil in pan - when theoil is hot , drop the balls carefully.
- Fry until golden, this may take 2-3mins.I fried it in batches.Drain in tissue paper.
My Notes:
- It is a must to keep the balls aside for resting time before you start frying else it will crumble.
- If you are not able to make balls, then jaggery syrup is not at the right consistency.
- This keeps well for 2-3 weeks.
- It is best to use homemade rice flour but if you do not have you can go ahead with store bought idiyappam flour.
