Rice Murukku ~ Spicy version

With Diwali approaching, you might be spending a lot more time in the kitchen preparing all the snacks and sweets for your family and friends. Sweets are one important thing on the menu and so are snacks. I still remember having Dahi Vadas, Chaats, Chakli etc along with the sweets, which our neighbor aunty used to serve us for diwali. Yum they were. Years have gone by but those days and memories are still so fresh. This spicy version of chakli is something that you should try to add a little variety to usual murukku/chakli that you make. If your family loves spicy food then I bet this would definitely be a hit.

This recipe just happened when I was trying out some other snack and it usually takes a lot of time, but I had to head to some place in an hour and just thought of giving it the murukku avatar instead. It wasn't a flop at all. My lil one loves spicy food and when I made it, he kept coming back to me asking "Eruvulla murukku Tharamo" meaning "Can you give me the spicy murukku". 

So try it this Diwali for your family and see if they like it too.

Ingredients

1. 1 cup roasted rice flour
2. 1 tbsp of moong dal, dry roasted
3. 1 tbsp of ghee
4. 1/2 tsp of ajwain/ carom seeds
5. 1/2 tsp of jeera /cumin seeds
6. A big pinch of asafoetida
7. 1/2 tsp of chilli powder
8. Salt to taste
9. 1 tbsp of hot oil
10. 1 cup of water
11. Oil for deep frying

Method

• Heat 1 cup of water. While it is heating up, add the ingredients 2-8. 
• When it starts boiling, add the rice flour, little by little, while you stir it in. Switch off heat and leave it covered for about 10 minutes.
• Open and add a tbsp of hot oil while you knead it well into a smooth dough.
• Divide the dough into portions that could fit into your murukku maker.
• Fix the one star plate that comes with the murukku maker.
• Form spiral shapes on to a plastic sheet/tray, using the murukku maker.
• Meanwhile, get the oil heated up in a deep bottom pan. Heat the oil to a desired temperature, so that when you drop a tiny piece of dough, it should rise to the top as soon as it hits the bottom. Try to maintain the same temperature for the frying. 
• Slide the murukku into the oil carefully in a manner that the shape retains, at the same time you do not end up burning up your fingers.  
• Flip over the murukku once it rises to the top. Deep fry it, till the bubbles around the murukku disappears. 
• Remove it to a tissue paper and let it cool.
• Store it in an air tight container.

Tips

1. Do not make the dough too wet. It would lead the murukku to absorb oil.
2. You could skip the addition of oil during the kneading process. If you choose to do so, do not form the spirals, if you expect a delay in frying it up. This would lead to drying up of the dough and the murukku may break and loose its shape while frying.
3. Once the desired temperature has been arrived, adjust the heat between medium to medium-high. Else the murukku might look crispy and dark, however, would stay uncooked inside.
4. For safety and to retain the shape of the murukku, it is advisable to slide the murukku on to a flat steel spoon and slide it into the heated oil.