"Puran Poli with Moong bean" table of contents
The year 2020 has made us all stronger physically, emotionally & spiritually and also made us richer by unique experiences. We have learnt many invaluable life lessons that would guide us sail through even the difficult phase of our life. Now I feel it is appropriate to follow our traditional way of celebrating New Year with sumptuous repast of various flavours like sweet, bitter, pungent etc. This tradition encourages us to accept and adapt to every season, every flavour and every change in our life gracefully.
Here I have posted the recipes for sweet puran poli and savoury poli in this New Year. Puran Poli is a traditional Maharashtrian flatbread stuffed with sweet lentil fillings. I prepared the sweet filling using moong bean and added sesame seeds for the nutty flavor, coconut for the delicious texture, green cardamom for the sweet aroma & dried ginger for the mildly pungent flavor into the filling. I have also enhanced the savoury filling with a dash of finely chopped green chilli, ginger, garlic, cumin seeds and copious amount of fresh coriander leaves.
Poli Vs Boli:
Maharashtrian Poli is bit different from the boli popular in southern peninsula. Boli has thin flaky skin stuffed with slightly dry filling, whereas poli has soft skin and moist filling inside. We use maida (APF) for dough but whole wheat flour is used for making poli dough, and both boli & poli usually have fillings made of Bengal gram (chickpeas). Since Bengal gram & besan flour cause flatulence I find the easily digestible protein-rich moong bean as the best alternate for Bengal gram.
Puran Poli Recipe
Yields: 10 puran poli
Dough for poli:
Ingredients:
| Whole wheat flour | 1 cup (200 ml) |
| Ghee | 1 tbsp (15 ml) |
| Salt (optional) | a pinch |
| Turmeric powder | 1 tsp |
| Water required to knead the dough | 1/2 cup (100 ml) |
- Add whole wheat flour, salt & turmeric powder into a mixing bowl and mix them.
- Now melt ghee in a small pan, pour into the flour & mix well with fingertips.
- Gradually add water into the flour and knead into a soft dough for about 5-7 minutes.
- Grease the dough with little ghee & then keep it covered.
Sweet moong bean filling:
Ingredients:
| Moong bean (whole green gram/pachai payaru) | 1 cup |
| Jaggery powder | 1 cup |
| Desiccated coconut | 1/2 cup |
| Black sesame seeds | 1 tbsp |
| Green Cardamom | 2 |
| Dried ginger | 1″ |
How to cook whole green gram:
- Wash & soak 2 cups of whole greengram for 3 hours in hot water.
- Pressure cook them by adding water in the ratio of 1:2 (simmer for 7 minutes after reaching high pressure).
- Divide the cooked legumes into two portions and keep them separately for preparing the sweet & savoury fillings.
How to make filling for puran poli:
- Toast sesame seeds on the stove top until they begin to pop up.
- Blitz toasted sesame, cardamom, dried ginger & cooked moong for few seconds.
- Transfer to a plate and add desiccated coconut.
- Mix well & leave aside.
- Heat a heavy-bottom cooking pan with jaggery powder & water (1-2 tbsp) in medium flame.
- When the syrup begins to bubble up add the moong mixture and stir until combined.
- Remove the pan from heat.
- Now the filling for puran poli is ready.
How to prepare puran poli:
- Divide the dough into 10 amla-sized balls and the filling into 10 lemon-sized balls.
- Roll out thin poli (approx. 16-18 cm diameter) as shown in the gif below.
- Heat a griddle in medium flame.
- Cook both the sides of poli and then drizzle ghee on both the sides.
- Transfer it to a serving casserole.
- Similarly prepare puran poli using the remaining dough & filling.
- Serve hot puran poli as dessert with any meal.
Poli making tips:
Consistency of dough & filling: We can make perfect puran poli only when the dough & filling are at the right consistency. We can add ghee (or coconut oil) while kneading the dough for poli (for paratha I like to add olive oil) to make the dough super soft & pliable. It is also required to make the filling soft & smooth but not hard or squishy. If the filling turns hard we can sprinkle some hot water, or we can add some wheat flour if it is squishy. Ideally the dough & the filling have to be of almost same consistency.
Size of the dough & filling: I prefer to use the filling almost double the size of dough while making poli mainly to enjoy the sweet flavor. But for paratha we can use both the dough & filling of equal size or more.
Thickness of poli: It is unpalatable when we end up in making thick hard poli. Nevertheless it is tricky to make soft thin poli by stuffing a lemon-sized filling into an amla-sized dough. We need to roll the rolling pin without applying too much of pressure on the dough and at the same time we need to roll it out as large as possible. So we may have to dust the dough frequently to prevent it getting stuck to the surface.
The diameter of my puran poli is about 18 cm (8″), but it is very much possible to make larger puran poli. You can check out this video of an old woman making exceptionally huge puran poli just by using her palms.
Delicious
Thanks.