Curry Pakora

This recipe gives 3-4 servings.

1. Curry

Ingredients

1. Gram flour: 4-5 tbsp. 
2. Onion: 3-4 tbsp (very finely chopped, preferably make a paste) 
3. Tomato puree: 1 tbsp 
4. Ginger & garlic paste: 1 tablespoon each
5. Cumin: 1 tsp
6. Cloves: 2-3
7. Black cardamom: 2 pieces
8. Cinnamon stick: 1
9. Red Chilli: To taste
10. Salt: To taste
11. Turmeric powder: 1/4 teaspoon 
12. Yogurt: 500 gms (do not use sweetened yogurt. Use fresh or greek yogurt that should be a few days old hence with a sour taste)
13. Water: 750 mL
14. Garam masala (powdered): 1 tbsp
15. Dried fenugreek (qasuri methi): 1 tbsp, optional
16. Oil: 1/2 cup
17. Boiled water: Optional

For tempering (tarka): 1/2 cup ghee, 3-4 whole red chillies, 1/2 tsp cumin, 7-8 curry leaves 

Optional: Green chillies and fresh coriander.

Instructions

1. Dry roast gram flour in a pan until it just changes color and gives a rich fragrance. Keep aside until cool. Now mix the yogurt and water to a smooth consistency. Once the flour has cooled down, add it to the yogurt+water mixture. Blend or mix well until smooth and you do  not see any grains of the gram flour in it.

Caution: Do not over-cook or burn  the gram flour while dry-roasting. 
Tip: The gram flour is dry-roasted before adding to the yogurt+water mixture to reduce the cooking time later on.
You can also use 1 Litre "lassi" instead of diluted yogurt. 

2. Heat oil in a deep pan. Add onion and sauté until it is golden brown in color. 

3. Add the whole spices like cumin, black cardamom, bay leaf, cinnamon stick and cloves to the pan and sauté for a minute or so. Add ginger and garlic and sauté for 2 minutes until fragrant.

4. Now add red chilli, salt and turmeric to the mixture. Stir for 2, 3 minutes. Add a little water to the mixture to avoid getting the mixture burnt.

5. Add tomato puree to the mixture. Cook it like a traditional "masala" until oil comes on top. The mixture should be a smooth paste.

Tip: The quantity of the mixture should only be a few tbsp. This is not a regular curry so large quantity of masala is not needed. Some people do not add any onion or tomato to the curry masala and only make it with ginger/garlic and the herbs and spices.

6. Once the "masala" is cooked, slowly add the yogurt+water+gram flour mixture to it while stirring continuously.
7. Keep on stirring this mixture and bring it to a boil. By this time the masala+yugurt mixture should be unified well.
8. Lower the heat now and cook (covered) for about an hour. Keep on checking the mixture from time to time and make sure it does not thicken too much. Add boiled water to make it thin, if required.

Picture: This is how it looks like during cooking. Oil will come on top.

9. Now here comes the part where you have to judge the curry yourself. After an hour, test taste the curry to see if it is cooked. I cant tell you exact cooking time since everyone roasts to a different level and many other factors like the heat temperature or consistency of the mixture can vary. It should not take more than 2 hours in any case since the gram flour is already roasted.
10. Once the curry seems cooked, bring it to a nice Nihari/soup-like consistency. Add boiled water if it needs to be thinner, cook on high flame if it needs to be thicker.
11. Add green chillies, coriander, garam masala, and dried fenugreek (optional) and stir a bit.
12. Once done, prepare the pakoras (spicy gram flour fried patties) and the "tarka" (tempering).

13. For tempering: Heat ghee in a small pan. Add cumin, whole red chillies and curry leaves to the pan. Sauté for a minute. Keep it aside. Its better to do this step after making the pakoras.

2. Pakora

I prefer lots of flavors in pakoras. You can use your traditional home recipe for pakoras or just make plain gram flour balls like most people do. I use the following recipe.

Ingredients

1. Gram flour: 1.5 cups 
2. Onion: 1 medium, thinly sliced
3. Potatoes: 1 medium, thinly sliced (optional)
4. Spinach: 1 cup, chopped (optional)
5. Cumin: 1/2 tsp
6. Garam Masala: 1/2 tsp
7. Chaat masala: 1/2 tsp
8. Red chilli powder: To taste ( or1/2 tsp)
9. Salt: to taste
10. Green chillies: Sliced, 1 tbsp
11. Coriander seeds, whole: 1/2 tsp
12. Fresh coriander: 1/2 cup, chopped
13. Yogurt: 1 tbsp (it makes the pakoras soft from the inside)
14. Baking soda: Just a pinch
15. Mango powder (optional): 1/2 tsp
16. Water, as required.

Instructions

1. Mix all the ingredients in a bowl.

2. Heat oil in a wok and bring it a medium hot temperature. Drop a little gram flour mixture into the oil and if it immediately comes to the surface, your oil is hot enough and you are good to go.

3. With the help of your hands or a serving spoon, scoop up the mixture and add it to the oil. If the oil is nice hot, the pakora will come to the surface. Once the bottom side is nicely golden, turn over. Lower the heat a little otherwise the pakora will turn brown from the surface but will remain raw from inside. Once the pakora is cooked, take it out and taste it. Adjust your spices, if necessary.

4. Bring the oil to medium-hot temperature again. Add more spoon-fulls of pakoras. You should be able to make atleast 7-8 pakoras with the quantity of the ingredients in this recipe.

Note: You can now add the pakoras to the curry mixture, cook it for a few minutes and add the tarka on top. I prefer the following serving method since this way pakoras remain crispy rather than soggy.

To serve: 

Put pakoras in a dish. Pour the curry over it. Add the tarka on top. Serve with naan bread or boiled rice.

Happy eating. :)