Ragi Rotti (Finger Millet Pancakes)

Today I was in a great mood to have these yummilicious Ragi Rotti. Ragi rotti (in Karnataka) also known as Nachani chi Bhakri in Maharashtra: is a very staple and savory breakfast dish. Ragi(finger millet) is hailed as a very nutritious millet/grain with a naturally nutty flavor. Lots of recipes are churned out using this ancient grain and Rotti (flat bread) is one of them. Feel free to take a look at few more interesting recipes on my blog that use Ragi as the main ingredient. In the past few years Ragi has taken a permanent place in my pantry :)

Ragi Rotti is nothing but a finger millet pancake made with mixing ragi flour, hot water, onions, chilies and few other ingredients to make a semi-soft dough. It makes a power packed breakfast or meal for that matter. It is usually served with spicy chutney, yogurt and dollops of ghee/butter.
Most authentic way of making it is by patting a rotti on a banana leaf and then frying the rotti on both the sides on a griddle till it's cooked. The flavors are amazing. As banana leaves are not easily available in the USA,  I use wax paper to roll it 🙂 . Many a times I directly pat the rotti on the griddle/tava itself. I wouldn't recommend it for the beginners though.

Ragi digests slowly and hence keeps you full for a longer period of time, just like protein. That's the reason why it is very loved and common amongst hard working class of people like farmers, construction workers etc. Ragi Mudde is another such example. Ragi flour porridge is given to babies once they start on solid food. A very staple grain found in almost every household in India. I highly recommend to incorporate this grain in your lifestyle.

Let us take a look at this recipe of Ragi Rotti.

Ingredients:

• 1 cup ragi flour (finger millet flour)
• 3/4 cup hot water (approx)
• 1 small onion chopped
• 1 green chili chopped
• 1 inch ginger minced
• couple sprigs of cilantro chopped
• salt as per taste
• 1 tsp cumin seeds
• oil to fry
• 2 tbsp grated coconut (optional)*

Semi Soft Dough

Spread the ball of dough on a wax paper with your greased fingers,

Fry on both sides.

Preparation:

• In a mixing bowl add all the ingredients except water.
• Nicely mix everything with your hands or use a wooden ladle. Pour hot water slowly little by little as you keep mixing the mixture in circular motion. Keep doing it till you get a nice soft dough. Not too hard. Keep aside closed for 5-10 minutes.
• Now heat a griddle/tava till smoking hot and then reduce the heat to med. Add 1 tsp of oil.
• Take a square piece of wax paper to roll out rotti's. Take a portion of the dough about the size of a tennis ball and keep it on the wax paper. Grease your palms with oil and flatten it nicely using your fingers slowly and gently making a round rotti about 5 inch in diameter. (You can also use a rolling pin to make rotti).
• If the edges are cracking, do not worry, just dip your finger with some water and gather it and seal the crack. Make some holes in between to make sure the oil gets absorbed uniformly well.
• Lift the rotti along with the wax paper and invert it on the hot tava carefully and peel the wax paper out leaving the rotti on it.
• Add oil or ghee gingerly around the rotti and over it. Cover with a lid and cook for couple of minutes. Flip the rotti and add more oil if you want and let it cook for another 2 minutes or till its done.
• Take it out and serve hot with ghee/butter/yogurt/chutney etc.

njoY!! happY cookinG!!

Note:* Usually the ragi rotti turns out little on the crispier side.
If you want it more on the softer side then add coconut.
If you think that dough is too soft to make rottis, add a tsp (or more) of rice flour to make it semi-soft.
You can also add veggies in it to make it more nutritious like grated carrot, cucumber etc.

You may also like:

Ragi Mudde
Ragi Iddiyapam
Ragi Poori
Potato Stew

Health Benefits: 
Finger Millet(Ragi) is a power packed grain! It is high in protein and minerals. Helpful in controlling diabetes, keeps one younger for a long period(cross-linking of collagen), reduces bad cholesterol, also has anti-microbial properties and has been found to act against a number of bacteria including Bacillus cereus, which causes food poisoning, Salmonella sp., which causes a typhoid-like fever etc. Try and include this healthy food in your diet when you can.

Thank you for dropping by this post! Your feedback is greatly appreciated.

Ragi Iddiyapam (Finger Millet flour Shevaya)

Ragi Shevaya with Vali Randai (Indian Spinach Coconut Curry)

   

Shevaya/Idiyappam/Sevai (Rice noodles) is a very known dish across the Indian subcontinent. It is made with a special kitchen gadget called shevaya press and looks something like this.

It used to be a long affair where ladies sat and made this seamless beautiful flowing spirals of rice flour called shevaya. Then it got steamed and served with the curry of their family favorite. While growing up I have seen a lot of ladies/grandmas who made it at home in bulk and sold in the neighborhood making it a cool home business. I used to really admire them then. In my house nobody particularly loved this :(, so my mom did not make it often, we ended up buying home made shevaya and ate.

In these past few years, I have become a big fat fan of Ragi (Finger Millet) also called as Nanchni (in Maharashtra/Karnataka) . So I try to substitute Ragi with the rice flour whenever possible. Ragi has a fantastic taste to it and I love to play with it. I used my Ragi Mudde (finger millet balls) recipe to make this ragi shevaya. Comes out really nice. I don't have a traditional press at home, so am using my chakli press with a plate that is used to make sev. I will have to buy a plate that makes thinner spirals :) For now am happy with this result!

Let us take a look at this simple recipe:

Ragi Shevaya with Coconut Oil

Ingredients:

• 1 cup Ragi flour (finger millet flour)
• 1 1/2 to 2 cups water (approx)*
• salt as per taste
• 1 tsp oil

ragi flour

ragi dough

chakli maker

spirals into idli mold

steam for 15-18 minutes

Preparation: 

• In a pan take ragi flour and salt and dry roast the mixture for few minutes. Simultaneously bring water to a boil in another vessel, add oil in it.
• Start adding little by little hot water in the ragi flour and with a wooden spatula keep mixing it. First, it will look like a crumbly mixture, but as you keep mixing water it forms a nice ball of dough. 
• Take a chakli maker with a plate that has many perforations(sev making plate). Put the dough into the chakli maker and squeeze little spirals of the flour into the idli mold that is greased. ( If you don't have an idli mold stand, just add the spirals in a steaming vessel and follow the same instructions on steaming)
• Keep doing it until all the dough is used up. Steam it for 15-18 minutes. 
• Serve hot with pure coconut oil or Potato Stew or any other coconut based curry. 
• Shown in the picture is vali bhaji (randai).

You may also like Ragi Mudde, Oats Rava Idli, Instant Poha Idli, Potato Stew....

Notes*: Add hot water into the flour 1 big spoon at a time. Quantity may vary a little depending on the flour quality. So keep adding till you get a soft dough.

njoY!! happY steaminG!! :)

Health Benefits: Where do I begin :) Finger Millet is a power packed grain! It is high in protein and minerals. Helpful in controlling diabetes, keeps one younger for a long period(cross-linking of collagen), reduces bad cholesterol, also has anti-microbial properties and has been found to act against a number of bacteria including Bacillus cereus, which causes food poisoning, Salmonella sp., which causes a typhoid-like fever etc. Try and include this healthy food in your diet.

Ragi Mudde (Finger Millet Balls)

Ragi (Finger Millet) is a cereal which is very rich in protein and minerals and we must include this in our regular diet. I have found a new permanent place for Ragi in my pantry :) Its original taste and texture itself is so good that you need to work very little around it to make it taste yummy. Various dishes can be made out of this humble grain. It is said to be originated in Africa and has been cultivated in India from past 4000 years.  It's an ancient grain where new age era has kind of forgotten its importance. This dish is called Ragi mudde/Ragi Sangati/Ragi Kali etc and is popular with rural folks of Karnataka, no doubt they are very healthy and strong people :) It can be served with spicy curries like sambar, chicken curry etc or even buttermilk. Ragi dosas and Ragi rotti are my other favorite dishes.

Let's get to the Ragi Mudde recipe:

Ingredients:

• 1 cup ragi flour (finger millet) 
• 2 cups water 
• salt to taste (1/4 tsp) 
• 1 tsp ghee
• 1 green chilli chopped

Optional tempering:

• 1 tsp ghee (clarified butter)
• 1/2 tsp mustard seeds
• 1 tsp fried gram dal (phutani)

 Preparation:

• Bring water to a boil in a vessel. Add salt and ghee, stir it once. Add ragi flour, close the lid and cook for 1 minute on a med-low flame.
• Now reduce the flame to low, add chopped chillis, and now with a flat mouth wooden ladle stir the ragi flour in water in quick circles mixing it together till no lumps are seen. Keep stirring/whipping till you get to a paste consistency. (stir for good 3-5 minutes) Close the lid and let it cook for another 2-3 minutes.
• In the meantime make the tempering/tadka which is totally optional (I wanted more flavors :)), heat ghee, add mustard seeds, once it splutters add gram dal stir quickly and pour it over ragi mixture.
• Mix everything nicely and switch off the gas. Let the mixture cool down a little bit till your hands can handle it. Grease your hand with little ghee and make bite size small balls from ragi mixture. 
• You can serve it dipped in buttermilk or sambar or chicken curry. Pour more ghee over it:) It tastes yum! It's actually swallowed as whole (mudde meaning lump) and not chewed. But I cut it and eat with the curry :) That's just me heeee

PS: I have Sambar Curry in the picture!

njoY! happY cookinG!!

Health Benefits: 
Where do I begin :) It is high in protein and minerals. Helpful in controlling diabetes, keeps one younger for a long period(cross-linking of collagen), reduces bad cholesterol, also has anti-microbial properties and has been found to act against a number of bacteria including Bacillus cereus, which causes food poisoning, Salmonella sp., which causes a typhoid-like fever etc