BENGALURU: Madhya Pradesh, the heart of India is well known for its culture, history and food across world. The state is referred as ‘food capital’ of the country. Some of the state specialities include Poha jalebi, Daal Bafla, Bhutte ke kess, Malpua, Ghost and Kebabs. Born and brought up in Madhya Pradesh, I have handpicked traditional recipes with me which will forever stay close to my cooking and heart. Food that is closest to my heart and reminds me of my childhood days is garadu – a root from yam/ potato family, largely found in central India.
My journey with garadu began when I was in my teens. My friends and I had a small party and we wanted to cook on our own and experiment some dishes on our own. We didn’t have much money and neither could we ask from anyone so, we went to the market and picked up some vegetables along with garadu. We decided to make some snacks with it and so, we started cutting them in big cubes and fried them. But it didn’t taste that great and had a rough taste. I asked my mother to understand what went wrong and she said that garadus or any root vegetable needs to be boiled first and then fried.
I followed my mother’s instructions and started cutting and boiling them again. After boiling them, I fried them without any spices. I fried them again following my mother’s instructions and they were perfect to the desired taste. I learnt that it is difficult to eat garadu without boiling them. That was my trial and error of cooking garadu first time. In winters, everyone loves to eat something fried and in Indore, we ate hot and crispy garadus every season. People love the taste of fleshy tuberous root from potato family found largely in central India.
All my family members are extremely fond of garadu. When I recollect my memories, I remember how we loved organising ‘garadu parties’ just so that we can relish the deliciousness of this food.Not only garadus are delicious, they have health benefits like eating deep-fried garadu’s is the best way to protect oneself from the winter chill. I relish savouring this delicacy and my favourite in garadus is the traditional garadu crisps/ fries.
Recipe
In a pan, add 7 to 9 cups of water and once the water is boiled, add the Garadus cut in cubes. Once they are boiled, take them out and drain the water and let it dry for 5 minutes.
In a frying pan, add some oil and let it heat. Once the oil is hot, add the boiled Garadus and fry them, take it out and keep them aside for a while. In the same hot oil, add the fried Garadus again till they turn slightly brown and take them out.
Once they are fried, add the Jiralu masala, coriander and lemon juice for a tingly taste.
To make Jiralu masala:
To make Jiralu Masala, mix 2 teaspoons roasted cumin powder, 1½ teaspoons dry ginger powder (soonth), ½ teaspoon red chilli powder, ¼ teaspoons turmeric powder, one pinch of asafoetida, ½ teaspoon black salt (kala namak), ½ teaspoon rock salt (sendha namak)
- Kapil Dubey, Executive Chef, The Den Bengaluru