Omampodi

Omampodi is one of the popular savories prepared in many house-hold in South India, especially Tamil Nadu , on the occasion of Diwali. It is a crispy deep fried snack. It is made with some mixed flours and Omam (Ajwain). Children will love this for its crispness and taste. Also it makes up a good snack during tea/coffee time too. Make this omampodi this diwali and relish it with your family.

To make this omampodi you need the traditional Omampodi mould and press, which is available in the market (also illustrated in photo). To make the omampodi dough easy to drop when squeezed, prior to its preparation, grease the inside of the mould and bottom of the press with oil, this will enable smooth flow of the dough from the mould into your pan.

Ingredients:

Gram Flour - 2 Cups

Rice Flour - 4 Tablespoon

Omam - 2 handful

Salt - to taste

Hing - 1 tsp

Butter - 4 tbsp

Omam Water - 1 Cup

Hot oil - 3 tsp - For mixing

Oil - For frying

Pre-Requisite:

1. Soak the oman in just enough water until it is immersed and keep aside for minimum 15 minutes. Then grind it adding some more water. Once ground to paste, strain the omam water through a strainer/colander and keep ready for use.

Method:

1. In a big bowl/vessel, add the gram flour, rice flour, salt, hing, oil and butter and mix well. Add the omam water little by little and make a dough similar to chapathi dough in consistency (the dough need not be too thick, slightly loose dough is good).

2. In a big kadai, add required oil and once it becomes hot, take the "Omam press mould" and stuff some dough into it and squeeze the dough into circles into the hot oil. Wait till the oomapodi becomes light brown in colour, keep turning sides to cook evenly. Once it turns light brown, remove from the oil and shift into another vessel spread with tissue paper to absorb any excess oil. 

Tips:

 

If you are not comfortable directly dropping the dough into the oil, then take a big ladle with holes (jalli karandhi as we call in tamil), reverse the ladle and grease it with little oil and then squeeze the mould in circular motion to make the omampodi on the reversed side. Then hold the ladle with the dough on top and take it close to the hot oil or slightly touching the oil and reverse it (so the squeezed dough comes below) , the dough drops into the oil & then remove the ladle from the oil. Repeat this for each omampodi  that you make.