Uttapam with egg

Uttapam, idli and dosa are south Indian breads and pancakes made with the same fermented batter, most commonly made with a mixture of rice and lentils. Dosa are thin crepes, idli are steamed savoury cakes and uttapam are thicker savoury hotcakes. In south Indian households, they are each made with multiple variations.

Uttapam with egg Credit: Kitti Gould

• makes

  8

• prep

  30 minutes

• cook

  10 minutes

• difficulty

  Easy

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Ingredients

• oil or ghee, for cooking
• eggs, 1 per person
• 3 eschallots, diced
• 2-3 tomatoes, diced
• 1 long green chilli, chopped
• curry leaves, to serve
• mustard seeds, to serve

Batter

• 1 cup idli rice or short-grain rice
• 1 cup white urad dhal (see Notes)

Soaking time: 12 hours–overnight

Fermenting time: 1-3 days

Instructions

1. Place rice and dal in separate bowls and cover generously with cold water. Cover and leave for 12 hours, or overnight.
2. Strain the rice, reserving the soaking water and place in a food processor. Blend until smooth, adding a little soaking water if necessary to bring it to the consistency of thick pancake batter. Set aside in a mixing bowl.
3. Strain the dal, reserving the soaking water and place in a food processor. Blend until smooth, adding a little soaking water if necessary to bring it to the consistency of thick pancake batter. Combine the rice and dal batter and mix until well combined.
4. Ensure you have a large bowl as the mixture will rise significantly, up to twice in volume. Cover the batter loosely with a cloth or lid and leave in a warm place for at least 24 hours to ferment.
5. When ready to cook, grease a shallow pan or crepe pan and place over medium heat. Spoon in the batter mixture. The thickness is up to you, and you can thin the mixture out with a little water if you want to spread it more thinly. If you make them thin, they are dosa. If they are thicker, they are uttapam. Generally, they don't need to be flipped, but it's really up to you! This is a base recipe for you to have fun with.
6. Sprinkle the top of the uttapam with the tomato, chilli and eschallots and crack an egg into the centre of the pancake.
7. Heat some ghee or oil in a separate medium saucepan and fry the curry leaves and mustard seeds until fragrant. Spoon the flavoured oil over the uttapam to serve.

Notes

• Ask your local Indian grocery shop for 'idli rice', or use any short-grain rice. You can also use pre-ground cream of rice. Urad dal is a type of legume native to India, made from split skinned black gram beans which are small, round and white in colour. Experiment with other dal or grains such as semolina. This recipe was fermented for 2 days.

• Keep extra mixture in a jar in the fridge but be aware it will keep fermenting. You can add a little salt to slow down the fermentation. There's much debate on when or if to add salt to the batter. I recommend adding a pinch of salt after fermentation and before cooking.

Photography by Kitti Gould.

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Cook's Notes

Oven temperatures are for conventional; if using fan-forced (convection), reduce the temperature by 20˚C. | We use Australian tablespoons and cups: 1 teaspoon equals 5 ml; 1 tablespoon equals 20 ml; 1 cup equals 250 ml. | All herbs are fresh (unless specified) and cups are lightly packed. | All vegetables are medium size and peeled, unless specified. | All eggs are 55-60 g, unless specified.

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