Heena's Kitchen Diaries: Kanda Poha

"Poha" ask any Mumbaikar who have not tasted it. Poha is the common breakfast you get early morning fresh and hot along with garam chai. It is nothing fancy but a common man's everyday breakfast just like " Vada Pav ".

Holidays and weekend mornings call for fresh hot homemade breakfast, as everybody is home and relaxed. A good breakfast makes your day more better. Not just breakfast but you can have Kanda Poha anytime of the day. It's quick, easy and cooks in a jiffy.

INGREDIENTS

2 cups thick poha / thick flattened rice puffs

2 tsp oil / ghee

1 tsp mustard seeds

asofotedia

few curry leaves

1 green chili

1 tbsp grated coconut dry OR fresh

1 tbsp roasted groundnuts ( optional )

1 tbsp cashews ( optional )

1 tbsp dried grapes ( optional )

1 finely chopped onions

1 potato small cut and boiled ( optional )

coriander

salt

1 teaspoon sugar ( optional for a diabetic friendly recipe )

SHAHI KANDA POHA RECIPE

You can also make it a level up with the addition of dry OR fresh coconut flakes, peanut, cashews, dried grapes making it Shahi Kanda Poha to treat yourself OR for your special ones OR for your guests too.

PROCEDURE

1) For this poha recipe we use thick flattened poha, be careful while choosing this variety as there are three to four varieties of poha available in the market - dagadi poha which are the extra thick ones, thin poha used for making chivda, this variety and other ones too. The dagadi poha takes long soaking time, and the thin chivda variety becomes all mushy if you soak it.

2) HOW TO SOAK POHA PERFECTLY

Soaking the poha is the utmost important step to get it right. Before proceeding the first step is to wet / rinse the dry poha. Take a colander / container having holes and run the poha under tap water to wet them, do not soak the poha directly in water else it will be soggy and unusable for this recipe. Do not touch it at all when wet. Just shake or toss up the colander gently a few times to separate out the wet poha by themselves. Let the excess water completely drain from it.

3) Meantime prep and chop onions, potato, green chili and coriander.

4) Heat oil in a pan, add mustard seeds, curry leaves, asofotedia, green chilies, also add groundnuts, grated fresh or dry coconut, cashews and raisins, chopped onions at this point and saute well. I like to add some freshly chopped coriander along with onions too it imparts a good flavor and more at the later stage too.

5) Add soaked poha to the sauted onions, mix well.

6) Add salt and sugar, check for the taste. Cook it with steam with closed lid on medium slow flame for 2-3 minutes. Add more coriander for garnish at this stage and serve warm.

Plating accompaniments

Fresh homemade Kanda Poha is ready. Serve warm with lemon wedges and your favorite sev OR bhussa snack as topping. We like to have it on weekends fresh and warm in morning breakfast with tea.