Aval (Poha) Payasam & Thenkuzal

My husband's family celebrates Sri Krishnastami with great devotion and fervor. They fast the whole day and perform the pooja in the evening. Various savory and sweet dishes are prepared for the occasion. Some of the commonly prepared dishes in the evening are various kinds of chaklis, paalakayalu and poha dishes.

The usually preferred and prepared chakli happens to be thenkuzal or thentharlu, one of our family favorites. Though aval or poha payasam is not prepared at our home, I thought it would be a perfect dish on this asthami. I got to try them both for the first time and they turned out fabulous.
Aval Payasam and Thenkuzal are my contributions for Sri Krishnastami - RCI - Tamil Festival Foods, hosted by dear Viji of Vcuisine.

Aval Payasam:
Payasam lovers would just fall in love (as we did) with this simple yet scrumptious dessert. I have used evaporated milk to make the kheer extra creamier and thicker. It is optional though.


Ingredients:
Poha - 1/2 cup
Milk - 1 cup (Whole milk is preferred)
Evaporated milk - 12 oz / 1.5 cups (or substitutewith whole milk)
Sugar - 1/2 cup
Cardamom powder - 1/2 tsp
Cashews and raisins - 1 Tbsp
Ghee - 2 Tbsp

Preparation:
Fry the poha in one Tbsp ghee till it turns golden brown. Add the milk to poha and cook it till it is done. (If the mixture has become solid before getting cooked, add sufficient evaporated milk). Then add sugar, cardamom powder and the evaporated milk (if not added already) and cook till the sugar melts. Then simmer it on low flame for about 10 - 15 minutes and turn off the stove.
Heat the other tbsp of ghee in a small pan. Add cashews and raisins to it. Fry till the cashews turn golden brown and the raisins turn plump. Add this to the above cooked poha. Stir well.


Note: The above measurements would yield a payasam with a thicker consistency, which I personally prefer. 1/2 to 1 cup of extra milk may be added, if more liquid is preferred and the sugar level may need to be adjusted as well.
Thenkuzal / Thentarlu

This heavenly tasting, crunchy, munchy snack is called thentarlu in our family. It is paler in color compared to murukku, simple to prepare and is perfect for every occasion. My mom or MIL would have gone with a freshly milled batch of flour. I have used the store bought rice flour and urad flour and thenkuzal were great.


Ingredients:
Rice flour - 2 cups
Urad flour - 1/2 cup
Melted butter - 1 Tbsp
Cumin seeds - 2 tsp
Sesame seeds - 2 tsp
Salt - 1 tsp
A pinch of asafoetida
Water - 1 & 1/4 cups (I needed this much. This may vary)
Oil to fry
A deep frying pan & a Chakli press
Making Thenkuzal:
Mix well all the ingredients (except water & oil) in a mixing bowl. Then gradually add water to the bowl and make a dough, almost like rice flour rotti dough. It should not be watery or very hard, should be somewhere in between.
Heat oil in a small wok / deep frying pan. When the oil is hot enough to fry, turn down the heat to medium flame. To know whether the oil is hot enough do this little test. Put a pinch of the dough in the hot oil. If it sizzles and come to the surface of the oil immediately, then it is ready. If the pinch of the dough stays at the bottom, then the oil is not hot enough.
Usually the chakli press is sold along with several plates which are interchangeable. For Thenkuzal, use the thenkuzal plate, the one which has bigger perforations than a sev one or simply, the one with plain holes. After fixing the plate, take a small portion of the dough and fill it into the chakli press and in a circular motion, press out the dough into the oil. The coils of dough would form a concentric circle. This dough is easy to work with and you can make two to three separate circles at a time or a single one.
Fry till they turn attain a slight golden tinge. You don't have to fry them till they turn golden brown as murukku. Remove them with a slotted spoon and drain them on paper towel covered plates.
Repeat the same process with the remaining dough and fry them in batches. Frying thenkuzal takes very less time, if you do it on a medium flame.



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