Makka pindi kudumulu, a humble steamed cake made of fermented maize flour and urad dal. Kudumulu are one of the ancient breakfast or snack Telangana cuisine offers. Apart from this maize flour one here, kudumulu has numerous other variations. This ancient way of cooking in sal leaves continues to thrive in Telangana households especially in countryside. The Sal leaves not only act as cooking medium, but also helps in retaining moisture and flavours, lends an earthy aroma, provides nutritional and medicinal values.
This simple preparation depicts how a humble and rustic way of cooking can lead to a beautiful dish. This dish is all about celebrating the goodness of basic ingredients with what you have in hands. Maize flour acts as the main element here, fermented with soaked and grind urad dal lends a beautiful sourness and also helps in digestion by promoting good bacteria to the gut. The sal leaves lend a earthy taste and smell to the food which makes it quite exquisite.
This steamed makka pindi kudumulu makes a meal suitable for every age group. A simple batter of urad dal, maize flour, addition of legumes or beans of our choice makes a wholesome healthy breakfast. Very minimal seasoning ingredients are used here green chilli paste, little pounded cumin, salt and some oil to brush the leaves. Once the batter is fermented, the seasoning, boiled legumes or beans are added to the batter and it is spread on SAL LEAVES. Simple, humble, Rustic and rooted. We always serve the steamed and fermented kudumulu in the cooked sal leaves along with some freshly pounded ellipaya karam(garlic chili chutney), oil and curd occasionally. As I’ve ran out of sal leaves and couldn’t find any fresh leaves for cooking, instead I used idli moulds. It works just fine although we miss the earthy aroma from the sal leaves.
And this dish is a completely based on plant based ingredients and also makes a great vegan breakfast option. Do try this out and let me know your feedback so let’s get into the recipe, but before that please Checkout more traditional and vegetarian Telangana recipes here.
MAKKA PINDI KUDUMULU
Equipment
- Sal leaves or Idli plates
Ingredients
- 2 cups Maize flour
- 1 cup Black gram dal/Urad dal
- 8 Green chillies
- ¼ cup Scallions
- ¼ cup Any legumes optional
- ¼ cup Indian broad beans chopped and cooked
- 1 tsp Cumin seeds
- Salt to taste
Instructions
Prepping the batter
- Wash and soak the urad dal for minimum of 6 hours or overnight.
- Grind the soaked urad dal to a smooth batter and keep aise.
- Add the maize flour to the ground urad dal and give it a nice mix, to help in fermenting you can add 2 tbsp of yogurt.
- Cover and keep the vessel in a dark cool place and let it ferment for 8 hours or overnight.
Making KUDUMULU
- Once the batter is fermented, add salt, ground cumin seeds+chilli paste, crushed cumin seeds, chopped scallion, boiled legumes/beans and give it a good mix.
- Wash and pat dry the sal leaves and apply some oil on it, spread a spoonful of batter and close it with another sal leaf.
- Place these sal leaves on the steaming rack and steam for about 10 mins and serve warm topped with oil and garlic chutney powder.
- If you're using idli moulds, grease the pans and add batter into the cavity.
- Place the idli mould in a steamer pan and steam the kudumulu for about 10 min.
- Let the kudumulu cool down a bit for 5 min and later demould them.
- Serve warm makka kudumulu with Ellipaya karam topped with oil/ghee.
Notes
- You can add any legumes of your choice like black eyed peas, whole moong which are used traditionally, but you can add kidney beans, edamame beans, peas etc., But note that any legume must be soaked and boiled before adding to the batter.
- As we 2:1 parts of maize flour:urad dal you can even use 1:1:1 ratio of Maize flour:rice flour:urad dal
- We can also add tempering to the batter cooking the kudumulu.
If you’ve tried this recipe and loved it, I’d love to hear your feedback by tagging your photo and share it with #mycurryveda on Instagram @mycurryveda or on Facebook . Also follow @taste.of.telangana on Instagram for more traditional recipes, culture and stories.
