Ragda Pattice

With respect to my eating habits, I am a kid!! Its true.. I love junk food... I can stay on chaat items for my whole life.. chaat for breafast, chaat for lunch, chat for teatime and chat for dinner.. Wish wish wish I had such a lifestyle!! :) Anyways, fortunately/unfortunately, I dont find any restos/thelas/chaat joints here.. Back in my hometown Pune, there used to be many chaat joints.. the most famous was Bheleshwar near SNDT college backgate... was the local hangout with colleagues and friends! Then the famous Ganesh bhel in Kothrud area and Kalyan bhel in Bibwewadi.. Also Deepak sweets in Aundh.. And how can I forget the chaat basket at Manmeet on FC road... How I miss all the chaat items that I used to eat!!! :( Thankfully, I have started to try prepaing some of these at home.. These are hygenic (i seriously dont care which water they use for preparation at the roadside thelas!) and I even get a chance to prove their nutrition value :D Many of you guys will agree with me that chaat items are not junk food... Murmura, aalo, tamatar, pyaaj, a bit of fried shev, groundnuts... we include these items regularly in our meals! To conclude, chaats are not junk food and I should try more of these dishes at home :) So here comes Ragda Pattice!

Ragda Pattice or Ragda Patties--(whatever u call it.. I mean, however u spell it) is my entry for Nupur's "R of Indian Vegetables". Ragda pattice consists of the thick gravy prepared from white peas(I used chickpeas instead) called ragda(probably due to the process of mashing some peas to thicken the gravy) and shallow fried Potato dumplings called pattice(probably because they are patted during shallow frying).. LOL.. what a logic!!! Well well.. the try wasnt bad at all.. Here goes the recipe!

Ragda Pattice

What you need:

For Pattice
3-4 medium sized Potatoes
2 Slices of Bread
1 tsp Red Chilli Powder
Salt to taste
Oil to fry

For Ragda
1 can (250 gm) Boiled Chickpeas
1 small Onion finely chopped
1 tsp Ginger Gralic Paste
2 tbsp Red Chilli Powder
1 tsp Turmeric
1 tsp Cumin Powder
1 tsp Jeera Powder
Salt to taste
1 cup Water
2 tbsp Oil

For Garnish
1 Onion finely chopped
2-3 tbsp Sweet Tamarind Chutney
2-3 tsp Corriander chopped
1 tsp Red chilli powder
1 tsp Chaat Masala
Thin Sev
Yoghurt (Optional)

How to proceed:

For Ragda
1) Take oil in a skillet. Fry onion till translucent
2) Add ginger garlic paste and fry for a min or two
3) Add all the spice powders and mix well
4) Mash half chickpeas and add them to spices.
5) Add remaining half can of boiled chickpeas
6) Add water and salt and let cook for 5 mins
7) Add more water if ragda is too thick, mash more peas if too thin

For Pattice
1) Boil the potatoes in a pressure cooker (4 whistles)
2) Mash potatoes well.
3) Soak bread slices in water, extract all water and add to mashed potatoes
4) Add salt and red chilli powder and knead well
5) Form 8-10 small round balls; place each ball on palm and flatten it to make pattice
6) Shallow fry/roast each pattice on a hot tava/skillet using a tsp of Oil


Putting it all together
1) Place 2-3 patties in a plate
2) Cover the patties with hot ragda
3) Garnish with onion, corriander, a pinch of chilli powder, chaat masala, tamarind chutney and sev.