Undi (Seasoned Rice Dumplings)

Undi is one of the common prepared breakfast item of the konkanis. Its very easy to prepare and hence most of them prefer to make either Undi, uppittu or neeru dose:). As a kid till my marriage I never liked Undi and hence I postponed preparing it after my marriage. Finally I prepared it after a year just for posting in the blog. Both of us ate it happily and this time it tasted good!! I was wondering why i didn't like it before,

Undi is a very healthy and filling breakfast. Since it is steamed, it has less oil in it.The local people of Mangalore and Udupi also prepare this and in Tulu language they call Undi as Pundi. Pundi is also rice dumpling but without seasoning.

Stories apart lets see how exactly its done. For steaming undis i used Pasta Steamer. You can also use an idli cooker or a non electric traditional idli steamer.

Ingredients:

• Rice (raw)- 1 cup
• Grated Coconut, fresh/frozen- 1/2 cup
• Oil- 1 1/2 Tbsp
• Mustard seeds- 1 tsp
• Urad dal/ split blackgram- 1 1/2 tsp
• Fenugreek seeds/ methi- 1/2 tsp
• Curry leaves- Few
• Salt- To taste

Procedure:

Soak rice in sufficient water for one hour. Then grind it adding little water (nearly 3/4 cup). Grinding the rice should be done very carefully. I gave just three pulses of few seconds. The rice grain should be coarse. If you feel it difficult, then you can use  rice rava (use of rice rava makes the procedure simpler because it eliminates the process of grinding but remember to soak the rice rava for an hour). After grinding I got the mixture as shown in the picture. I transferred the rice rava in a bowl. To this I added salt and coconut.

Now take a Kadai and add oil. When it gets heated add mustard seeds. Once the mustard seeds starts spluttering add curry leaves, urad dal and methi seeds. Fry well until pale brown.

Now add the rice and coconut mixture to the kadai. Stir well.

Keep stirring until the water evaporates and it converts into a semi-dry mass. Then turn off the heat.

Let the mass cool for a while (don't cool it completely because it may turn hard).Then apply little water on the hand and take small amount of the mass to make a small ball. Then make a slight depression anywhere on it as shown in the picture below.

Keep the rice balls in the steamer and steam it for 15 minutes.

Undi is ready!! You can serve it with chutney,pickle, any curry of your choice or just coconut oil. This measurement serves for two people.