Sweet Potato Cutlet

Sweet Potatoes are in abundance this season and in keeping with the year's resolution to eat what is in season, I picked up radish leaves for sarson ka saag and sweet potatoes to make something sweet.The Sarson ka saag and the way we ate it for three days is another story I will reserve for later. The sweet potatoes however lay forgotten among the potatoes. I found them looking almost forlorn when I was skimming the vegetable basket to see what to make as a quick snack for the evening hunger pang. I decided to quickly boil them, season with some chat masala and make a snack. When I shut the cooker, I realized that I had another 10 minutes to kill until they were cooked. So that's when the boiled sweet potato idea turned into sweet potato cutlet idea.

If you have the ingredients at hand, it is super easy to make. I had a cabbage and I added about a quarter of it to increase the bulk and also since cabbages tend to get this really crunchy texture when roasted. Since all the ingredients are cooked, I did not shallow fry the cutlets but roasted them on a thick bottomed tava with very little oil. It takes some patience to fry it this way. If you want, you can add a little more oil and shallow fry it. While it was getting done, I snacked on a little bit of the cutlet dough topped with curd, bhujia and green chutney. Let me show you how I made the Sweet Potato Cutlet.

Preparation Time: 10 Minutes
Cooking Time: 10 Minutes (for sweet potatoes) + 15 Minutes
Makes 6 cutlets

Ingredients for the Sweet Potato Cutlet

Oil - 4 tbsp
1/2 tsp ajwain or carom seeds
A pinch of hing
2 medium sized sweet potatoes
1 small onion chopped
1/4 cabbage chopped
A few sprigs of coriander chopped
1 green chilli chopped
2 pods of garlic crushed
1 inch ginger crushed
salt to taste
1/4 tsp turmeric powder
1/4 tsp chilli, coriander, cumin powder each
1/2 tsp chat masala
1 tsp rava or semolina
1/2 tsp gram flour

Recipe for the Sweet Potato Cutlet

Peel and roughly chop the sweet potatoes and pressure cook them until soft. While it is getting done, chop up your cabbage, onion and coriander. In a mortar, crush the ginger, garlic and green chillis.

In a pan, heat 1 tbsp of oil and add the carom seeds and hing to it. Then add the onions and fry. When it starts browning, add the crushed masala from the mortar. To this add the cabbage and fry nicely till all the aromas rise up. Now add the dry spice powders - turmeric, chilli, coriander and cumin.

Sprinkle some water and fry until the vegetables are done. While they are getting done, mash the boiled sweet potatoes. Add the onion-cabbage mixture to the sweet potatoes. Allow it to cool for a few minutes. Top with some chaat masala and coriander and mix well. The chat masala already has some black salt in it. Taste the mixture and adjust the salt.

Mix well so that all the spices get uniformly mixed and you have a dough like ball at the end.

Divide this into 6 small balls and flatten them. Place your griddle on the flame on medium heat. Grease it well with 1/2 tbsp of oil. Mix the semolina and the gram flour on a plate. They will be used to coat the cutlet. Normally, only rava or bread crumbs are used. Gram flour helps it bind and that is why I added a bit of it. Run the cutlet on both sides on the rava-gram flour mixture.

Dust off the excess coating. Now place them on the heated griddle and patiently let them roast.

Brush some oil on both sides and roast them on the tava. Let them brown on both sides. Once they are done, serve hot with some green chutney or tomato ketchup.

Pumpkin and Sweet Potato Soup

I love one pot meals. Khichdi, Bisi bele baath, pasta or a heartwarming soup. With the nip in the air becoming a little too hard to bear, i was craving for something warm and light for dinner. I had a quarter of a pumpkin and one sweet potato. With yellow sunshine in mind, i set out to make a soup with what i had.

Preparation Time: 15 Mins
Cooking Time :      15 Mins

Ingredients: 

Pumpkin                    1 cup, chopped into cubes
Sweet Potato             1 cup, chopped into cubes
Onion                         1 , sliced
Garlic                         3 cloves, sliced
Ginger                        1 inch, sliced
Salt                             to taste
Pepper                        to taste
Cumin Powder            1/2 tsp
Lemongrass                 a few sprigs
Milk                            half a cup
Water                         1 1/2 cups

Preparation:

Chop the ingredients as mentioned above.

In a pressure cooker, add some olive oil and some butter. Add in the ingredients shown above and saute for a few minutes.
Now add the diced pumpkin and sweet potato and toss. Add the water, salt to taste and the lemongrass.

Cover and pressure cook on low flame until two whistles. Let it cool. Once it has cooled, take off the lemon grass, add the veggies with the stock to a mixer and puree it well. It should have a smooth consistency. 

Now in a deep pan, add in the vegetable puree, some pepper powder and cumin powder.

Let the mixture boil for a minute. Lower the heat and mix in the milk. Give it a stir and turn off the heat.
Transfer the hot soup into your bowl. Top it with a basil leaf. Serve with any bread of your choice or khakhra. Enjoy your soup - a little sweet from the veggies, hot from the pepper and zingy from the ginger.