Vada Pav is a mouth watering, spicy and the most loved street food of Mumbai. It’s a common man’s food. It’s everybody’s favourite in Mumbai since time immemorial. Basically the Maharashtrians love it. People have it for breakfast, for lunch or in the evenings as a snack – a savoury that is enjoyed by people of all castes and races in India. It’s easy to make and even very affordable. Vada Pav is also known as the Desi Burger. A Vada Pav can give any American burger a run for its money, I would say!
Vada Pav is a quick-fix snack easily available in Schools, Colleges, Railway Stations, Tea stalls, Canteens, Roadside vendors (Thela vallahs), Beaches, nooks and crannies and restaurants in Mumbai, also in Pune and other cities of Maharashtra. I remember how we used to binge on vada pavs in our childhood – saving in our pocket monies just to eat our all time favourite vada pav with my sister and friends. Vadas are the spicy potato dumplings deep fried in gram flour batter that are served by assembling them into the Pav with dry red garlic chutney/ green/sweet chutney and fried green chillies. Chutneys could be made well in advance and of your choice.
Having vada pavs along with a hot cup of tea is a sheer bliss during the monsoon. You get the best vada pavs in Mumbai at Dadar and at ‘J.J Garden Vada pav’ at M.G Road Camp, Pune. Jumbo sized vada pavs are also available in Mumbai. A food joint called Goli Vada Pav also tasted its success with introduction of hygienic kitchen and equipments and good quality vada pav. Goli Vada Pav is a food chain where they make varieties of vada pav; it’s an Indian version of McDonalds. These days you get a lot of variations in vada pavs like the Spinach and Corn vada pav, Cheese and Mayonnaise vada pav, Schezwan vada pav etc.
Many desi dishes these days get a Michelin Tweak! Thanks to our creative Indian Chefs and cooking enthusiasts who love experimenting. Vada Pav is so popular that Indians living abroad crave to eat it. You may find a vendor or two selling them in cities like London, New York, Dubai, Singapore where more number of Indians have settled. A visit to the Rhine Falls, Switzerland will land you to a vada pav stall! Yes. A rare treat indeed! I often make vada pav at home as everyone likes it, I personally am a street food buff plus making them at home is hygienic as well. So let’s get on to the recipe friends.
Vada Pav
Preparation Time: 40 minutes
Cooking Time: 40 Minutes
Total Time: 1 Hour 20 Minutes
Serves: 10-12 Vada Pavs
Ingredients:
For spiced Potato Stuffing:
- Boiled and Mashed Potatoes – 4-5 Medium Potatoes
- Garlic – 7-8 cloves
- Ginger – 3-4 juliennes
- Green Chillies – 2-3
- Coriander – 2 tbsp
- Asafoetida ( Hing ) – a pinch of it
- Turmeric powder – 1 ½ tsp
- Curry leaves – 7-8
- Oil – 2-3 Tbsp
- Salt as required
Take the garlic, ginger, coriander leaves and green chillies and pound it into a mortar pestle.
For Batter:
- Gram Flour/ Besan – 2 Cups
- Asafoetida/ Hing – a pinch of it
- Turmeric/Haldi Powder – ½ tsp
- A pinch of Baking soda (Optional)
- Salt as required
- Water- ½ cup or as required
For Dry Red Chutney:
- Garlic : 8 Cloves
- Dry Grated Coconut : ½ Cup
- Red Chilli Powder :2 tsps
- Roasted peanuts :1 tbsp
- Sesame seeds : 1 tbsp
- Coriander Powder :1 tsp
- Oil : 1 tsp
- Salt as required
Method:
Firstly make the dry red garlic chutney and keep it aside.
- Heat oil in a skillet and roast the garlic cloves for a minute, transfer it to a plate.
- Dry roast grated dry coconut in the same skillet until it turns light brown, transfer to a plate. Similarly dry roast the sesame seeds and transfer to a plate.
- Let all the roasted ingredients cool for about 5 Minutes.
- Then add the ingredients roasted and kept in the plate along with roasted peanuts, red chilli powder, coriander powder and salt in a grinder. Grind them to a medium coarse powder. Chutney is ready. Store it in an Air tight container for further use.
Next head on to make Vadas
- In a Kadai or skillet take 2-3 tbsp oil, add mustard seeds and crackle them.( I personally don’t like adding mustard seeds to this spiced potato stuffing) you may skip adding if you wish. Then add curry leaves and hing, sauté for about few seconds.
- Add the boiled and mashed potatoes, ginger garlic chilli paste crushed in a mortar pestle, Turmeric Powder, Salt and mix everything well. Turn off the flame and keep aside. Let the mixture cool for 2-3 minutes, then make small to medium balls from this mixture, you may flatten these balls a bit and keep it aside.
- In another bowl take the gram flour, turmeric powder, hing, salt, a pinch of baking powder and ½ cup water and mix well, the batter should not be too thick or thin in consistency. Keep aside.
- In a kadai, heat oil for deep frying.
- Dip the balls in the batter and coat them evenly.
- Gently drop these balls into the kadai and fry the balls until they turn golden evenly.
- Drain them on tissue paper.
- Slice the pav into two halves in between without breaking it and spread the sweet and green chutney if you have made and sprinkle some dry red garlic chutney into the halves of the pav then place the hot vadas into them. Serve them immediately with fried and salted green chillies (optional).
Note:
- You can make your own variations of the chutneys according to your taste and liking.
