Finger Millet/Ragi – Sweet and Kara Paniyaram
Prep Time : 30 mins (excluding soaking time)
Serves: 3-4
Recipe Category: Snacks-Breakfast
Recipe Cuisine: Indian
Author:Padhu Sankar
Ingredients needed
For Paniyaram Batter
Finger Millet – 1 cup
Raw Rice – 3/4 cup
Idli Rice – 3/4 cup
Urad dal – 1/4 cup
Salt to taste
For Kara/Spicy Paniyaram
Oil – 1 tbsp
Mustard seeds – 1 tsp
Bengal gram/kadalai paruppu – 2 tbsp
Urad dal – 2 tbsp
Whole black peppercorns – 1 tsp
Salt to taste
Shallots/pearl onions – 15
Green Chilli – 1-2
Ginger – 1/2 inch piece
Coriander Leaves – 2-3 tbsp finely chopped
Tender Curry leaves – a sprig
Oil for frying paniyarams
Sweet Paniyaram
Paniyaram Batter – 1 cup
Jaggery – 1/2 cup
Coconut – 1/4 cup
Cardamom – a generous pinch
Ghee for frying paniyarams
Preparations
Wash and soak raw rice, finger millet, idli rice, urad dal together for 3-4 hours.
Grind it to a smooth paste adding water gradually. The consistency of the batter should be that of idli batter. So do not add too much water.
Add little salt to the batter, mix well and ferment. As we are going to use the same batter for making both savory and sweet paniyarams, add less salt and leave it to ferment for 5 hours.
Now the batter is ready.
For making Savory/ salted paniyarams
Take needed batter, add salt to it and mix well.
Method
Heat oil in a pan, add mustard seeds, when it sizzles, add bengal gram, urad dal and whole black pepper corns. You can also add broken cashew nuts if preferred.
When dal turns golden brown, add finely chopped pearl onions, finely chopped ginger and green chillies and curry leaves.
When onion turns transparent, add finely chopped coriander leaves, salt needed and remove from heat.
Mix it with the batter.
Heat paniyaram pan, add 1/2 tsp oil inside the cavities/holes.
Fill the holes with the batter. Cook covered on low heat.
Once you find the corners lifting up, flip it over to the other side with a spoon or paniyaram stick.
Cook on low heat uncovered until done. Simply take a toothpick/paniyaram stick and insert it into the center of the paniyaram, if it comes out clean, it is done.
Serve paniyaram hot with any chutney of your choice.
How to make sweet paniyaram
I kept aside 1 cup of the batter to make sweet paniyarams. 1 cup of batter yields approximately 7 paniyarams.
Method
Heat 2-3 tbsp of water, add jaggery (add a little more jaggery than mentioned if you want it very sweet) to it and dissolve it. Stain to remove any impurities in the jaggery.
Heat the jaggery again, when it starts to bubble, add grated coconut, cardamom powder and remove from heat.
Mix it well and add to the paniyaram batter. Mix the batter well.
Heat paniyaram pan, add 1/2 tsp of ghee in each of the holes.
Fill in all the cavities/holes with the sweet paniyaram batter.
Cook covered on low heat. When the corners starts to lift up, flip it over to the other side and cook uncovered until done. Enjoy warm sweet paniyarams as such.
Paniyarams make a healthy after school snack for kids. If you are searching for more healthy snacks like these, then check healthy snacks for kids. If you love paniyarams, find more paniyaram recipes below –
Unniappam (Kerala recipes)
Rava Kara Kuzhi Paniyaram (sooji)
If you have paniyaram pan, you can also make guilt free snack like vada, bonda etc.
View Comments (8)
Thanks Padhu for giving such a wonderful recepie.always your well researched recepie come in handy.going to try this with my grand daughters.thanks once again for a bhealthy recepie.
As I cannot get whole ragi in Indian stores near my area (I am staying in US), will it be good if I use ragi flour instead? If so, please explain how to do that?
Also, did u grind the batter in grinder or mixie?
Regards,
Preetha
Can you please reply to my above doubts?
I ground the batter in wet grinder. I will share soon a different ragi paniyaram recipe using ragi flour.
Hi mam.. Very nice recipe... Can we use the same batter for Ragi dosa or Ragi idli?
For ragi dosa, you can use it.
Thank you Padhu mam...
Your recipes are simple and healthy very nice be always blessed
Your recipes are super helpful and easy to follow. I mostly follow ur recipes for daily cooking as well as for occasions. This is a wonderful ragi recipe but here we don't get good quality ragi millet so we buy ragi flour. Can u let me know the proportion if we use ragi flour