SOFT FLUFFY IDLI RECIPE | IDLI BATTER USING IDLI RAVA | hotel style soft idli tips

Idli is one of the most popular south Indian recipes all over the country. Extremely scrumptious, light and nutritious, Idli is an ideal breakfast item. Made of rice and Urad Daal, making Idli is not difficult at all, however its preparation takes a little time as the batter for Idli requires fermentation. As it is a steamed food with minimum oil and no spices, it is an ideal food item for every body. It is one of the most regularly made items in any home. Idli is served hot along with sambhar and coconut- chutney/south-indian-tomato-chutney/raw-mango chutney

I learnt making idlis from a south indian aunty.Touch wood my first attempt turned out to be successful....

Ingredients:

1 cup urad dal
2 cups idli rava (rice sooji) or 2 cups rice
Salt

note :Idli rava, also called as rice rava or rice sooji, is available in market with the name “Idli rava(Cream of rice)”.

If idly rava is not available, use 2 cups of rice instead. Soak rice for around 4-5 hrs. Then let the water go by spreading it on cloth for around 30mins. When all water is gone, grind(without any water) to a coarse powder (of coarse sand consistency).

Method:

1. Soak urad dal for around 4-5 hours.
2. Grind .it to a very smooth paste (Do not add too much water, just add as much as needed). Touch the batter and no pieces of dal should be felt. The more it is ground, the better. Once it is ground very soft, some bubbles can be found on the surface, the more the bubbles, the better is the batter
3. Wash the rava with water and grind it for 5-6 seconds, do not grind more than that, just to make the rava a bit fine. Some people, do not grind the rava, but most of the times the ready made rava is too coarse and grinding it makes the idlis turn out softer.
4. If you have more time in hand, grind the dal previous day afternoon and mix the rava in the night. Add salt and mix well (When dal is completely gound, the rava can be added to mixer and ground 5-6 seconds as explained earlier to speed up the process. But make sure the dal is completely ground before adding the rava).
5. Keep the batter in a warm place overnight. I keep it on warm gas stove, after all the cooking has been finished.
6. Check in the morning if the batter is fermented. The volume would have increased.
7. Grease the idli stand with oil .Steam them for around 10-12 mins (if using cooker, do not use the weight). Leave it for around 5-10mins before opening the steamer/cooker (or else, the steam falls on idlis and make them mushy).

Tips

If you are on a higher altitude and the idlis are not coming out as expected, try using dal, rice rava in 1:3(1 dal 3 rava) proportion.
If the batter becomes too thick or too watery, the idlis might not come as expected. Do a bit of trial and error to know the correct consistency.

If nothing works, try using urad dal:rava in 1:1 proportion

 Add a little cooked rice (say 1-2 tbsps) while grinding urad dal (once the urad dal is ground finely)in order to make the idlis softer & fluffier