Recipe for Kongunad Pazha Kachayam – Banana Kajjaya. Sweet Banana Fritters recipe made with all purpose flour, semolina and ripe bananas.
This is a very popular evening snack made in the kongu region and the nice thing about this recipe is that it can be put together in no time. This recipe involves very minimal prep work and uses very basic ingredients that can be found in almost every home. Whenever I have over ripe bananas at home, I store it in the freezer and use it later for making banana bread or Pazha kachayam. Usually poovan or rasthali variety of banana is used for this recipe back home. But you can use any variety of ripe banana and it just works fine. The key to this recipe is to use ripe bananas. This makes for a killer evening snack. In Kongunad, we call this Kachayam or Kajjayam கச்சாயம் . Many people tell me that its a variety of adirasam அதிரசம். But there is a difference. Adirasam uses only rice flour but kachayam uses a combination of rice flour, wheat flour or semolina. Whatever you wanna call it, this is one good fritter.
Here is how to do Pazha Kachayam
Mash the bananas in a bowl.
Add in the maida and fine rava to the bowl.
Add in powdered sugar (You can pulse the sugar in a mixie for a minute and add it) and cardamom powder.
A note on Sugar – Do not add too much sugar. Adding too much sugar will brown the kachayam very fast in oil before the inside gets cooked. So add only the mentioned amount of sugar. In some homes, they even use powdered jaggery.
Mix the batter well. Add in two tablespoon of water and mix the batter. Do not add too much water. The batter itself will become watery after a couple of minutes due to the addition of sugar and bananas. So add water only if the batter is dry.
Add in the baking soda and mix well. The batter should be thick like the picture below. Allow the batter to rest for 10 minutes.
Heat oil in a kadai until medium hot. Add a small piece of the batter to check if the oil is ready. The oil is ready if the batter floats immediately to the top. If not wait for a minute more. Add in small scoops of the batter to the oil when the oil is ready.
Keep turning the batter balls so the batter cooks evenly on both sides. I use a fork / spoon to turn the batter. It works so well.
Deep fry until its golden. Remove and drain on paper towels.
Crisp on the outside, soft and spongy and sweet on the inside. The flavours of cardamom and bananas are heavenly.
Do try it at home.
- 1 cup mashed bananas (about 3 ripe medium size bananas)
- 1 cup maida (all purpose flour)
- ½ cup fine rava (sooji semolina)
- ½ cup granulated sugar (powdered in mixie)
- ¼ teaspoon cardamom powder
- ¼ teaspoon baking soda
- Mash the bananas in a bowl. Add in the maida and fine rava to the bowl.
- Add in powdered sugar and cardamom powder.
- Mix the batter well. Add in two tablespoon of water and mix the batter. Do not add too much water. The batter itself will become watery after a couple of minutes due to the addition of sugar and bananas. So add water only if the batter is dry.
- Add in the baking soda and mix well. Allow the batter to rest for 10 minutes.
- Heat oil in a kadai until medium hot.
- Add in small scoops of the batter to the oil when the oil is ready.
- Keep turning the batter balls so the batter cooks evenly on both sides.
- Deep fry until its golden. Remove and drain on paper towels.
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