Let us start with the name. Vattam means round. Appam means bread. So round shaped appam is Vattayappam.
Vattayappam is a specialty dish of Christian families in Kerala. This fermented, mildly sweet rice cake is one of the main dish on the breakfast table most of days and also sometimes during festivals like Easter and Christmas. But at home whenever mom prepares paalappam for breakfast, the same day evening she prepares vattayappam. She sweeten the left over paalappam batter with sugar or jaggery…for aroma grounded cumin seeds and/or cardamoms is added
- Pachari ( Raw rice ) - 1.5 cup (white or long grain basmati or red) (It is not boiled rice)
- Water - 1.5 cup for grinding
- Freshly scrapped coconut - ¾ cup
- Active dry yeast - ½ teaspoon
- Sugar - 1 tbsp
- Salt - ¼ teaspoon
- Sugar - ½ cup
- Raisins - 2 tbsp
- Cumin seeds - ¼ teaspoon, freshly grounded
- Cardamom - 2 grounded
- Clarified butter(ghee) for greasing the pans
- Wash rice well and soak in 5 cups of water for 4 to 6 hours
- Drain and transfer this to a grinder jar.
- Add 1 cup of water and grind to a smooth paste..(add the remaining water when you feel the batter is turning dry during grinding. )
- Add in coconut, cumin seeds , water if remaining and continue grinding for few more minutes
- Now add rest of the ingredients(yeast, sugar, salt) and grind for couple of minutes
- Transfer this to a deep bowl leaving enough space for the batter to rise
- Cover and set aside in a warm place to ferment.
- For me it took hardly 2 hours to rise. Sometimes it takes more time depending upon the room temperature (So you could say 3 - 4 hours)
- Once it is fermented add in the flavoring ingredients(1/2 cup sugar, raisin, cumin seeds and cardamom) and whisk well.
- With this recipe you could prepare 2 vattayappams in 8 inch pan
- Grease 2 cake tins or deep plates, which can sit inside your steamer, with clarified butter
- pour half the batter in one tin and place in a steamer.
- Steam for 20 minutes
- Remove and repeat the same with second batch.
- Once it is cool down, slice and serve
It will be spongy, soft and airy. You could eat it warm or cold.. Just in case if you are refrigerating, make sure to steam it again before eating..
Back at home, we get lot of tender coconuts from our farms. Mom replaces the coconut with tender coconut pulp.. and water with tender coconut water.. The appams will become more tastier
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