Rawa Dosai

Rawa dosai and rawa idli were few of the regulars while we were at school and college. Later, I do not remember having tried making these on my own for years. There were two valid reasons for that. Firstly,the rawa idli mix from MTR was a boon and secondly, I was not confident about my rawa dosai spreading skills! For a person who learnt to make the neer dosai with ease, this was still 'approach with caution' zone.
Later, when made in the non-stick tawa I could make these near perfect dosais. And guess what, my husband's suggestion would often be these for a light dinner!
My mother used to powder the rawa also and measure out as she would the rice flour. There is no fixed proportion for the buttermilk / whisked yoghurt in the recipe. I am assuming that the yoghurt provides some sourness to the taste and hence we use yoghurt, though I have never tried eliminating yoghurt all together.
I tend to add some roasted cashews, a fair quantity of cumin seeds and coarsely broken peppercorns just to enhance the taste. I ensure that the pepper corns are broken enough that we are not able to pick them and discard them while eating. Also a lot of coriander leaves go in, just because I love them.

Ingredients:
1 cup semolina (if possible powder somewhat finely; it is purely optional)
1 cup finely powdered rice (store bought rice flour works well)
1/4 cup (or even less will do) thin yoghurt
Salt to taste
Oil/ ghee for sprinkling
1 teaspoon black peppercorns
1 teaspoon cumin seeds
1 fist full chopped coriander leaves
Few curry leaves chopped
1 tablespoon broken cashew nuts
1& 1/2 inch piece of ginger chopped
2-3 green chillis chopped
1 teaspoon mustard seeds
2 teaspoons oil for roasting the condiments

Method:
Mix the semolina, rice flour and salt with the yoghurt. Add sufficient water to mix these in a pouring batter.
Heat the 2 teaspoons oil in a pan. Add the mustard and cumin seeds and allow them to crackle.
Add to this the pepper corns, cashews and green chillis. Saute' for a few seconds. Toss in the chopped ginger and the curry leaves. Switch the heat off and transfer the contents of the pan to the prepared batter.
Add the chopped coriander leaves to the batter.
Leave the batter to rest for sometime. I leave it for two hours to even longer.



The flours will absorb the water and the batter will thicken. Water is added at regular intervals while the dosais are being prepared to keep the batter in thin pouring consistency.
When you are ready to prepare the dosais, keep a utensil full of water by the side to be added to the batter, in small quantities as and when required.
Heat the dosa tawa.
The solid contents in the batter would often settle at the bottom, leaving a rare watery liquid on the surface. Mix the batter well each time before to transfer a ladle full of contents on the hot tawa.
When the tawa is warm enough, give a brisk stir of the batter, and pour a ladle full on the hot tawa in a fanning motion. You will not be able to pour and spread in circles like the rice - urad dosa batter. This has to be swiftly tossed on the hot surface. you can add some more batter to fill the big holes that may have formed while spreading. However, keep the dosai as thinly spread as possible.
Sprinkle some oil and allow the dosai to cook. Once you are able to lift it off the pan, it ensures that the under side has been cooked. Flip the dosai and cook the other side.
When both sides have been cooked well, remove the dosai from the tawa and transfer on to serving plates.



Repeat the process again for the rest of the batter, ensuring that the batter is always in a medium to rare and pouring consistency.
Serve hot with any chutney of your choice and sambhar.
It is optional that you can add chopped and slightly saute'ed onions to the batter. Or you may make the potato masal and fold it in the middle of the dosai, call it rawa masala dosai.
This is quite simple to make and with practice you can make perfectly thin, nicely roasted, restaurant style rawa dosais.