During childhood, sunday evenings were always spent in front of the TV watching Doordarshan movies. All the homework and assignments for the next week would be finished by sunday afternoon. Evening movies and the cartoon Jungle Book was not a thing to miss. Also, my amma would make nice snacks for the movie time. She made cutlets, noodles, diamond cuts, potato fries, jackfruit chips and many other things for those evenings. One among her favourite(not mine) was vettu cake. A sweet fried snack which was commonly available during her school days in the small local tea shops of her locality. ( nammude swantham ‘chaayakkada’. Athaanu uddeshichath ?)
I didn’t like it much then. But now, after all these years when my little Jebu asked for some evening snack to munch, this came to my mind. Immediately I rang my amma and asked for the recipe. This time when I tasted this, I felt something special about it which I did not find in my amma’s preparation. It is nothing but nostalgia. Those sweet memories about my childhood sunday evenings! A secret ingredient that gets sweeter with time. NOSTALGIA! ?
Jebu and her father loved it too. This is how we make it. So easy!
- All purpose flour- 1 cup plus a little extra for dusting.
- Baking powder- 1 large pinch.
- Egg- 1 large.
- Sugar- 1/4 cup.
- Essence- any flavour, 4 drops. You make also use cardamom.
- Oil for deep frying.
Method:
- Mix all the ingredients except oil. You will get a very sticky dough. Never mind. ☺
- Keep it undisturbed for 1 hour.
- Later, make dough balls of the size of a small gooseberry. Dust it with more flour if necessary. Flatten it slightly and make a deep cut cross on it with a knife( In malayalam, a cross mark is called ‘vettu’. Hence the name vettu cake).
- Deep fry in hot oil. Keep the flame low and fry until the surface turns golden brown.
- It is tricky to get the inside portion cooked too. So remember to keep the flame low and wait with patience until done.
- When it is completely cooked, the vettu cake will puff up and become very light.
- Serve hot with tea.
The inside portion, if properly cooked will look like this.
Enjoy cooking!