recipe of millet pongal live from the millet workshop | millets are for everyone, use them everyday

Millets are tasty grains. Trust me when I say this. The only reason why you might have had a lukewarm experience with millets is that our cooking procedures have tuned in so much with rice and wheat that we have forgotten how to cook millets well.

And no, there is nothing elaborate about cooking millets, it is actually simpler. We often make the recipes so complicated and overburden the ingredients with seasonings that the dish gets killed. Millets need simpler treatment, simpler seasoning and fewer accompaniments in my experience.

I am sharing the recipe of a very simple millet pongal made with Foxtail millet (kangni) and Mung daal (skinned yellow mung). Pongal is a savoury porridge that is a popular breakfast dish in the south but rarely made with millets. Pongal is also a popular temple prasad and I have had the best pongals of my life as prasad (offerings made to God and then distributed to everyone).

I made this pongal for the participants of the workshop I conducted at Our Sacred Space in Hyderabad, with a theme 'Millets for everyone, for everyday'. The objective was to introduce the participants about how and why millets are better than wheat and rice for our own health as well as for the health of the planet and agriculture practices. The bunch of participants was a joy to interact with.

I wanted something tangible for the participants at the end of the workshop so they could get a taste of what we talk about. I had made some multi grain panjeeri, some ragi crackers, Jau ki ghaat and jowar banana pankeas and a millet pongal was planned as live cooking. While I was confident about everything else, I felt really nervous about the pongal as this was one dish that I have not grown up eating and cooking it for people from Andhra was like a vegetarian talking about fish to a Bengali. Yes I was nervous for the pongal.

This is a phone picture of the cooked pongal to which I added tadka in a huge pot. The pongal was made for 40-50 people.

It was a pleasant surprise to know that everyone loved this pongal and took second and third helpings. The second thing everyone one loved was Jau ki ghaat because it was the right season for such a drink, although panjeeri, pancakes and crackers were all favourites. Panjeeri made an instant fan following there with people asking for more, saving some for themselves too.

Pongal made me happy for obvious reasons.

The feedback I got for this millet pongal was that they couldn't believe it could taste better than rice pongal. I was exhausted by the end of the workshop that lasted 4 hours but I did taste the pongal so I can recreate the same in my own kitchen later. But honestly speaking, when pongal is made in larger quantities the taste is better for some reason. You might be familiar with the belief that prasad pongal always tastes better.

Recipe of millet pongal (the way I cooked for the millet workshop) 

ingredients 
(40-50 servings with other side dishes)

Foxtail millet (Kangni) 1 kilo
split Mung daal 1 kilo
water 7 Liters
chopped green chillies 1 cup
chopped curry patta 1/2 cup
salt 1/4 cup, add more after checking the salt balance once the pongal is cooked
ghee 250 gm
asafoetida powder 1/2 tsp
cumin seeds 2 tbsp
whole red chillies broken 10-12
whole pepper corns 1 tbsp
cashew nuts 250 gm chopped

procedure 

Rinse the mung daal, drain and tip in to the cooking vessel. I used a large (12 Liter capacity) pot for cooking this pongal. Add the water and the salt and place it on stove. Let the mixture come to a boil, lower the heat and let it simmer for 20 minutes.

Rinse the millet, drain water and tip in to the cooking pot. Let it come to a boil again and simmer for 30 minutes. You might need a little more water if the consistency is too thick. Add the chopped green chillies and 1/3rd of the ghee, mix well and let it simmer for a few more minutes.

Now heat the ghee in a pan, add the asafoetida, cumin seeds, red chillies, pepper corns, curry patta and cashew nuts in that order and let them all get sizzling. Let the cashews get a bit brownish, the curry patta will also be fried nicely by this time. Add this whole mixture to the cooked pongal, mix well and keep the pongal covered. Serve while the pongal is still hot. This huge pot of pongal was hot for a couple of hours.

Here is a picture collage of iphone pictures my friend Bhavana clicked. There were a few organic farmers at the workshop and some people who wanted to know more about millets and their uses.

This workshop was organised and held at Our Sacred Space, brainchild of Nayantara Nandakumar who works tirelessly behind this beautiful space and its working. She has transformed her huge garden into a retreat, a mindfully done oasis of peace. Outdoors surrounded with beautiful plants, walls finished with mud and red oxide flooring gives this space a feel of an old village chaupal. Finding such a peaceful oasis in the heart of a crowded city Secuderabad feels like a bliss.

Our sacred space holds farmer's markets to support local produce, flee markets for local craftsmen and workshops for children and adults on many different themes. The Sunday Farmer's market that I witness was so good I am dreaming if we could have something like that in Delhi.

Later, back home I cooked the same pongal in pressure cooker. Since I was going to pressure cook the pongal in one step I decided to break the mung daal in smaller bits by running it into the mixie for a few seconds. The foxtail and mung mix was added to water (4 times the millet-lentil mix) and was pressure cooked with salt. Then a tempering was added and it made a really good lunch that day. I had chilled buttermilk with this meal.

It has been just too hot in Delhi these days and we have lost our appetite for heavier foods. Watermelon, buttermilk, chilled mango slices, chilled milk etc is what I am having mostly but I do eat a few spicy meals in between too. This pongal made me so happy with it's spice quotient and still felt very light on the system.

If you are using Pearl millet (bajra) or Barnyard millet (sama) for pongal you might like to cook them along with the mung daal as those take a bit longer time to cook. Just adjusting the cooking time and consistency you should be able to cook a delicious pongal with just any kind of millets you choose.

I was so glad to see so many varieties of millets available in Hyderabad, specially Our Sacred Space Sunday market was treasure trove for organic food seekers. The variety of millet rawa (millet semolina), millet vermicelli, broken millets etc is so good you would want to find out more ways to cook with them.

I buy my millets from Navdanya store, Down to Earth website and I Say Organic whenever possible. I also collect millets and lentils from my travels to interiors of the country. This foxtail millet from I Say Organic is from Uttarakhand.

Do let me know whenever you have a query about millets. I will be glad to share whatever I know.

Millets are ancient grains that need to be brought back to mainstream, not only for our own health but to break the pattern of monoculture of wheat and rice that is cause much harm to the agriculture and food chain both.

Did you know millets are hardy crops that can grow well in arid regions and don't need much chemical fertilizers or pesticides because they are naturally disease resistant. Also because millets have not been aggressively bred for huge yield etc. most millets are native varieties. Millets can be grown organically well and most millets you get in the market are grown by organic means.

Bring back millets on your dining table, every day.

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baking with buckwheat : a buckwheat groats granola bar and a buckwheat flour and dates cookie | no added sugar

Healthy baking using alternative flours and natural sweeteners looks difficult for most bakers but many of them do it with ease. I think it is just about keeping your mind open and trying new flavours with real ingredients and not artificial flavouring agents and texture enhancers. I am here with another Wednesday post for Home Baker's Guild discussing buckwheat and amaranth as ingredients for baking a couple of healthy bars and cookies with no added sugar.

Baking a granola bar and a cookie with buckwheat this time as I have always noticed that most families consume a lot of biscuits every single day. Many people start the day with a biscuit or a rusk along with their tea or coffee and keep having a couple of different types of biscuits in between meals as snacks when they get bored or just to accompany a cup of tea. So much so that even kids are fed biscuits as meals when they refuse to eat regular food. This needs to change. One must bake some alternative dry snacks at home or try and get them made by local bakeries. Once the commercial establishments know what you are looking for, they would see a business opportunity in it and such snacks will be easily available.

Baking granola bar using fresh fruit pulp and buckwheat groats and some coarsely powdered almonds is really easy. One of those recipes where you just mix everything and spread on the baking sheet before pushing the tray into the oven. Adding some natural sugar is optional, I have added a spoonful of honey in this bar as we like mild sweet snacks and not too sugary. A little grated jaggery will be good to add if you want it more sweet.

It will be good to know a few properties of buckwheat if this grain (pseudo grain) is new for you. Cooking with buckwheat and it's flour can be tricky if you don't realise it can be a slimy goop when cooked, here are a few clever ways to cook and bake with buckwheat.

• Buckwheat groats get a little slimy when soaked or cooked with water, roasting them before adding water helps if you want the groats cooked separately in pulao like recipes.
• Whole buckwheat is more suited for roasting the grains first and then cooking it with water to get cooked plump buckwheat that can be seasoned or dressed like a pasta. One can soak the buckwheat and cook with some more water and a little butter to get a pulao, rice or pasta like texture.
• Buckwheat flour gets really slimy when made into a batter with water, milk or buttermilk. It almost behaves like flaxmeal slurry but this property is useful in baking egg less cakes and breads. This buckwheat English muffin recipe works well even when you want a bread that bakes on a skillet.
• Because of it's sliminess buckwheat flour has a good capacity to bind ingredients. This peoperty can be used to add loads of grated vegetables or fruits to make pancakes of sweet or savoury type.
• Do not add liquids if you are baking cookies with buckwheat. The dough would result in hard cookies. Use lightly moist dates or figs that help binding along with butter and make the cookie dough.

Note that you can make your own buckwheat groats or buckwheat flour if you have whole buckwheat. Just run through a coffee grinder or spice grinder of a mixie for a second and you get groats. Grind it for about 2 minutes and you get a white fine powder. Buckwheat is a soft seed that powders quickly.

ingredients 
(makes about 20 bars)

buckwheat groats 200 gm (or run the whole buckwheat in blender for a second and use)
almonds 200 gm (coarsely powdered)
Fresh apricots seeds removed 180 gm
honey 1 tbsp or a little more
nutmeg powder a pinch

procedure 

Pulp the apricots well along with the honey. You might want to use a little more honey of the apricots are tart.

Mix with the buckwheat groats and almond meal using hands and knead lightly to make a sticky dough. Adding the apricot pulp slowly works better, add a little more of the pulp if required as it depends on how ripe and juicy the apricots are.

Spread this mixture on silpat sheet or any nonstick baking sheet and pat to make a thin layer of the mixture (a little less than one cm). Use a flat spatula to keep the margins straight. Then mark the sheet to cut bars.

Bake in preheated oven at 160 C for 25 minutes. Take out the baking tray and invert the silpat on a large chopping board. Cut the bars as marked. Spread them again on the baking sheet and bake again on 150 C for 30 minutes or till they get firm and crunchy.

I have been working on many recipes of granola bars and cookies baked using alternative flours. Some are here on this blog and some more to come but the thing is, we rarely snack on these cookies and granola bars. These kind of cookies, bars and some roasted nuts are useful only when we travel to places where we have to trek or hike and carrying light weight dry food is convenient. At home we love to snack on fruits and some freshly cooked snacks like roasted nuts, a bowl of poha, jhal mudi or a sprouts chaat.

This granola bar using amaranth flour is also baked sometimes for everyday snacking.

Being ginger and jaggery rich, this amaranth bar is more suited for winters. Even the cookies with buckwheat that I am sharing now will be more suited for winters with war spicing. It would be great if you add bits of candied ginger ti the dough.

This cookie with buckwheat flour would surprise you in the way it looks and the way it tastes. Mildly spiced and pleasantly sweet and nutty, this cookie has not used any nuts in it. Add a little more butter to this cookie when baking for kids as with lesser butter (as in this recipe) the cookies are better suited for adults. Butter makes these cookies really crisp. Sticking some chopped nuts or poppy seeds on these cookies will make it more attractive for the kids as well.

This cookie dough is a very good base for tarts as well. Try that sometime to make gluten free fruit tarts for kids.

ingredients
(for 20 small cookies(
I am giving cup measurements as the battery of my kitchen weighing scale died as I was making it.

buckwheat flour 1 cup
good quality soft dates (not sticky ones) 18
butter 1/4 cup
clove powder 1 pinch
nutmeg powder 1 pinch
ginger powder 1/4th tsp

procedure

Chop the dates and remove seeds.
Place all ingredients in a blender and mix well till it resembles bread crumbs or is the consistency of a tart dough. If you take a spoonful of mixture and apply pressure, it binds well.

Make small balls of this mixture, flatten all of them and arrange on a baking sheet.

Bake in a preheated oven at 160 C for 25 minutes.

This cookie is dense but a nice nutty crunch with a hint of spice gives it a unique flavour. You might like to add some chopped dehydrated fruits like cranberries or candied peel to this cookie dough to make it more enjoyable for the kids. This is an easy almost 2 step recipe suitable for busy adults who bake in the night to save time. Yes I baked this cookie in the night.

You would know how tasty buckwheat can be if you use it the right way. There are many buckwheat recipes on my blog you can try once you start getting buckwheat in your pastry. Buckwheat has been used in our homes for centuries, more for fasting foods during navratri and other festivals.

So buckwheat is completely sattvic in vedic terms, tags like gluten free and low glycemic, high protein etc started being relevant only recently. And did you notice how apricots and dates make wonderful natural sweeteners?

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