Sweet Pottukadalai Somas is a light crescent shaped traditional sweet that is prepared during Diwali festival. One major advantage of this sweet is it has good shelf life and can be stored for weeks. At home Amma and MIL will usually start a week before deepavali and make these in batches along with other sweet and savories. Its not only for special occasions but can be had anytime of the day, makes a good evening snack too. The stuffing for this sweet has many variations… there is rava coconut filling, some with poppy seeds, my favorite one is with coconut & fried grams…which is very tasty and today we are goinf to see how to make this crisp sweet snack.
Another version with rava filling… Sweet Somas
Ingredients for the dough
- Maida – 1 cup + a little for dusting
- Salt – 1/4 teaspoon
- Ghee -1 Tablespoon
- Water – 1/4 cup + 1 Tablespoon (only if necessary)
Ingredients for Filling
- Roasted gram / Pottukadalai / Fried gram – 1/2 cup
- Fresh grated Coconut – 1/2 cup (tightly packed)
- Sugar – 3/4 cup
- Cardamom – 3
- Cashew nut – 15 (finely chopped)
- Ghee (for roasting coconut) – 1/2 teaspoon
Other Ingredients
- Water (for sealing) – few teaspoons
- Oil (for deep frying) – 3 cups
Lets see how to make these Sweet Pottukadalai Somas….
Mix Maida, salt and ghee in a bowl. Slowly add water to make a stiff dough. (With the given quantity of water it will be little hard to form a stiff dough but keep kneading until you form a soft but stiff dough. This trick yields nice crispy somas. Cover and let the dough sit for at least for 2 hours.
Roast coconut in 1 teaspoon ghee until they turn slightly golden and dry. (about 5 minutes over low medium flame) Once done remove and set aside to cool. Make sure you keep the flame at the lowest setting possible. Once they turn light brown, remove from pan and set aside to cool. If using dry desiccated coconut then it may turn golden very quick(within minutes) so make sure to keep the flame low to avoid browning too much. Fresh grated coconut takes about 4-5 minutes over low flame. Also lightly roast the fried grams… this is optional but it will help to keep them crisp too.
Finely chop the cashewnuts. Powder sugar and elachi in a mixie and keep aside. Combine powered sugar, roasted gram powder, roasted coconut and cashews. Filling is all ready & keep this aside.
Divide the dough equally by making small dough balls. Roll out to make a thin poori. Place a little of the stuffing mix( about 2 teaspoons) in the center of the poori. Wet your finger and run it along the edges of the poori and fold into half.
Now make sure to press gently to seal. Cut the edges using a somas spoon (the spoon with wheels). If you don’t have one, then use somas mould or just use a fork to press. Repeat the process for the rest of the dough balls and keep all those shaped somas in plate covered with a towel to avoid drying.
Now heat enough oil and start deep frying. The oil temperature should not be too hot, it may burn the somas, make sure its about medium hot and keep the flame between low-medium setting to fry perfectly. (Fry only 2 or 3 in one batch)Once you drop the somas in oil, it will sizzle and come up to the top. Flip once and then when both sides turn golden, remove and drain excess oil in a paper towel. Let them cool completely, then store them in air-tight container for upto 2 weeks.
Notes
- Makes 12 to 15 somas.
- Make sure you use refined all purpose flour if you can’t find maida. Elite brand maida is really good.
- Un-bleached all purpose won’t yield crispy outer covering… they will turn out like soft pooris.
- Resting the dough for couple of hours really matter.
- Rolling out them really thin yields crisp outer covering.
- The dough should be really tight and not too soft.