Frizzled fryums

A fried snack that's light, crispy and a perfect accompaniment to a hot meal, fryums are the best homemade crackers, writes Anu Abraham

As we bid goodbye to winter, most of us would want to brace up and stock up on some yummy crispies that we can savour all year long. Such recipes evoke the child in us and take us back to the days when we would be ready to stack our old books away to the kabadiwala and eagerly join our mothers on the terrace to prepare rice fryums.

Gulabi sandige is one such delicacy that has fond memories for many. These are rice fryums that are retained in the shape of flowers. When deep-fried, they transform into lovely flower-shaped fryums. They employ a variety of hues, including red, yellow, green, white, orange, and pink, to pique the interest of picky eaters, particularly kids. These fryums are made in bulk throughout the summer to be enjoyed all year round.

Most frequently, we observe neighbours working together to prepare the gruel that would be spread out evenly on clean bed linens or plastic sheets that are left to dry out under the sun and later stored and fried as vibrant fryums.

Children are tasked with assisting in folding and bringing the sheets back home in the evenings. Once dried, these fryums are preserved for usage all year long. This is one creative way to persuade toddlers to eat rice in a colourful form. These can be made with not only rice but also with other healthy ingredients like pearl sago, ash gourd, and wheat along with popped rice.

(The writer is the author of the cookbook Manna: Your Guide to Indian & Continental Cooking which is a result of her culinary journey during which she documented some of the most sought-after heritage recipes of India and elsewhere.)

Ingredients
Dosa rice: 1 kg
White butter: 100 grams
Hing: 1 tsp
Salt to taste

Method
Soak rice for three days changing the water twice a day. Grind the rice into a fine, smooth paste with just enough water, salt and hing.
Measure the rice batter.
Add 3 cups of water to each cup of batter you have measured. (Water in a ratio of 1:3, where 1 is the measured batter and 3 is extra water.)
In a large pot, boil water over a medium gas flame and add butter to it.
Now, while continuously churning with a wooden ladle, slowly pour the rice batter, being careful not to create any lumps.
Stir until it thickens so that you can pour the sandige (prepared batter) without it getting spread on the plastic sheet.
Dry them in the sun for three to four days, turning them over at the end of each day.

(Recipe courtesy Vibha Koppar)

One ingredient, one recipe

This column celebrates food and explores the possibility of forming an invisible chain that will bind us together as a family. Readers can send us a unique recipe that has either a childhood memory attached to it or even a food philosophy. We will hand-pick one unique recipe and publish it along with this column the following month. Please share your recipe and story in 300 words with “Food Family: Love” mentioned in the subject line to [e-mail] by March 13.