Not every kozhukattai is sweet. The savoury one, filled with coarsely ground urad dal and tempered with mustard and curry leaves, sits on the same offering plate as the sweet ones and gets eaten first by anyone with sense.
The technique that matters here is the crumbling. The ground dal is steamed into a firm cake, then broken up by hand into a rough, uneven mixture. Do it in a blender and you get paste, and paste inside a rice dough is a disappointing thing. Fingers only. Grind the dal with as little water as you can manage, because a wet filling never dries out properly in the pan.
Everything you need for this recipe is on the shelf at One Place Bazaar, delivered to all 32 counties. See the rest of our Ganesh Chaturthi recipes.
