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PHOTO: S. SUBRAMANIUM

SAVOUR IT Winter is a good season to dish out some chaat in a spring roll

When people order spring rolls, they expect either chicken or vegetarian filling. The vegetarian roll will always contain cabbage, beans, sprouts and carrots tossed with soy sauce and garlic. Customers and chefs have become so used to this that it has become boring. I felt there was an urgent need for another kind of vegetarian spring rolls.

I make sure the aloo is prepared like the traditional aloo tawa chaat in our dhabas. It should be shallow fried with chaat masalas. The aloo is prepared with just onions and green chillies. I don’t like it when people add tomatoes. That makes it soggy and takes away the ‘mazaa’. The spring roll pastry provides the crunchiness of golgappas.

Since soy or chilli garlic sauce wouldn’t match, I serve it with mint chutney only.

It’s a great item for the winter. Chaat is actually best eaten in the winters. I wouldn’t put it on the menu for summers.

2 cups boiled potatoes, peeled and diced

1/4 cup chopped onion

1 tbsp chopped green chilli 1 tsp yellow chilli powder

1 tbsp chaat masala

Juice of one lemon

1/4 cup chopped fresh coriander

2 tbsp chopped fresh mint

2 tbsp plain flour

8 pieces spring roll pastry

Oil to fry

1 serving mint and green chilli chutney

Put boiled and diced potatoes in a mixing bowl. Add the chopped onion, chopped green chilli, yellow chilli powder, chaat masala, the chopped coriander, lemon juice and the chopped mint leaves. Mix well and refrigerate.

Take plain flour and add just enough water to form a paste for sticking and binding the spring roll pastry.

Place one sheet on a flat clean surface, ideally a clean chopping board.

Place a generous portion of potato chaat mix in it, preferably at one end to make folding easier.

Apply the plain flour paste on all sides and roll the sheet, forming a spring roll. Finish all the spring roll pastry sheets in that manner and refrigerate for 15 minutes.

Heat the oil in a cauldron and fry the spring rolls till golden brown and crisp in texture.

Serve hot with mint and green chilli chutney.

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