How to make perfectly cooked Upma
Upma is a delicious, flavorful savory dish specially prepared for breakfast. It is a very popular dish in India just as Poha. It is an old recipe and often prepared in almost every kitchen.
Some tips to make perfect Upma
The most important step to make upma is to roast the sooji properly. If the sooji is not properly roasted, it will feel sticky while eating. You will be not able to chew the upma. Even while preparing Sooji ka Halwa, the taste entirely depends on how nicely the sooji is roasted in the ghee.
Moreover adding some flavorful ingredients to the upma makes the dish more tasty. One of the ingredient often added is urad or moong dal, this entirely changes the texture and flavour of upma.
The other and most important ingredient to add is ginger. Ginger enhances the taste of upma to a different level, try this step and believe me next time you will never make upma without adding ginger.
One more important ingredient which should not be missed out for more flavor is curry leaves. Curry leaves has its own aromatic flavour which makes any dish delicious. So for making upma never miss out curry leaves. Always add hot boiling water while cooking upma. Hot water is easily soaked by sooji and it cooks properly.
Ingredients:
- Sooji – 1 cup
- Chopped onion – 1 medium
- Grated ginger – 1 tsp
- Cumin/jeera – 1 tsp
- Chopped Green chilli – 4 to 5
- Curry leaves – 5 to 6
- Peas/peanuts – a fistful
- Yellow split Moong dal – 2 tbsp
- Salt – to taste
- Oil – 2 tbsp
- Chopped coriander – to garnish
- Hot water – 2 cups
Also try my other recipes for breakfast,
4 Easy ways to make namkeen and spicy parathas
Method:
- Wash and soak the moong dal in warm water for half-hour. Instead of moong dal you can also use urad dal.
- Heat 1 tbsp of oil in a kadhai. Add sooji and roast it till light brown color. Keep the flame on low. This will take around 10 to 15 minutes.
- Remove the roasted sooji in a plate.
- In the same kadhai heat the remaining oil.
- Also on the other side keep 2 cups of water for boiling. Quantity of water depends on the quality and variety of sooji. If sooji is fine texture then less water will be required but if sooji is coarse then more water is used. So boil some extra water.
- If you are using peanuts then add peanut to the oil and roast it for 1 minute on low flame.
- Add cumin, green chilli, curry leaves, and soaked moong dal.
- Sauté for 2 minutes.
- Add chopped onion and cook till golden color.
- Once the onion is cooked, add green peas (if using peas instead of a peanut) and mix.
- Cook the green peas for few minutes, then add the roasted sooji and sauté for a minute.
- Add the boiling water and cover with a lid immediately, as the water is hot, it will spatter out.
- Lower the flame.
- Season with salt as required and mix properly.
- Add water as per the consistency you prefer. Some like the upma to be dry or some prefer it to be more moist.
- After a minute remove the lid and mix properly.
- Cook for 5 minutes.
- Garnish with chopped coriander.
- Serve hot with lime pickle.
