Holige (Ganesh Chaturthi special)

Happy Gowri-Ganesha festival to all. I know wishing you all a bit late, but I got tied up with the festival preparations and couldn't wish all my blog friends. So here is a dish very traditional and must during this festival. I always get nostalgic during this festival as it's a big one in my maternal place and we always used to look forward for this festival even when we were young. With all the colorful flowers and clothes comes the traditional and elaborated lunch to fill the whole banana leaf made by the cook specially called for such occasion. They cook every dish on the wood fire pit and it has it's own smell and taste in the food. Oh! I guess I made some of you familiar with this nostalgic aswell. Once back from a long summer vacation with parents you always miss them more. Anyways here is the dish I made for this occasion.

Holige or Obbattu in Kannada is similar to Pooran Poli in Marati/Maharastra. It's a sweet dish made during special occasions or Festivals. It's made with dal/lentils as stuffing into the dough and rolling it out like paratha. It's one of the popular dish in Karnataka and my favorite to say;)

Ingredients:
1 Cup Toor Dal
1.25 Cup Jaggery
1 tsp Kuskus/poppy seeds
1tbsp Fresh or dry coconut
1 pinch Cardamom powder
2.5 cups All purpose flour/Maida
1 tsp Turmeric
A pinch of salt
2-3 tbsp Oil
Round shaped cut parchment paper about 8 inch circumference.

Method:
In a mixing bowl take all purpose flour, turmeric and salt and mix well. Now add little water and make a soft sticky dough. Pour 2-3 tbsp of oil and coat it well , cover it and keep it aside for at least 2-3 hours. Cook the toor dal in a pressure cooker with very little water, so the dal isn't broken completely but cooked. Cool it completely. Now in a heavy bottom pan take the jaggery and once it melts add kuskus, cardamom powder, coconut and mix well. Once it starts to get sticky add the cooked dal and keep mixing till it for a little dry dough. You can add a tbsp of ghee/ clarified butter if it's getting too sticky or too dry. Now cool it completely. Divided them into small balls.

Now take small ball of the all purpose dough and make it into a bowl shaped with your fingers exactly the way you do it to stuff the filling for partita. Now add the jaggery filling inside and close it. Put it on the parchment paper and start spreading to with hands making it into round and as thin as possible. Put it on a hot skillet with adding a little oil from your dough base and cook on both the sides. Make the rest of them and store in an airtight container or serve them warm. Left overs you can refrigerate and warm them in microwave for. 30 secs with a wet tissue paper on top. Enjoy it with a spoon of ghee and warm milk.