How to make Bhel Puri at home?
Recipe of Bhel Puri – Here’s a simple step-by-step recipe that even kids can make. It is great for those hunger pangs – healthy and not too heavy on the stomach.
Bhel Puri is quintessentially Indian in heart 🙂 it is that easy-going Indian street food/chaat that everyone loves. It is a perfect evening snack along with a hot cuppa of Chai or piping hot coffee. For those who are calorie conscious, Bhel Puri falls under the healthy Indian recipes category as well.
The primary ingredient of Bhel Puri is Puffed Rice – Muri / Murmura in Hindi, Pori in Tamil or Mandakki in Karnataka. Puffed Rice is light and can be had a snack in itself. By itself it’s bland but when combined with spices it makes for a wonderful snack or Chaat. In fact an entire street-food industry thrives in India because of this simple ingredient and a simpler Chaat called Bhel Puri.
Bhel Puri belongs to the famous Indian chaat or street-food category. It is typically made in movable food carts along with other chaats such as Masala Puri, Pani Puri, Cutlet, and others.
Of all the chaats that there is, Bhel Puri is perhaps the healthiest since it has little or no fried ingredients in them. The semi-dry or Wet Bhel Puri will usually have Tomatoes, Onions and Potatoes in them. There are two kinds of Bhel Puri – Wet Bhel Puri and Dry Bhel Puri. What we have here is a semi-dry Bhel Puri, because we use ingredients such as Tomatoes which have a water content in them.
Most of the items that are mixed are dry and are an easy to consume a snack. Make this as an evening snack to go along with your Chai.
Depending on where you are in India, Bhel Puri is either served with spicy chutneys such as Chilli Chutne (Gujarati-style), Mint Chutney or Gujarati Coriander Chutney.
In this recipe for Bhel Puri, we’ve used Tomatoes, Onions, and Groundnuts as the side ingredients. Groundnuts really complete the soft Bhel by their crunchiness.
Some other Snack recipes are here:
If you need more Chutney recipes for Bhel Puri, here are 3 varieties from CookingwithSmita
How to make the Bhel Puris crisp?
If you want very crisp Bhel Puri, then the choice of Muri is very important. You get medium crisp to very crisp Murmuras that can be used for this.
My Bhel Puri has become soggy, what to do?
Bhel Puri needs to be served immediately after you mix them as the other ingredients such as Tomatoes, Onions and others release water into the Puri. This makes it soggy and unpalatable. There is a temporary fix – add fresh Bhel into the mix along with the required amounts of Salt and spices. It won’t fully solve the problem but will be definitely eatable
What other ingredients can I add in Bhel Puri?
You can add Khatta Meetha mixture, Nippat, some sev or roasted peas. But don’t overdo it as it might take away the original flavor and will make the final result too heavy.
Recipe for making Bhel Puri, below:
Bhel Puri Recipe
Equipment
- Bowl
Ingredients
- 1/2 cup Onion finely chopped
- 1/2 cup Tomatoes cut into circles
- 1/2 cup Cucumber English Cucumber can also be used
- 1 cup carrot finely grated
- 3 cups puffed rice
- 1 teaspoon chilli powder
- 1 teaspoon garam masala powder
- 3 tablespoon Ground nuts
- 1 tablespoon lemon juice extracted freshly from lemon
- 1 pinch salt as required
- 1 bunch coriander leaves for garnishing
How to make:
- In a big bowl, add onion, tomato, cucumber, carrot and mix well.
- Add puffed rice, chilli powder, garam masala powder, groundnuts lemon juice and salt.
- Finally add coriander leaves and bhel puri is ready to serve.
