Greetings, My dear Hive Fellows.
After a long time, I have tried something new as an experimental recipe. It is a kind of 'Vegetable Pakoda', but not exactly the same as you are used to if you are not from the Indian subcontinent region. In our country, we call it 'Beguni', which means something prepared from eggplant. It is a deep-fried food, so I don't eat too much, and usually, it is mainly served in street food shops in Bangladesh. Only during Ramadan, the sacred month for Muslims all over the world, do people prepare such things during their Iftar time. When I was in Bangladesh and lived in a mess with shared an apartment with some other friends, we used to buy these kinds of delicious items for our Iftar. Though it is quite unhealthy from the street shops as they used their oil many times but in home it can be quite healthy if you can make sure the oil you are using is healthy enough. I have used olive oil to make them less unhealthy by frying them in a half-deep frying process.
Though it is important take good and healthy foods during the iftar time but in Bangladesh you can find that most of the Iftar items are not good at all but people love enjoying those after the whole day of fasting. I was also very familiar with the trend when I was in my home country, but after I came to China, my habit of eating those deep fries and fast foods was not included in my Iftar as I used to break my fast with dates and often with the dinner after breaking my fast. It is healthier and more comfortable to maintain the stomach-related problems that I had with unhealthy foods.
But it is true that those unhealthy foods were as delicious as usual, with the processed ingredients and tons of bad oil in them. And in China, I often try to prepare some foods that are my favourite but, most of the time, a little bit unhealthy. Such a recipe of Beguni is also included among those foods. I have never tried this, and today, I wanted to try this as an experimental step. Also, to prepare Beguni, you don't need any uncommon ingredients as I have almost everything that is needed to prepare. The Eggplant and Gram flour are the main raw material.
The process starts with the cutting of eggplant as thinner slice and soak them in salted water to make it tastes better. And make a dough with the gram flour by mixing some masalas like chilli powder, turmeric powder and Garam masala powder and a little salt. Pour a little more water to make it thick liquid to put a good cover on the eggplant. Also, adding a little bit baking soda will make it more crispy and swollen. After dipping the eggplant slice in the dough liquid, place them in the hot oil. When the bottom side is okay, split the slice and cook untill you get a brown color as in my photos. Then take them and place them on a oil soaking paper to make them contain less oil. And Finally the Beguni is ready to serve with some tomato ketchup.
Though it was first time for me to prepare it all on a sudden but I love the taste and I feel that I ma quite good making such delicious foods at home.
I hope you like my photos of the delicious Beguni which can eaten as a kind of snacks in anytime with simple process to make them. If you have any queries, let me know in the comments, and I will try my best to answer them as much as I can afford.
Thanks a lot for your time and attention. I will catch up with you at the next one.
Wish you a good day!
All the photos are taken by me and these are my own properties.
