Appam and Stew

Christmas time is a time of eating and making merry in our culture like a lot of cultures. In particular a lot of my compatriots will remember getting up early for the Christmas morning service and coming home with tummy rumbling to a delightful breakfast of appam and stew.  Today I recreate the magic for you with all locally available ingredients in Melbourne.  You will have to create the magic yourself, though! Both these recipes are gluten free with the option of making the stew vegetarian. 


 

For the Appam

This recipe makes about 20-24 6 inch diameter appams.

Raw white rice ( from Indian store) – 2 cups – cleaned and soaked in water

Cooked rice – 1 cup – soaked in water

2 heaped table spoons dessicated coconut

1 tablespoon sugar

A pinch of salt

2 teaspoons dry yeast.

Oil to coat appam wok.

Grind the raw rice, soaked rice, dessicated coconut, sugar and salt in a blender till smooth.  Mix in the yeast.  Let it rest for a couple of hours to allow the yeast to activate the batter.  This is the batter to make the appam and it has to be of similar consistency to pancake batter.

Once the batter is ready, use a well seasoned wok with a tight fitting lid to make the appams.  Add a cup of batter, swill it around the wok to leave a coating on the sides and a puddle in the middle. Close the lid.  The batter in the middle rises up and forms a spongy bread in the middle with a crisp lacy edging.  This is your appam bread.  It is gluten free and one of the staple foods in Kerala.  I find that depending on the type of wok I use like non stick coated or normal aluminium, I get a slightly different type of lace edging on my appam.

For the Stew

Chopped meat – about 500 grams (chicken, beef or goat) I have used goat this time.

2 cups of mixed chopped vegetables – whatever you may have handy at home. (beans, carrot, mushroom, potato) Hint: A torn cabbage leaf added at the end of cooking greatly enhances the flavor of this dish.

Crushed ginger and garlic – ½ a table spoon each

1 - 200 ml tin of coconut milk

2-3 cloves

2 sticks of cinnamon

½ teaspoon turmeric powder

2-3 green chillies, sliced

1 large onion, sliced
1-2 cups of julienned vegetables (carrots, beans, potatoes, green peas, roughly chopped cabbage)

 A table spoon of oil

½ teaspoon mustard seeds

1 stalk of curry leaves

½ a cup of milk if needed (optional)

Freshly ground black pepper – ½ teaspoon

Salt to taste

In a casserole dish, add the meat, turmeric, ginger garlic, cloves, cinnamon, green chillies, salt, a cup of water   and let it cook to almost done.  Add the vegetables next and the coconut milk and complete the cooking process.

In a wok, heat oil, add mustard seeds and when it crackles, add the curry leaves.  Add this to the stew. Check stew for salt, add freshly ground black pepper and serve hot with appam. You can thicken the stew at the end with some fresh full cream milk if desired.  This stew can be completely made with vegetables as well. 

Serve hot with the appams. The spongy appams soak up the stew and the dish just melts in your mouth.