Bottle gourd patties/sorakaya appalu

Bottle gourd patties are one of the tastiest Andhra snack/breakfast!!Before my marriage my mother used to make these patties,i like these patties very much .This is one of my favourite sanck ,but i ate these patties approximately 3 to 4 yrs back.This is my first time making after my marriage and reviving my memories.For this snack,I got compliments from my husband too :)

I am sure everyone likes to eat these patties!!

Bottle Gourd is very beneficial for health, especially for heart, and you can have a glass full of its juice if you are on a weight loss program too.

Ingredients:

Bottle gourd/ Sorakaya - 1 big
green chilies - 8 (3 tbsp paste ) or more depending on your taste
ginger-half inch piece
curry leaves-2 springs
chana dal-4 tsp- optional
Sesame seeds/ nuvvulu - 2 tbsp optional
peanuts-5 tsp -optional
Rice flour-required according to the moisture contained in the bottle gourd
Oil for deep frying
mint and coriander leaves-1 bunch of each

Preparation:

1.Wash the green chilies(remove stems) and ginger ( and peel the skin of ginger) , put it in the blender , make a coarse paste.

2.wash the bottle gourd and Grate the gourd, no need to peel the skin. To the grated gourd add green chili-ginger paste, salt, curry leaves ,coriander leaves ,now mix well.

3.To this mixture add rice flour as much as the mixture takes until you are able to make nice dough out of it, do not add any water . The amount of rice flour adding to the grated mixture depends on the moisture in the bottle gourd.The mixture sholdn't be too hard or too loose.

4.Once the dough is made,taste it and if you want add more chili paste or salt .Make small ball (the size of a golf ball), apply some oil to one side of a ziploc bag. Now using your fingers press it into a nice even round shape or you can use a poori press using two ziploc bags on each side of the press.

5.Take a deep pan and heat enough oil, slowly take the appam from the cover and slide it in the oil fry it until the edges are little brown.

6.If you are health concious ,just fry it like chapathi on the flat pan. Enjoy the patties!!

This is my entry to the WYF : Cuisine event at Simple Indian Food.

Note:1. you can eat these patties without any chutney or with any chutney.In both the ways it tastes too good!!

2.You can make this appam soft or crispy depending on your taste. To make soft ones, dough should not be too hard and do not fry it for too long. And vice versa for the crispy ones.

3.If you feel the gourd contains more moisture ,just remove some water (after grating) out of it otherwise you have to add more rice flour and it will take more time to fry all patties and you may feel tired and sometimes the quantity of flour is more than the quantity of grated gourd and it may not taste that good.