Cumin Bhajia with Tatziki

In my primary school, we used to wash our classrooms every Friday afternoon before heading home for the weekend. This not only instilled a sense of responsibility and cleanliness in us but made our learning environment a lot more conducive. We would wash our classroom as fast as we possibly could so that we could proceed to play for the rest of the afternoon. When we were released to go home on Friday, my friends and I would walk home instead of taking public matatu transportation. We would indulge in our silly girly musings and pass by some shops not too far from school to buy bhajias. I always made sure to save my 5 shillings so that I did not miss out. To us, this signaled the end of the school week and we ushered in the weekend with the tastiest snacks which were very popular with school going children. The bhajias we bought from the neighbourhood shops were usually served with some chilli powder and/or salt. Today, I went down memory lane and made my bhajia with a cumin infused batter together with the creamiest tatziki dip that’s both easy to make and tasty to have.

I hope you enjoy this as much as I did.

Here is what you will need:

For the bhajia

3 large potatoes
Garam (chick pea) flour
½ green bell pepper
1 table spoon of Ground Cumin
1 table spoon of Ground coriander
½ teaspoon of Tumeric
Salt

Method

Mix the dry ingredients (ground cumin, salt, ground coriander, turmeric, garam flour) together first until they are evenly distributed.
Then add some water bit by bit until the mixture becomes slightly thicker than pancake batter. Do not make it too stiff or too light though.
Grate your bell pepper, add it to the batter and mix. It should look like this:

Boil your potatoes for about 20 minutes or until they are just beginning to become soft. Be careful not to make them too soft since they will disintegrate as you cut through them. Slice them width wise with a thickness of about 1/4 of an inch.

Once your batter is ready and your potatoes chopped, dip them in the batter and once they are coated, place them in the hot oil on medium heat.

** Make sure the oil is not too cold as this will result in soggy bhajia, neither should it be extremely hot since this will make them brown too fast if not burn.

Turn after two minutes to have both sides cook. Then remove from the heat, drain them then serve them.

For the tatziki dip

120 g of thick Plain youghurt
½ cucumber, seeded
½ tea spoon of salt
½ teaspoon of black pepper
Freshly squeezed ½ lemon
2 crushed garlic cloves

Put your plain yoghurt in a container.
Grate your cucumber and let it fall on a paper towel. This absorbs the excess liquid. After the paper towel is soaked, take the cucumber in handfuls and squeeze out the as much of the remaining liquid as you can. This is the most important step of making a tatziki since is prevents the cucumber from diluting it. Once you have squeezed out as much liquid as you possibly can, add this to the yoghurt.

Mix in the lemon juice, freshly pounded garlic, coriander, salt and pepper.

Serve chilled.

I can not begin to describe how heavenly this dish tasted. The bhajias were perfectly browned, and the cumin flavor was subtle but very memorable. They were crunchy on the outside and soft on the inside.

The dip had the perfect balance between the tang of the lemon, the heat of the pepper, the wholesomeness of the garlic and this was all elevated by the creaminess of the yoghurt. This dip can also go really well with grilled chicken.

Once you have some hot bhajia dipped in chilled tatziki your life purpose will have been fulfilled… seriously!

Perfect dip, for the perfect bhajias!

You can also have these bhajias with the sauce we made here.

When you want something different from your fries or want to try a different potato dish, try these cumin bhajia with tatziki sauce. You will love them!

Stay Happy,

Kaluhi

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