What about breakfast in South India? Now that is an exercise in art and taste for which I had only read about before venturing into the states of Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Kerala. By far the most popular item served at home and in guest accommodations is idli. Four letters smooshed together pronounced id as in did, and li as in lee, don’t sound very tempting yet. Just wait.

What is Idli?

Idli is a soft, spongy white rice cake formed by steaming a fermented combination of rice and lentils. Regional variations on recipes exist resulting in different textures and tastes from Rava Idli which uses semolina as the batter base instead of rice to masala stuffed idli.

How to Cook Idli?

Just as regional variations exist for idli recipes, so too are the number of ways to cook the delicious rice cakes. In general idlis are made from two parts rice and one part fermented black lentils, or white urad daal. Lentils are washed and soaked for an extended period of time (preferably overnight) to allow fermentation. The rice and the daal are ground separately to different consistencies and then mixed together.

Special idli cooking trays make portioning easy while giving each disc a uniform look. These trays are then placed inside pressure cookers. The finished product is the base of a heavenly South India breakfast.

How to Serve Idli

What takes the round rice cake from idli to Incredible Idli!? It’s all in the accompaniments. Consider each rice patty a base from which to build a perfect breakfast. Next come the side dishes. Serving idli without the proper garnish would be sacrilege. Each one adds a different level of flavor. Popular sides are sambar and a variety of sauces such as coconut chutney, coriander chutney, and onion chutney. Even a dab of ghee can change idli into Incredible Idli!

How to Eat Idli

There is no wrong or right way to enjoy South Indian idli. The Full Stop India way is to set sambhar aside to enjoy as an after idli palette cleanser. Next, add the onion chutney as a base coating to each idli rice cake. Follow this with the coriander chutney before finishing with a final coating of coconut chutney. Cut into bite size pieces and slowly enjoy each morsel. Pace yourself! Idli can be deceptively filling after just one cake. Any more than two idli in one setting could result in button popping, belt loosening, stomach extending unpleasantness until lunchtime. End breakfast with a bowl of sambar (now around the perfect temperature to sip directly from the bowl).

How do you like to eat your idli? Tell us in the comments below.

Basic Idli Recipe

2 cups idli rava cream of rice
1 cups urud dal wash
1 tsp salt

Prepare

Rinse and soak the above ingredients in water for about 6 hours. Then grind urad dal split in a blender (with adding water in steps). Add idli rava by squeezing out water, add salt and keep it aside (to ferment) for 12 hours.

Take idli plates and place a drop of oil in each idli mold and spread it over the entire mold. Heat 2 cups of water in a large vessel or pressure cooker and place the filled idli plates and cover with lid. Heat in high for about 20 minutes. Remove the plates from the vessel and remove the idlis. Pour 2 tsp of sesame oil while serving.

While using pressure cooker for making idlis, the steam hole should not be covered by adding the cooker weight. Steam should escape freely.

Mornings are not a particularly popular time for the plethora of restaurants within the surrounding Jaisalmer Fort area. I’m not sure if most tourists have found accommodation with breakfast included or maybe my eating schedule of 8:00 – 8:30 AM was too early. Either way, one look inside any restaurant during normal breakfast hours will result in a room full of empty seats. Natraj Restaurant’s very clean exterior and immaculate dining hall (found after a healthy climb up stairs) was no exception.

A sole waiter sitting behind a desk scanning the morning’s printed headlines turned out to be the owner and cook. Fortunately, as the only customer in the place, the wait to have an order taken, prepared and ultimately served only depended on my simple order of aloo parantha and chai. It’s hard to judge a restaurant based on such a meager meal, except to say my plate didn’t stay empty but for a second before being restocked with a piping hot, fresh parantha straight from the kitchen. Any restaurant who doesn’t either offer or just bring a refill of parantha shouldn’t be in business. The crispy outer coating with ever so slightly a hint of salty ghee mixes perfectly with the soft, spicy goodness of potatoes inside. One helping is never enough. Combined with a bowl of fresh curd and steaming chai, this was an Indian breakfast of tourist champions.

Not one other traveler ventured up the twist and turns of stairs to reach the restaurant during the 45 minutes I spent there. Morning sun bathed the half covered, half uncovered seating area giving me full reign to snoop about while clicking away at sights below. Sounds of residents waking up could be heard in the short distance. That omnipresent hacking noise so many Indians can be heard making as they clear their bodies of yesterday’s pollution left me feeling as if I was waking up in someone’s own kitchen. And that’s a hard feeling to come by in the bamboozling city of Jaisalmer.

Lunch and dinner must be the bread winning meals of the day for Natraj Restaurant’s gentle, soft spoken owner. I vowed to return as all my Indian food favorites were on the menu, priced fairly for this tourist community.

When traveling India, most of my mornings are started with gobi paranthas for breakfast. Paired with a boiled egg and some chai, my hungry pains are covered until the late morning. Depending on the season or your location, gobi (cauliflower) may not be available and you’ll have to settled for aloo (potato). Parantha is stuffed whole wheat bread, similar to roti, with a spiced gobi or aloo filling. Served with pickled mango or chili peppers to really kick start your mornings, this staple of North Indian food can be found nearly anywhere.