Ammini Kozhakattai

What is this ammini or miniature kozhakattai, you ask? When the outer covering is in excess of the filling and remains, my mom used to make this. I liked this much more than the normal modaks. So whenever I make modaks, I intentionally make more dough so that I can have my fill of these modaks.

These do not have filling, these are basically plain steamed rice balls but tempered with different spices.

I am listing first the traditional recipe and then the variations below.

Cook Time: 1 hr

Ingredients

• 1 cup Outer covering dough of modaks

• Salt, to taste

• 1 tsp Chilli powder

• 1/2 tsp Hing

• 1 tbsp Fresh grated coconut

To temper

• Oil

• Mustard seeds

• Torn curry leaves

Instructions

1. Mix all the ingredients except the tempering ingredients

2. Make small marble sized balls out of this

3. Steam them in an idli cooker lined with banana leaves for around 15 minutes

4. In a pan take oil and splutter mustard seeds and curry leaves

5. Add the steamed balls and saute for 2 minutes

Notes

There are many variations to this recipe:

1. Make plain balls out of the outer covering and steam them

2. In a pan take oil, add as much of the crumbled salt modak filling you like and saute for a minute

3. Add the steamed balls and saute for another minute more

4. Instead of salt modak filling, you can even use the dal crumble from my usili recipe and saute it with the plain steamed balls