Sara- Your appalam gave it away.
me- huh?
she- ya, we make papadum not appalam
me- all the same no?
she- no papadum will puff up, appalam won't.
****Insert spinning wheels the kind they show in movies to depict flashbacks- I stayed in a small Kerala place called Makut for my field work, and the lady used to serve us dal with these puffed up appalam (I should start calling it papadum from now on). I have searched all over for this type of appalam sorry pappadum and wondered why mine would never puff like that. The lady also used to fry them in coconut oil it was so yum****
she- you get it in 5Star, ask him for kerala pap..
---CRASH---
I was so immersed in this scintillating conversation that I had failed to keep an eye on my boy. He had broken her ceramic cup. I wanted to dig a 20 feet hole and bury myself. Then I learnt that the bowl and the pebbles that it contained were something related to Feng Shui, and that finding a blue colour ceramic bowl was very difficult. Now I wanted to dig that 20 feet hole, pour 40lts HCl and jump into my HCl swimming pool. I apologized and hurriedly left her place trying ever so hard to think of a place that sold ceramic pots. I went to Singapore shoppe and saw a poster on the door "Happy Onam. Kerala Papadum available". The dumb store didn't have any ceramic bowls let alone blue so naturally the next thing I did was what every sane woman would do- bought the Kerala papadum :D
I brought it home, opened it and ooohh how different it was compared to the normal yucky appalams.
The 1st thing one notices is that the kerala papadum is not stiff like the normal ones.
Kerala papadum-
Yucky appalam-
You can actually roll it up whereas the other one...well just broke into 2 pieces (ok not sure how and why I thought I could roll a stiff appalam. Sometimes my brilliance is puzzling).
And when fried in oil it puffed up like so,
Flat boring appalam and puffed up aww..so cute papadum-
I most definitely liked the taste of kerala papadum (must be pretty obvious by now :D)- it's somewhat light and has a different type of crunch when compared to the appalam (again just like podis I have cough cough tested over 5 varieties of appalam- from Bindu to Ambika to Stag everything is just so meh). Henceforth, I would like you all to ditch the appalam and use Kerala papadum for all your daily and special meals. I would also like to blog-lically apologize to Sara on my boy's behalf for breaking her bowl and thank her for introducing me to Kerala Papadum.
PS- this post was most definitely not sponsored by the Kerala tourism board or the Kerala papadum association.
me- huh?
she- ya, we make papadum not appalam
me- all the same no?
she- no papadum will puff up, appalam won't.
****Insert spinning wheels the kind they show in movies to depict flashbacks- I stayed in a small Kerala place called Makut for my field work, and the lady used to serve us dal with these puffed up appalam (I should start calling it papadum from now on). I have searched all over for this type of appalam sorry pappadum and wondered why mine would never puff like that. The lady also used to fry them in coconut oil it was so yum****
she- you get it in 5Star, ask him for kerala pap..
---CRASH---
I was so immersed in this scintillating conversation that I had failed to keep an eye on my boy. He had broken her ceramic cup. I wanted to dig a 20 feet hole and bury myself. Then I learnt that the bowl and the pebbles that it contained were something related to Feng Shui, and that finding a blue colour ceramic bowl was very difficult. Now I wanted to dig that 20 feet hole, pour 40lts HCl and jump into my HCl swimming pool. I apologized and hurriedly left her place trying ever so hard to think of a place that sold ceramic pots. I went to Singapore shoppe and saw a poster on the door "Happy Onam. Kerala Papadum available". The dumb store didn't have any ceramic bowls let alone blue so naturally the next thing I did was what every sane woman would do- bought the Kerala papadum :D
I brought it home, opened it and ooohh how different it was compared to the normal yucky appalams.
The 1st thing one notices is that the kerala papadum is not stiff like the normal ones.
Kerala papadum-
Yucky appalam-
You can actually roll it up whereas the other one...well just broke into 2 pieces (ok not sure how and why I thought I could roll a stiff appalam. Sometimes my brilliance is puzzling).
And when fried in oil it puffed up like so,
Flat boring appalam and puffed up aww..so cute papadum-
I most definitely liked the taste of kerala papadum (must be pretty obvious by now :D)- it's somewhat light and has a different type of crunch when compared to the appalam (again just like podis I have cough cough tested over 5 varieties of appalam- from Bindu to Ambika to Stag everything is just so meh). Henceforth, I would like you all to ditch the appalam and use Kerala papadum for all your daily and special meals. I would also like to blog-lically apologize to Sara on my boy's behalf for breaking her bowl and thank her for introducing me to Kerala Papadum.
PS- this post was most definitely not sponsored by the Kerala tourism board or the Kerala papadum association.
So glad a broken blue bowl was the inspiration for this post.I was thinking of changing it anyway. Happy papadumming(!!)
ReplyDeleteHaa the Kerala pappadum....it's the SUN among all the other pappadums!!! The husband hates two things about Kerala.....the pappadum and curry leaves. He says I use them as if like my family owns a Pappadum business and a curry leaf farm :( :( But, nothing will make me give up on these beauties...and thank god Bay Area has a Kerala store that sells awesome pappadums.
ReplyDeleteBtw are you just going to write food post for the entire month and make me fatter by the day??
He He! I love papadums too and called appalams as the poor cousin in TN until my paati introduced me to something called rettai appalam. It is two appalams stuck with each other and when fried, beautifully forms layers. She got it from some maami somewhere.
ReplyDeleteNo pic of the blue bowl : ) ?
woohoo! glad you got introduced to pappadams :) according to my mom, they have a very low shelf life and need to be bought fresh. so i never bring them back when i go home. also, amma makes a small slit in the centre before frying so it doesn't completely puff up. if that happens, the pappadam becomes very... insubstantial, let's say. but you must know that these days pappadams are made with lots of cheap things that are not supposed to go into food. there's something called "kaaram" that they add to it which is typically used for washing greasy vessels in restaurants. it's a chemical or something.
ReplyDeleteanyhow, hope i haven't spoilt it for you :D
ps: since this is very commonplace in kottayam, my family goes seeking appalam and use only that. irony, eh?