This Raw banana bajji is a crisp and tasty fritters made with raw unripe bananas or plantains and spiced gram flour batter. Make these delicious fritters easily under 30 minutes for your next evening snack.
Rinse and then peel the bananas (vazhakkai). Chop them into two to three equal pieces, horizontally. Then take each piece and slice in 3 to 4 pieces vertically. Put the slices in water so that they do not get discoloured.
Each slice should be of approximate 4 to 4.5 inches in height and ¼ inch in thickness.
Prepare the batter by mixing besan, rice flour, baking soda, salt, red chilli powder, asafoetida and turmeric powder.
Add little water in parts and mix. We need a thick batter. So avoid adding water once, as the batter may become thin. Mix to a thick batter without lumps.
Frying banana bajji
Now pat dry the raw banana slices on a kitchen towel.
Heat oil in a deep frying pan. Dip the banana slices in the batter and coat the banana slices completely with the batter.
Add the batter coated slices in the hot oil and fry the plaintain pakoras till golden brown.
Drain the fried plaintain pakoras on kitchen tissues to remove excess oil.
Serve banana bajji hot with green chutney or coconut chutney or tomato ketchup.
Notes
The recipe can be doubled or tripled.
The amount of spices can vary according to your taste.
You can swap gram flour with chickpea flour.
Fry the bajji in a medium hot oil. Keep the heat from medium to medium high. Frying them in a warm oil will make them absorb more oil and become soggy. Frying them in a very hot oil will the outside batter cook fast or get burnt and leaving the insides uncooked.
Use any high smoke point neutral oil for frying.
Make the batter to a thick flowing consistency. But do not make the batter very thick or else the outer texture will become doughy. A thin batter will not coat the banana slices well and they will absorb a lot of oil.