Dal Pakwan

Dal Pakwan is an authentic breakfast delicacy in Sindhi homes. Visit a Sindhi family on a Sunday morning and you are likely to be greeted with the aroma of Dal Pakwan being prepared for breakfast.
I remember we ordered this dish from a restaurant for our breakfast and we all loved the taste of this dish and later my mom tried making this at home, from then it is frequently prepared at our home too. We have this dish for breakfast, sometimes for lunch or dinner too.

Dal

Ingredients

• 2 cups of gram dal
• 4 large potatoes.
• 1 medium onion
• 1 medium tomato
• 5-6 green chilies
• 4-5 tsp mint leaves
• 1/4 tsp turmeric powder
• 2-3 tsp oil
• Salt as per taste
• Water

Recipe

Soak gram dal for 5-6 hours. Later pressure cook the dal for 2-3 whistles.

Pressure cook potatoes. Peel off them and cut 3 potatoes into pieces.

Take half cup dal and 1 remaining potato in grinding jar. Add min leaves to it and grind them to a smooth paste.

Finely chop onion and tomato. Chop chillies into medium sized pieces.

Heat oil in a pan and add onions to it. Sauté them till they become soft. Now add tomatoes to it and cook well. Add chopped green chillies and mix well.

Now add gram dal, potato and min leaves paste to it and mix well. Add remaining dal and chopped potatoes to it. Add salt as per your taste. Add little water to it and cook well. Boil the mixture for 2-3 minutes.

Pakwan

Ingredients

• 2 cups of all purpose flour (maida)
• Salt as per taste
• 1 tsp oil for greasing dough
• Water to knead the dough 
• Oil for frying

Recipe

Take all purpose flour in a bowl. Add salt as per your taste and start adding little water to it. Knead the dough well like we make for roti. Grease the dough with oil and let it rest for few mins.

Heat enough oil for frying.

Make small balls out of the dough and roll medium sized roti out of it. Prick the rolled dough all over using a fork, this will limit the puris from puffing and will make them crispy.

Fry the puris till you get the golden color from both the sides. Transfer puris over the kitchen towel to remove excess oil from it.

After puris cool down to room temperature they become crispy.

Serving -

Take 2 pakwans (puris) in a plate. Add dal in a serving bowl, place the bowl in serving plate and serve. You can garnish the dal with some finely chopped onions and finely chopped coriander leaves.

(Rolling and pricking pakwan)

(Gram dal, potato and mint leaves mixture)

*Note - If you don't have green chillies available you can add red chili powder to the dal.

*Note - Quantity of green chili depends upon your taste.

*Note - If you like the taste of mint leaves you can increase the quantity of mint leaves in the paste.
*Note - I added a tsp of cumin seeds while kneading dough for pakwan, this is completely optional.