Indari Appam / Pesaha Appam & Pal

Indari appam and pesaha  paal is made only one’s in a year on Munday Thursday.  This is the day we celebrate the Last Supper of Jesus Christ with the Apostles.  It is in remembrance of the Passover meal, that we make the unleavened bread. 

The Kerala Syrian Catholics follow the tradition of making Indari Appam and Pesaha Pal, wherein after the Mauday Thursday church service all the family members and friend come together and elders cut and give the appam and pal to everyone.

As I always say for me every food  is associated with lots of memories. When we were kids, I remember my mother and her friend our own Chunni Aunty would share in their knowledge of the recipe.  As those days there were no phones to talk to your mother or aunts to get the recipe and we were staying in Nagpur.  Finally both of them would make their version of appam and pal.  And we as kids waited desperately for the mass to get over and then to reach back to our home to taste it. It was real partying time. And then we went back to the church for the worship of the Eucharist in Malayalam.  All of us would sleep royally on church floor and our parents prayed.

As we grew up we went out of Nagpur to study and work and started staying in hostels.  As Good Friday was a holiday, we traveled back from our respective palaces on thursday evening and started missing all these celebration.  But on Friday morning when we reached back home. The first thing we asked mom was the leftover Pal. So, the best part is to drink the leftover pal the next morning.  It tastes heavenly.

Till date I call up Chinnu aunty every Mauduy Thursday before I start preparing the appam.  I call her in the pretext of check the quantity or the ingredient. But I know from my heart that it’s a ritual which I can’t break.  “A remembrance of my Mother”.

So her I go with the recipe ; 

Indari Appam

Ingredients

Roasted Rice Powder – 2 ½ cup

Grated Coconut – 1 cup

Urad Dal – 5 tsp

Jeera / cumin – 1 tsp

Garlic – 5 to 6

Sambar onion - 6

Salt to taste

Water as required

Method

1.      Soak urad dal for 2-3 hrs.
2.      Grind together soaked dal, cumin, onion and garlic into a paste.
3.      Grind the coconut to a course paste.
4.      Put both of this paste in a mixing bowl and add in the rice flour. 
5.      To this add in the water to make a thick batter (it should be thicker than a idli batter). Mix it nicely.
6.      Line a round steel or aluminum plate with a banana leaf and grease it with oil.
7.      Now pour the batter in the greased plate.
8.      Get your stemmer/idle cooker ready with water.
9.      Take two palm leaf which you got on Palm Sunday. Cut the edges, one should be bigger than the other.
10.  Just before keeping the batter in the stemmer make a cross in the center with the palm leaf.
11.  Steam it till it is cooked about 20 min.
12.  Once it is done let it cool before you remove it from the container. 
13.  It is ready to serve with Pesuha/Archana Pal on Mauday Thursday.

Pesaha Paal

Ingredients

Coconut milk – from 2 coconuts (about 3-4 cups)

Gud/ Jaggery/ Sharkara – ½ kg

Rice powder – 4 tsp to thicken

Cardamon powder – ¼ tsp

Cumin/ jeera powder – ¼ tsp

Method

1.         Grate the jaggery.

2.         In one cup of water melt the Jaggery.

3.         Filter this syrup.

4.         Add one more cup of water to this and boil.

5.         Dissolve rice flour in a little water and add it to the above mixture ( stirring continuously), so that the mixture thickens. Switch of the heat.

6.         Now add the coconut milk and heat on low flame, stirring continuously.

7.         While it is getting heated  cut small pieces of the palm leaf  you got on Palm Sunday.

8.         Now add the cardamom powder and cumin powder and mix well.

9.         It is ready to be blessed and consumed with Indari appam along with your family on Maundy Thursday evening.