Regional cuisine along the Konkan coasts of Maharashtra makes abundant use of local, seasonal ingredients to create recipes that are warm and wholesome delights. Lightly spiced but packed with flavour, these delicacies are made on festive occasions or to mark celebratory affairs like weddings, baby showers and small rituals. One such dish is the ghavan-ghatala, a rice flour pancake served with delicious coconut kheer.
Ghavan-ghatla is almost an heirloom recipe, passed down from grandmothers who keep alive the cultures and flavours of Konkani cuisine through these delicious feasts. The sweet and savoury cucumber pancakes are generally made on Gauri Poojan as an offering to goddess Parvati. Ghavan are paired with ghatla, or coconut milk kheer for a complete meal enjoyed as lunch.
Image Credits: Better Butter
The month of Sawan or Shravan means heavy showers that work their charm on the rice fields in Konkan. This season also brings respite to the local farmers and fishermen from hard labour and are a time to express their gratitude to the forces of nature. Shravan is filled with many small festivals worshipping gods and goddesses and one of them is the Mangalagaur, a festival for newly-wedded women to pray to goddess Parvati. With coconuts in abundance, many delicacies are made from this sweet fruit, including the ghatla, presented as an offering to the goddess.
Women along the coast laboriously work to draw coconut milk out of freshly grated coconuts to make the ghatla, which blends together jaggery, rice flour and cardamom powder to celebrate the flavours of these humble ingredients. The rice flour thickens the ghatla which can then be used as a curry for dipping warm ghavan lathered in ghee. A wholesome meal packed with mild Konkani flavours, this comforting dish is a must-have during Sawan. Check out the recipe below:
Ingredients
For The Ghavan
1 cup grated cucumber (if you are opting for plain, rice flour ghavan, drop the cucumber and use 1 full cup of rice flour to make the pancakes)
1 cup grated jaggery
1 cup milk
½ cup rice flour
½ tsp baking soda
Oil for shallow frying.
For The Ghatla
¾ cup freshly grated coconut
1 cup coconut milk
3 tbsp jaggery
2 tbsp rice flour
1 tsp cardamom powder
Pinch of salt
Method:
1. For the ghavan, put cucumber and jaggery in a pan and mix well. Stir continuously before adding rice flour.
2. Mix all the ingredients and remove from the heat. Let the mixture cool.
3. In a mixing bowl, add the cooled mixture, rice flour and baking soda. Pour in milk so that the batter acquires a slightly liquid consistency.
4. To make the ghavan, pour some oil onto a girdle and when it is hot enough, ladle the batter onto the tawa like a pancake.
5. For the ghatla, add shredded coconut, salt, cardamom and jaggery to a pan. When the jaggery has melted, add in the rice flour and keep stirring to avoid lumps.
6. Next, pour in the coconut milk gradually and let it warm for another two minutes before taking it off the flame. Pour the ghatla into a bowl and garnish with pistachios. Ghavan-ghatla is now ready to be enjoyed.