Ela ada , chakka varatti and jack fruit chips makes me nostalgic and brings lot memories with it. During Jack fruit season (March to August) in Kerala, especially during summer vacations time grandma used to make large containers of jack fruit chips for us to munch during the vacation. I usually visited her during that time as there is a festival in the nearby temple at that time. During night time serious plays, Kathakali and ganamela (singing songs from various movies) are staged. To see this festivities, myself, aunt and grandma used to go with packet full of jack fruit chips and small sheet (as precaution, if I fell asleep during the late night, they wanted me to sleep in that sheet, instead of soil in the temple grounds) . Thinking back, I am amazed how I could sleep in loud noise. If you are a kid and tired, you don’t care about the noise I guess? When Jackfruits ripen during the end of summer grandma made chakka varatti ( Jackfruit preserve: usually made with ripe fruit and Jaggery). It is a tedious process as somebody needs to stir continuously to prevent the fruit from sticking the bottom of the pan. Once made it is stored in Bharani (china pot) for several months. She packs some for her daughters –in-law and daughters to take back. If some guests popped up for evening tea then there will be ela ada or elaappam using some of chakka varatti. Or some time chakka prathaman (Jackfruit pudding) is made for some occasions. Any way we kids had a great fun with all treats. With the Chakkavarati provided by grandma, amma used to make ela ada for our after school evening snack.
Ela ada means rice wrappers made with some sweet filling. Usual filling are jaggery and coconut, and chakkavaratti (Jackfruit preserve) or some aval (rice flakes), coconut and jaggery. From small tea shops also you can get ela ada where they use either jaggery coconut filling or rice flakes coconut jaggery filling some time ripe plantain in jaggery too. Appa also used to buy Ela ada from the tea shops for us.
As I mentioned earlier this time during our India visit we didn’t go to Kerala. However my sister in law who went to Kerala for Onam brought back some of the goodies I was looking forward to have, such as chakka varatti, mold for acchappam, handloom cotton dress for little princess etc. Okay I got chakka varatti, now I needed banana leaves to make ela ada. I planted banana plant year before last and got only small leaves, most of the leaves are broken into pieces by wind, if this is the case of leaves, and then what about fruit forget it. After growing with so much expectation, it died during winter. My hubby, who was not interested in any more banana plant, removed all the shoots so that it can’t come back later. So my dream of banana leaves from garden got a sudden death. He always tells me you can buy leaves from store. Okay when you go to store, there is always big packet of banana leaves, he will say why you want big packet you need only few leaves. So buying banana leaves is out of question. You can ask Andrea (our friend who has banana tree) he would say. Finally I told him I need some leaves for Ela ada and I am going to buy it. We bought few leaves and made ela ada yesterday.
Ela ada and ela appam is made with similar ingredients difference in the way of making. In the former rice is ground into a pancake batter and then stuffed with sweet filling and wrapped in banana leaves and steamed where as in the latter rice and chakka varatti are mixed and grind together to form a uniform paste and wrapped in banana leaves and steamed.
While searching through Ela ada recipe in the Google, I found out there two versions. One is traditional time consuming that requires soaking of rice of 5 hours and then grinding them into fine paste. Whereas other version using store bought rice flour since I want to use my precious chakka varatti. I followed traditional version. If you take effort then the end result will be good. I added a little bit extra jaggery, freshly grated coconut and cardamom along with chakka varatti. Trust me they are absolute sweet parcels you can dream about. Banana leaves impart such a flavor to the dish, you can’t replace with anything. You need to add ½ cup extra coconut to use of amount rice in the recipe, I have some leftover of rice batter without any sweet filling. So increase the amount of sweet filling. Here goes the recipe.
Print recipe from here
How I made
For outer covering
Raw rice: ¾ cup
Boiled rice: ¾ cup
Gingerly oil: 1 tablespoon
Banana leaves: 8 nos ( 13x 10 inch)
Salt: 1 teaspoon
Water: 4 cup for soaking + 2 ½ cup for grinding
For filling
Chakka varatti/ Jackfruit preserve: 1 cup
Freshly grated coconut: 1 cup
Jaggery: ⅕ cup
Water: ¼+ ⅕ cup
Cardamom: 3 no
How I made
Soak the both rice for 5 hours with 4 cup Water. After 5 hours of soaking drain the rice in colander and grind into fine paste with 2 cup of water. To the batter add salt and gingerly oil and mix and set aside. The batter should be thick as pancake batter.
In a small sauce pan add ⅓ cup water and jaggery heat until jaggery dissolves completely. Remove from the fire and strain the jaggery syrup to remove any impurities.
In the same sauce pan add jaggery syrup, chakka varati and coconut and heat it.
Once chakka varati is loosened and all the ingredients mixed well add the crushed cardamom. It took about 4 minutes. Switch off the flame and set aside.
Wash the banana leaves in the running water and season it on open flame (Hold the banana leaves for 30 seconds on the flame so that leaf starts pliable, and then remove them from the flame) set aside.
Take one leaf, and in the inner side of banana leaf add ¼ cup of rice batter and spread it like a pancake.
To this add 2 tablespoon of sweet filling and spread it so that the rice layer is covered with the sweet layer.
First fold it from bottom part and then tuck in sides and fold again to form a parcel.
In a steamer, ( I used Idly steamer) arrange banana leaf parcel one by one.
Close the lid and steam it for about 15 minutes or until color of the leaves changes from green to brown and firm to touch.
Enjoy warm as much as you wish.
Preparation time: Outer cover: 5 hours of rice soaking + 5 minutes of grinding rice
Sweet filling: 7 minutes
Assembly: 15 minutes
Steaming: 15 minutes
Yield: 6 no
Verdict: yummy
Will you make it again: Depending upon the availability of chakka varatti I will make it.
This is Swathi ( Dr. Ambujom Saraswathy Ph.D) from Zesty South Indian Kitchen who loves to explore cuisines from all over the world. Whenever possible I try to to give an Indian touch to several of the world cuisine, and has weakness for freshly baked bread. All the recipes you see here are created by me and approved after taste-test by my family.
Shella says
Mummy de orma vannu....... We get Chaka here, but never brought it coz I am not such a fan!! But your pics make me want it - Shella http://www.kitchensecrets.blogspot.com
Shanavi says
omg, awesome, drooling here..
http://jellybelly-shanavi.blogspot.com
MiniBinoy says
ohh swathyyyy, this has been my fav since childhood!..really kothiyavunnu.. i luv that jaggery coconut filling!!i am so lazy to make it since i get it from my mom whenever i crave for it!!. now ur clicks make me feel like calling on my mom!!but wn she makes it she cooks it on a hot tava, till the leaves become brown.. try it next time!!
Usha says
This is one of my favorites and has been a while since I made it! Looking at your pictures now, I wish I could grab one through the screen, looks perfect !
Sarah Naveen says
iyyyoo!!!! adipoli..kothiyayittu vayya...i love this filling..yummyyyyyy
Sreelekha Sumesh says
Ohhh!kothipichu konnu.yummmm yummm.Chakka varatti nu kelkumbo thanne kothiyanu :)so tempting pics da.
El Oteador de los Mercados says
An authentic recipe irresistible. And what I like is that it is another way to prepare the dishes that I may be able to adapt to the ingredients we have around here. Congratulations.
Adelina says
wow a million times- I am bookmarking this for trial- and what an amazing presentation! Love it- no flattering words here- you are the best!
Rachana says
What an interesting new dish. A great preparation and am sure must have tasted good too 🙂
Silence Sings says
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Jay says
Never tried this recipe...sounds amazing ...excellent clicks...I will def try this weekend...thanks for sharing dear..
Tasty Appetite
Cooking Gallery says
This sounds like a very yummy dessert! Thanks for sharing!
Hamaree Rasoi says
Very delicious dish. Thank you for showing it in a step by step method. Very well made.
Deepa
Hamaree Rasoi
Pushpa says
Delicious!!Delicious!!Delicious!!
Pushpa @ simplehomefood.com
Gulmohar says
love this...kothiyayittu vayyeee...Got to get hold of some plantain leaf soon...:-)
Nitha says
wow.. that really makes me drool...
Faith says
What a delicious dish! The rice wrappers look like so much fun to make and the filling you used is delicious with the jackfruit preserve (I would love to be able to find this!) and coconut!
Foodie Ann says
I love ela ada its been a looooong time since had this...its making me droool...:)
Priya says
Absolutely divine, truly tempting ela ada..
Panchpakwan says
Sounds so yummy with jackfruit flavour init..
PALATABLE says
Sounds healthy and yummy, the wrapper is a lot of work but worth the effort, turns out great..
http://treatntrick.blogspot.com
women-wisdom.com says
Delicious Ada with Jackfruit preservere. This is new to me. I love these types of steamed wrappers. Glad to follow you.
Hamsamalini chandrasekaran
http://indianyummykitchen.blogspot.com
kothiyavunu.com says
eswara..vayil kappalodan thodaghi..chakka varatti ennu parayumbol thanee kothiayee athundekodi ella adayum..haaaa..ingane kothipikkallee swathi..:)chakka varattiokkee kazhichu kalam marannu dear.:(
kitchen queen says
lovely ada very tempting and inviting.
Kairali sisters says
Ohhw made me nostalgic too, Swathi..I miss ela ada and jackfruit chips the most...Looks heavenly....
aipi says
Absolutely beautiful..a very new n interesting dish!
As I totally adore jackfruits ..might just try it..a very very well explained recipe with great pictorials ..good one Swathi:)
US Masala
sinfullyspicy says
Looks really yummy Swathi...and its something really new to me.Liked the way you showed step by step pics.
Silence Sings says
DEar Swathi, it is really appreciated for sharing such an informative post with us...For that I came to know about the detail of a dish which is totally new to me....Thanks again...The dish looks grt...
Sushma Mallya says
Looks like a lot of work but worth trying this one...looks yummy swathi...
Satya says
wow swati what a superb dish ...very nicely explained ..i enjoyed each n every bit of it ...n i am sure it tastes awesome too
Satya
http://www.superyummyrecipes.com
Hari Chandana says
Wowwwwwww... sounds too good.. thanks for the delicious recipe 🙂
ladyyjae says
ouuu! Thanks for sharing - this is another new dish to me. Looks tasty and easy to make eh? I think I would need to go out and try indian food one day. there's so much different cuisines here in toronto! Thanks for sharing lady!!
It's FRIDAY! Enjoy the lovely weekend!
jen @ http://www.passion4food.ca
Joanne says
Mmm I've never had jackfruit before but I hear it's delicious! This preparation of it is new to me! Very intriguing.