Congress Kadalekayi

We are on Day 3 in the Journey Through The Cuisines and here come the alphabet C. What looks like a simple and easy alphabet, made me go crazy! This and the other few, about which I will be talking later, when the time comes.

For now, a dish for C was a bit elusive.I didn't like a few that I heard / saw and a couple of others were already done.So moving from the circle of family recipes, I broadened my net to fit all of Karnataka cuisine recipes.

Even then nothing came to my liking.Out of the blue, I just remembered this name -Congress Kadalekayi and there it was - a good dish for C!!!

Congress Kadalekayi is a simple peanut snack that has a very interesting story behind its name. I read about this in a couple of places and I am really not sure if it is true, but it is interesting enough to share.

Well, years ago, the Congress party used to organize their political meetings in Bengaluru's Cubbon Park. So to attract members and the public, the committee went on to serve these spiced peanuts during or after the meets and it is said that folks were eager to attend this meet just to savor these peanuts!! And hence the name -Congress kadalekayi-the peanuts that were served in the Congress meetings!

Like I said earlier, I am not sure if this piece of information is authentic but its fun to read such info. But what is true is the fact that these peanuts are really very famous and extremely addictive .It is sold in almost all the bakeries across the city.

Usually, raw peanuts are roasted and the skin is removed and then this dish is made.It take a while to roast the peanuts so I took the short way out and used store bought roasted nuts with skin[I couldn't find the other variety] and used it in this recipe.So it got done under 5 minutes!

It is very simple to make and just takes a couple of ingredients and a few minutes of your time to get this snack ready. It is generally eaten as a tea time snack along with tea / coffee.

With the heat wave lashing out here, we had this with buttermilk. The kids loved it and kept repeating its name each time they grabbed a handful from the bowl.

I used:

Roasted peanuts - 150 grams
Red chili powder- 1/2 teaspoon
Asafoetida powder- 1/8 teaspoon
Turmeric powder- a pinch
Pepper powder- 1/2 teaspoon
Sugar- 1/8 teaspoon
Salt to taste
Curry leaves a few
Oil- 1 teaspoon

Remove and discard the peanut skin and split the peanuts.

Heat oil and add asafoetida powder, curry leaves.

Switch off the heat as soon as the curry leaves turn crisp and add the turmeric powder, chili powder and the peanuts[read note below]. Mix well. Add salt, sugar, pepper powder. Mix well to coat the spices. The snack is ready to be served,

Serve as a tea time snack...

Note:

It is better to add the chili powder after switching off the flame,else the chili powder will get burnt quickly and give an unpleasant color to the dish.
Adjust the quantity of red chili powder and pepper powder to suit your taste.