R101Ragi Banana Pancake
Finger millet, banana and no added sugar at all
R100
Baked Ethakka Appam
Pazham pori out of the oven, and what that costs
Photograph: Adobe Stock · representative of the dish
The re-engineeringThe frying is gone and nothing else has changed except the jaggery, which halves. A fried portion absorbs about 14 g of oil; a baked one absorbs the 2.5 g you brush on. Energy falls from about 332 kcal to 215 kcal a portion and saturated fat from about 12 g to 0.6 g.
Say what is lost first, because it is real. Deep-frying makes a shell that shatters, because water leaving the batter at 180°C (350°F) blows it into a rigid lace. An oven cannot do that. What you get instead is a crust that is crisp at the edges and tender-chewy in the middle, closer to a good baked ada than to a pazham pori. It is a different pleasure, not a diminished one, and the banana tastes far more of banana without frying oil over it.
Before you start: Heat the oven and the tray together. Batter meeting a hot tray sets instantly and does not spread into a puddle, which is the single difference between a good baked version and a bad one.
Baked Ethakka Appam
Active 20 minutes Total 45 minutes
Scale
4 servings
Ingredients — tap to tick off
- ✓400 g (2 medium) ripe nendran plantains, peeled and cut lengthways into 4 slices each
- ✓50 g (6 tbsp) rice flour
- ✓20 g (2½ tbsp) refined wheat flour (maida)
- ✓15 g (1 tbsp, packed) jaggery, grated
- ✓2 g (⅓ tsp) ground turmeric
- ✓3 g (½ tsp) ground cardamom
- ✓1 g (¼ tsp) salt
- ✓90 ml water
- ✓10 g (2 tsp) sesame (gingelly) oil, for brushing
Allergens: Sesame, gluten (wheat).
Equipment: Oven; heavy baking tray; baking parchment; pastry brush. Substitute: an air fryer at 190°C (375°F) for 12–14 minutes gives a slightly crisper result in two batches. A tawa or heavy frying pan with a lid also works — 4–5 minutes a side over a low flame, with a brushing of oil — and gives the best crust of the three.
Per serving (estimated)
| Energy | 215 kcal |
| Protein | 3 g |
| Fibre | 3 g |
| Net carbohydrate | 43 g |
| Total carbohydrate | 46 g |
| Sugars | 26 g |
| Fat | 3 g |
| Saturated fat | 0.6 g |
| Sodium | 100 mg |
From ICMR-NIN IFCT 2017 and USDA FoodData Central. Per-serving figures stay the same when you scale.
Method — tap a step to mark it done, tap a time to start a timer
- Heat the oven to 200°C (400°F) with the baking tray inside it.
- Whisk the rice flour, wheat flour, jaggery, turmeric, cardamom and salt with the water into a batter the consistency of single cream — thick enough to coat a slice and thin enough to drip off in a steady thread, not a blob. Rest it so the flours hydrate.
- Slice the plantains lengthways into four flat pieces each, about 8 mm thick. Thinner and they dry out; thicker and the centre stays starchy.
- Line the hot tray with parchment, working quickly, and brush the parchment with half the sesame oil.
- Dip each slice into the batter, let the excess run off for two or three seconds, and lay it on the hot tray with space between the pieces. Crowding makes them steam.
- Brush the tops with the remaining oil and bake , until the batter has set opaque and is beginning to blister and colour at the edges.
- Turn each piece with a thin spatula and bake a further , until both sides are golden with darker freckles and the underside lifts cleanly without sticking. Golden, not brown — the batter contains sugar and goes from golden to bitter in about two minutes.
- Rest on the tray before lifting. Straight from the oven the crust is soft; after three minutes it firms up as the surface steam leaves.
Why this worksDeep-frying transfers heat through oil, and the oil that carries it stays in the food — 14 g a portion, at 9 kcal a gram. An oven transfers heat through air, so the same starch gelatinisation and browning happen with only the fat you brush on. The turmeric matters: it supplies the golden colour the eye reads as fried, and appearance is part of how a snack satisfies.
Sourcing note
Nendran is the plantain this dish is built on — long, angular, ripening to deep yellow, sold as "Kerala banana" or "nendran" frozen and fresh in South Asian groceries. Where it is unavailable, a large ripe plantain from a Caribbean or African grocer is the right substitute; ordinary dessert bananas are too soft and will collapse. The fruit must be ripe enough to smell sweet through the skin but still firm enough to slice cleanly — a fully soft banana turns to purée on the tray.
If you are watching…
Blood sugar: this is still 43 g of net carbohydrate and 26 g of sugars a portion, and baking does not change that. Ripe nendran is a sugary fruit and no cooking method makes it otherwise. Eat one piece rather than two, eat it after a meal containing a pulse rather than on an empty stomach at four o'clock, and treat it as the carbohydrate of that meal rather than an addition to it.
Cholesterol: the reason to make this version. Saturated fat drops from about 12 g to 0.6 g a portion, which over a daily habit is the largest single saturated-fat reduction available anywhere in this book.
Blood pressure: 100 mg a portion, and it can be nil — the salt is there for flavour balance, not structure.
Swap it
Ragi flour for the refined wheat flour → Consequence: earthier, darker, less crisp, and fibre rises by about 2 g a portion.
No jaggery in the batter → Consequence: sugars fall from 26 g to about 22 g and the crust browns less, because there is less sugar to caramelise. With a properly ripe fruit you will not miss it.
Green plantain instead of ripe, sliced thin → Consequence: a different dish entirely, savoury rather than sweet, at about 17.6 g of available carbohydrate per 100 g against ripe nendran's 25 g. Serve it with R093 rather than with tea.
Fried, honestly, in coconut oil → Consequence: the crust you remember, and the second panel above. If you are going to fry, fry once a fortnight and weigh the oil that goes in and the oil that is left, so you know what you ate.
Scale it
At eight servings use two trays on two shelves and swap them at the turn, or bake in two batches. A crowded tray steams and the pieces go pale and soft.
Make ahead · store · freeze
Best within 20 minutes of leaving the oven. Fridge 2 days in a covered box, refreshed in a 180°C (350°F) oven for 5–6 minutes — a microwave turns the crust to rubber. Freeze 1 month baked and cooled, reheated from frozen at 180°C (350°F) for 10–12 minutes. Make ahead by mixing the batter up to 4 hours in advance and keeping it covered in the fridge; slice the fruit only at the last moment, because cut plantain darkens within 15 minutes.
Leftovers
Chop cold pieces and fold them through R101's batter for the next morning's pancakes, or mash them with a spoonful of curd and a pinch of cardamom for a child's breakfast.
Troubleshooting
Soggy and pale: the tray was cold, or the pieces were crowded. Both are fixable and both are the usual fault.
Batter slid off: the plantain was wet. Pat the slices dry before dipping.
Bitter edges: the sugar in the batter caught. Pull them at golden; two minutes past golden is too far.
Starchy in the centre: the slices were too thick, or the fruit was underripe.
Serve with
R106 Chai, unsweetened or at half a teaspoon · R111 Sulaimani · R105 Roasted Kadala Mix, if one sweet piece is not enough
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