Quinoa Idiyappam (Noolappam, Noolputtu, String Hoppers)

      Last evening I had this fancy to munch on some warm delicious Idiyappam with spicy Egg Roast (a typical south Indian combo) but I was very hesitant to go about making the traditional Rice Idiyappam basically because those are made of white rice flour,  rich in carbs and of very little nutritious value. I then came up with this idea of trying a Quinoa-based  Idiyappam  and as I 'googled' to see if someone had already come up with this idea, I was pleasantly surprised that this was indeed going to be my very own original idea as there were no related posts on the Internet. This also did bring about the risk of failure but that's what makes experimental cooking even more challenging and interesting. 

Verdict : Both my husband and my daughter loved it :) Yay!!! So bye-bye Rice Idiyappams and welcome to the nutty flavored Quinoa version. In case you are not too keen about the Quinoa flavor, the curry that you have it with will definitely overpower it. The texture was perfect and similar to the traditional Rice version.  The one setback I noticed was that after I made my first prepared batch I got engrossed in my photo-shoot for nearly 2 hours and by then the dough had released some water and became a little gooey. Therefore do make sure you make them all in a single batch if possible without waiting between batches for long. 


Yields 20 Idiyappam

Ingredients 
1 1/2 Cup - Quinoa or 2 Cup - Quinoa Flour
1 Cup - Rice flour
2 Tsp - Ghee (Clarified butter)
Boiling hot water
1/4 Cup - Grated coconut
Salt

Directions

• Grind Quinoa until you get finely ground flour (I used my Preethi Blender for this)
• In a large bowl, stir in rice flour, quinoa flour, ghee, salt and add boiling water to it little by little. Mix with a steel spoon and add water until you are able to bind the flour and make a dough just like you would do for a Rice Idiyappam
• Load the dough into the Idiyappam maker and make Iddiappam of desired shapes
• Sprinkle some grated coconut over each Idiyappam
• Steam for 15 minutes or until the Idiyappam are cooked through.

Notes and Tips

• Start making Iddiappams as soon as the dough is ready and DO NOT keep it out for long as the dough turns gooey after an hour

Other Quinoa Recipes

• Quinoa, Kidney bean & Vegetable Medley
• Vegetable Quinoa Pulav
• Quinoa Tomato Dosa / Savoury Quinoa Crepe