AInickal

Indian Oats UPMA (IOU) – ഇന്ത്യൻ ഓട്സ് ഉപ്പുമാവ് (ഐ ഓ യു)

Here is one classic, traditional dish!

This dish was prepared for Yummy Aid Contest 2008 at Office, a charity program conducted every year since. This was only a start. Later it was conducted in a more professional manner by setting stalls etc.

Got much appreciation then. You may please try and let me know in the comments section

World’s Healthiest Breakfast in Traditional Kerala Style!

A mouth-watering dish, indeed! 🙂

Ingredients needed:

Two and half cups white oats

A tablespoon each of urad (whole) and chana dal

A teaspoon of mustard seeds

Two small onions finely chopped

One tomato chopped

A small piece of ginger, grated

Two green chillies chopped

Three and half cups water

Salt to taste

Three tablespoons of sunflower oil

Cashew nuts, Resins and Curry leaves to garnish

Preparation Method:

Pour the oil in a kadai and heat it. Add mustard seeds. When they begin to crackle add both dal and fry. Then add the onions and fry till they are translucent. Add curry leaves.

Add the tomato, ginger and chilies and fry until the raw smell of ginger goes. Add the water and salt and let it come to a boil

Now lower the heat and gradually add the oats and keep stirring until it comes to a porridge consistency. If you cook further you would end up with a very dry upma which will stick to your throat and will be a terrible experience. Too much watery is also not good. Switch off the stove and let the upma cool down a bit. It will thicken on its own. Garnish with Cashew Nuts, Resins and curry leaves fried in Pure Ghee!

Eat it with pickle and curd. This upma is ideal for those who hate oats porridge particularly kids. :)

Note:

If you want it to more nutritive, you can add vegetables like carrots and cabbage. In that case after adding the onions, ginger and tomatoes add the vegetables and stir fry them until the vegetables become soft and then add the water and follow the above-mentioned preparation/procedure.

Tail end (വാൽകഷ്ണം):

At the Yummy Aid at Office, my team had won first prize for 4 consecutive years! Those themes were super as I remember, Backyard Kitchen, Know your roots etc. Once, with all kinds of dishes only from Plantain tree, stem, flower…. It was the coolest! If it was today, I would have named the stall as ‘വാഴ’ (Banana Tree) 🤣

Those big trophies we bagged now must be lying on some account manager’s desk or drawer for various reasons!😒

Fivestar Chefs were invited by the company to evaluate and find the winner! Serious event it was! Later due to competition between accounts, some of the account managers were distributing money to its own team to buy from their own stalls to bag the most popular stall award! However, Good amount was collected for the charity!

Later to give others a chance too😂, I stepped out by distributing മോരും വെള്ളം (butter milk) free to all in that year of my exit from the event!

The end (ശുഭം):

As I had mentioned in the beginning, this was just a start of Yummy Aid and there were no professional judges to evaluate the dishes then. When introduced my dish, Upma, to one of the local judges from the office, (guess she was from visa processing division) she simply refused to taste it by saying “I don’t like Upma from my childhood!” It was so inappropriate to get such a remark, that too from the judge, even if she hates upma from childhood! Although it was so discouraging to the team, my dish got finished first as I remember, collecting a fair amount of money by charging 10 or something for a couple of scoops!

Comments

2 responses to “Indian Oats UPMA (IOU) – ഇന്ത്യൻ ഓട്സ് ഉപ്പുമാവ് (ഐ ഓ യു)”

  1. Pinto Ainickal Avatar

    Seeing my enthusiasm, few colleague friends joined to show case it as a team event.

    Thanks to PremChand who provided me with his brother’s toque and also made my poster with chef hat and all those who joined (@Mahesh Thamban, Rajeev Prasad, Sudeesh Premdas, Jomy Thomas & others who appreciated and supported)

    (Apologies if I have forgotten some names or if I named you wrongly!)

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  2. Pinto Ainickal Avatar

    ये ILU ILU, Oops! IOU क्या है?! :)

    *I Love UIndian Oats Upma

    *ഫോർ മല്ലൂസ്, “ഐ ഓ യൂ” “ഐ ഓ യൂ” …..”അയ്യയ്യോ” എന്നല്ല! കേട്ടോ!😂

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