Thengai sevai/ thengai idiyappam/ coconut flavoured string hoppers

I think I had mentioned this in the past.. Dinesh isn’t in the habit of reading through my blogs. Don’t get me wrong, he is someone who is a firm supporter of my blog, but more like an outside support ;). He gives feedback on the food, photos & makes sure to like my photos/ comment on social media but that was kinda it. Somewhere deep down, I was a little upset that he doesn’t read my blogs entries. However, I never forced him to read & just left it at that. I am more than happy that my mom, mil & a lot of my friends read my blog & specifically enjoy the prelude. To the extend, it’s kind of a pressure on me to write a nice prelude :). Anywho, I had a mega surprise when D told me yesterday night as we were just having our unwind talk that he read through a lot of my blog posts the previous day. I was genuinely super duper happy. Repeating.. D read multiple blog entries, not just one :). I was curious as to why he suddenly decided to read through. I had posted this lemon sevai a few days ago & it had Adya’s pics & my caption on social media said to read the post for more details. D was taking a breather at work & read through the blog. He found it very cute (his words) & was curious to read all the posts that had references to Adya & himself (the narcissist in him pops up every now and then) :). D had one complaint about my blog posts though :). He said I should start addressing him as Dinesh in my blog entries wherever I make references to him. Why exactly? Apparently, searching for Adya was easy but ‘D’ searches led him to too many search hits & he couldn’t clearly decipher which ones were D, as in Dinesh 😀 (he said this smiley I use too often as well adding to the confusion 😀 :D). Cute right?? D, I love you & you totally made my day by reading through my blogs & remembering to come and tell me :). The icing on top of the cake – he said I write well :). I was on cloud 9. He made a quirky statement (typical him) by saying it’s not like he’s shakespeare to certify my writing :D. For people who know D but not much about him, he’s awesome when it comes to languages. He used to blog a lot & is extremely good at writing poems (in both English & Tamil). The lazy fellow has stopped writing. I really really wish he would start writing in some form again.

Now on to the coconut sevai bit, similar to lemon sevai.. super simple to make & extremely tasty. Super healthy breakfast option & quick to prepare. These days we get boxes of scrapped coconut at grocery shops which is always there in our freezer. That’s the main thing & ofcourse sevai that you need. Rest will surely be there in your kitchen. And ooh, the background thuni/ cloth in the below pic is a shorts I purchased in Sri Lanka. I am proud how far I have come in terms of using my clothes for my final pics instead of buying stuff (Yes, I was doing that for a short while before realising I am not gonna be able to sustain that 😀 and that’s one more D, lol). So to wrap, I have a coconut sevai displayed in a coconut shell laid out on a cloth purchased from a coconut land. ahaa, kavidhai kavidhai 🙂 (no, am not going to translate this for the non-tamil speaking folks).

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Thengai sevai/ thengai idiyappam/ coconut flavoured string hoppers

Prep Time

5 mins

Cook Time

5 mins

 

Course: Breakfast, Main Course

Cuisine: Indian

Servings: 3 persons

Ingredients

• 4 medium sevai/ idiyappam/ string hoppers 2 cups roughly
• 1 tbsp urad dal/ skinless black gram (whole)
• 1 tbsp channa dal/ bengal gram
• 1 tsp mustard seeds
• 2 nos green chillies
• 1/2 tsp asafoedita
• 3 tsp coconut oil refined oil works fine too
• a few curry leaves
• 1 cup shredded coconut

Instructions

1. Using your fingers, wet the sevai & microwave for 1 minute or till they become soft. 

2. Once they become warm, break them into shreds (similar to vermicelli). Set it aside. 

3. In a small pan, heat some oil & once hot, add mustard seeds. Let it splutter. 

4. Add channa & urad dal, let it brown. 

5. Now add chopped green chillies, asafoedita, curry leaves. Saute till the raw smell from the chilli fades off. 

6. Add the shredded coconut & some salt at this stage. You can turn off the heat immediately or let the coconut brown a bit & then turn off the heat. Though letting the coconut brown isn't very healthy, tastes like heaven since it releases more flavour and some oil. 

7. Finally mix the sevai & check/ adjust for salt. 

8. Serve warm as is or with coconut chutney/ curd. Yummmmm!

Recipe Notes

1. You can use ginger instead of asafoedita. 
2. You can steam instead of microwaving the sevai.
3. You can make fresh sevai instead of buying them as well :D.
4. You can add more green chillies if you like it spicy.

Stepwise pictures

Using your fingers, just wet the frozen sevai for 1 minute in the microwave or till they turn soft.

Take them out & once they are warm, using your hands just break them into vermicelli type pieces/ shreds. Set it aside.

In a small pan, heat some oil & once hot, add mustard seeds & let it splutter. Then add, channa dal & urad dal. Saute till they brown.

Now add asafoedita, chopped green chillies, curry leaves & saute till the raw smell fades off.

Add salt & shredded coconut at this stage. You can either turn off the heat immediately or let the coconut brown a bit which releases a certain kind of flavour & oil (not great for health though to do this). Turn off the heat.

Add the sevai to this & mix well. Check & adjust for salt.

Serve warm just as is or with some coconut chutney or curd.

Yes, you heard me right, more coconut makes it more tasty :). And this I have served in a coconut shell on a sri lankan shorts. Wow, I did get the essence of coconut in fully :D.