Chama dumpa (taro root) fry

Calling this a fry is not right, because I've only used about 2 tbsp oil (yes!!) for 2 pounds taro. Baking does the trick. Earlier, I blogged about (baked) fried potato curry. Making chama dumpa vepudu (fry) is exactly same as the other recipe with potatoes, with the following differences:

• Taro is cooked prior to baking
• No onions

So, here's the recipe phat-a-phat:

(A)

1. Steam the taro in a pressure cooker until 4 whistles.
2. Leave the taro root to cool and then peel it. Washing the cooked taro in a running drain of cold/tap water will help remove all the heat.
3. Once peeled, wash and cut the taro into medium size pieces. Typically, an average sized chama dumpa sold in US can be pieced into about 10-12parts. Don't cut them too small. Also, steamed taro can be extremely slippery on the hands - so be careful not to let your fingers come in the way of the knife.

or (B):

Start with step 3 above and microwave the taro till they are 80% cooked. If you have a microwave, I suggest you follow method (B). Cooking time is greatly reduced and cutting the taro also becomes easier as its un-cooked and hence not slippery.

After (A) or (B),

1. Bake the taro pieces at about 350F. Don't bake for too long. Only bake until a thin crust forms on the pieces. When left in the oven for a long time, taro becomes dry and hard. Important thing is, you should bake until the sliminess goes away, so that taro becomes easier to work with in the cooking pan. In the traditional way of frying in a pool of oil, taro is fried in batches so that they don't stick to each other. We're skipping this step by baking and then doing a stir fry.
2. Oil + jeera + curry leaves; baked taro+ salt + turmeric; cook with lid covered for 5min; add chilli powder.

To note:

If you're a two-time mealmaker like I am, *DO NOT* fry the baked taro all at once. Doing so makes them absolutely dry for the 2nd time meal and no amount of microwaving can fix it. What I do is, fry half the baked stuff and store the rest in a sealed container. Just before the 2nd meal, I fry them.