Whole wheat papdi

I must admit I'm in love with chaats. All my life living in Jaipur I've been savouringgol-gappas, papdi chaat and all other roadside chaats. But boom! As I moved out of India, there are no chaats, no roadside vendors.. So now? It's okay, I told myself and searched for the typical papdi in the Indian stores. And wow! I found it !! I felt wonderful so I bought a big pack and started making chaats and enjoying them at home with my husband. But as the excitement began fading and the chaats becoming regular weekly affair, I started to think about how would these papdis have been made.. there's no way I could know.

But as lately I have been experimenting a lot with whole wheat, like Wheat Samosa, Wheat Kachori, Wheat Namak Pare etc., I decided to give the papdis a try with the whole wheat, just experimenting.. And guess what? They came out just AMAZING... Those lovely round little beauties stole my heart and they tasted heavenly. Okay, not so great as those made with all purpose flour (maida) but this little compromise on taste is okay for health benefits of eating whole wheat v/s maida.

And the first thing I did on making these was preparing Papdi Chaat.. !!

Ingredients:

Whole wheat (atta): 2 cups
Salt to taste
Carom seeds: 1 tsp.
Butter/ghee: 2 tsp.
Lukewarm water for kneading the dough
Oil for deep frying

1. Add the ghee/butter and the flour in a bowl. Mix together with your fingers until they have a crumbled consistency.
2. Add the salt and carom seeds. Mix well with your fingers some more. This will impart flakiness to the papdi.
3. Now very slowly add very little water at a time and nix in very well with the flour. You don't have to knead it just we do for regular chappatis. Just mix and make a hard, solid dough. It must NOT be runny. Cover and keep aside for 30 minutes.
4. Now divide the dough into four balls. Take one ball and roll it large round with the help of a rolling pin, as you would do chappati. 
5. Now using a cookie cutter, cut small rounds from the dough and keep aside. Roll back the remaining atta and mix with the remaining. Do this with all the atta and make small rounds (or any other shape you like).
6. Pierce all the rounds with a fork so they don't puff up like pooris. 
7. Deep fry all of them on medium-high heat till they get a brown color on both sides. 
   
8. Drain on kitchen paper, let cool and make papdi chaat or just plain have it with tea. This makes a wonderful tea-time snack. Store in an air-tight container.