Sunday biryani and seeraga samba rice
A small, fragrant grain from Thanjavur, and why our biryani sells out by two.
Why we still grind batter on stone
A wet grinder, eight hours and the reason our dosa tastes the way it does.
Every night at nine, two of our cooks soak rice and urad dal, and by eleven the grinders are running. We use traditional stone wet grinders, the kind with a heavy granite roller turning in a granite bowl, not a high-speed mixer. It takes longer, and it is worth it.
A stone grinder works slowly and stays cool. The urad dal is ground for about 40 minutes until it turns fluffy and nearly doubles in volume. That air is what makes our idlis soft and our dosas crisp. A fast mixer heats the batter as it grinds, and the dal never becomes as light.
The rice is ground separately to a slightly coarse texture, like fine semolina. The two are mixed by hand with salt, and left to ferment overnight in the kitchen. In summer it takes seven hours; in the cooler months of December and January we leave it a little longer.
By six in the morning the batter has risen and smells faintly sour, which is exactly right. Our dosa master tests it on the tawa before the doors open. If it is not ready, breakfast starts with idli and pongal for half an hour while it catches up.
