Karuppatti aappam

Karuppatti - palm jaggery / panai vellam. Palm jaggery is a kind of sweetener used in South India. In my native place, palm jaggery extraction is a well known cottage industry. It is used in preparing many Indian medicines especially the Tamil medicines and healthy food. When mixed with tamarind extract and dry ginger, it is believed to treat UTI and kidney stones. It is also believed to be a healthy and less calorific sugar for everyone. From the root to the top, the whole tree can be used for one purpose or another. Some of the useful things we get from palm tree are, palm root (panan kilangu), thavun (germinating seed), panan kuruthu (tender edible leaves), fuel from leaves and trunk, strong wood for construction, neera / pathaneer (palmira juice), palm leaf fan and some crafts, nongu/nungu (unripe palm fruit), a very sweet palm fruit and of course the palm jaggery also. The best part is this tree won't need much irrigation or attention, so it can be cultivated in hot arid conditions also. As the whole tree serves the humans in many ways, they call it as karpaga virutcham (a mythical tree that can give whatever we wish for). The coffee made with this karipotti, will taste great even without milk. Because of lesser awareness and negligence the palmyra trees are fast vanishing from our farms. Moreover the Tamilnadu government's policies on palm products,  export,  license etc made this farming extremely difficult, which ultimately resulted in high price tags on this otherwise cheaper palm jaggery.

Last month I got a pack of Gur, (a Bangladeshi palm sugar made from date palm) from an Indian grocery stores. It resembles the South Indian palm jaggery, but the one I am talking about tastes more like a caramel syrup. Apart from eating it raw as snack, I prepared some palm jaggery aappam and started drenching in those memories:)

Here are some links on palm trees.
news , uses,

Karuppatti appam served with coconut milk.

Palm jaggery is prepared by pouring hot (pathaneer) palm syrup in coconut shells.

Gur, I got in Indian stores.

Appam making pan.

Vellai appam batter and karupatti appam batter.

Appam batter after fermentation.

I have already posted the recipe for a traditional karuppatti aappam when I started blogging. But I didn't have any images then. Click here to see the recipe.

Here is an alternative / short cut method to prepare aappam using left over dosa batter.

Ingredients:

Sour dosa batter - 1 cup
rice flour - 1 cup
shredded coconut - 1/2 cup
yeast - 1 tsp
(optional if you don't have it. But yeast makes the aappam tasty)
salt - 1/2 tsp,
baking soda - 1/4 tsp.
Palm jaggery / Karupatti (in tamil)- 1/2 (150 gms)

Preparation:

Grind the coconut and add it to the dosa batter, rice flour, yeast, salt and add very little water to make a thick batter. Keep it closed and place in a warm place for 6-8 hours or Let it ferment overnight.
( I make this batter at night by 9 pm and leave it inside the oven (warm but turned off). The next day morning when I take it out my kitchen will be filled with a nice aroma).

There will be bubbles on the surface and the batter would have risen and become more watery.
Now take 1/2 - 1 cup of water and add the palm jaggery . Heat it until the jaggery gets dissolved.Allow it to cool. Then take the top layer jaggery solution leaving behind the sandy bottom.
Add this mixture to the aappam batter. Add the baking soda, mix well  and now we are ready to make aappam.

Method:

We may need a special aappam pan for this. But can also be done with a curved bottom non stick pan, with lid.
Heat the aappam pan and wipe a drop of coconut oil all over the pan by using a clean cloth.
Check the thickness of aappam batter now. It should be have a thin consistency than that of dosa batter.If not so add some water.
Pour a big ladle over the pan and shake the pan in a circular motion so that the flour spreads and expands along the edges, so that the aappam is thick at the center and very thin along the sides. (The cooked batter forms a layer of 'lace' around the thicker center portion). Cover tightly, reduce flame and let it cook in it's own steam. (I wait to hear a mild "dropping/ cracking" sound of water) .Now we can be sure that the aapam is cooked.Open the lid.Then by using a dosa spatula gently take out the aapam.

Aappam is ready!

Serving suggestions:

Extract some coconut milk. First place the hot aappam on the dinner plate and drizzle a few tsp of white sugar over it. Then pour a ladle of coconut milk over it.
Enjoy the karuppatti aappam soaked in coconut milk.

Makes nearly 15 number of aapam.
We can store the rest of the aapam batter in fridge and use it later if you dont need this much number of aapams.
If you don't have palm jaggery , then skip that step and prepare white aappam without any sweetener, which can be served with any spicy kuruma.