<p>The monsoon season gives us respite from summer heat and presents an opportunity to try out special dishes at home while it rains outside. There are so many special snacks and other food items that can be enjoyed during the rainy season.<br><br>Eating fried and spicy food can be an offense in any other season, but pakoras and samosas are the season's delights. One can shun all the exercise, yoga, gym, and throw away diet food to indulge in monsoon treats.<br><br>This year's rainfall is healthy. Experts are expecting a normal rainy season between June and September. Here is a list of some recipes worth trying this monsoon:<br><br>1. <strong>The Evergreen Pakodas:</strong>- This is one of the favourite and old snacks of India. Nowadays, it is not limited to potato, onion and spinach. We have a numbers of pakoda varieties, including baby corns, chicken, brinjal, fish, ice-cream, green chili, noodles, macaroni, curd, and cabbage. Baby corn pakodas are easy to make. Take out 12 pieces of tender baby corns and chickpea flour to make a batter. Put in a bowl one cup of chickpea flour and mix it with red chilli powder, turmeric, ginger-garlic paste, garam masala, salt, baking soda and carom seeds to make a smooth paste with water. Add some baby corns and deep fry. Serve them hot with green mint chutney or tomato sauce.<br><br>2. <strong>Mumbai Masala Toast Sandwich or Potato Sandwich</strong>: A famous street food of Mumbai that will give a feel of the city's rainy weather. Mumbai toast sandwich is also called masala toast sandwich and generally known as aloo toast among Delhiites. Use a few boiled potatoes, green peas, tomato, onion, butter, mustard seeds, cumin seed, onion, chopped green chillies, curry leaves, chilli-ginger to make a smooth curry. Gently apply this curry on the bread slices with butter and green chutney and place into the grill until the bread becomes crisp and golden brown. Serve this specialty with hot coffee.</p><table style="width: 500px;" align="center" border="1" cellpadding="1" cellspacing="1"><tbody><tr><td><img alt="" src="http://bw-image.s3.amazonaws.com/samosa-shutterstock-lrg.jpg" style="width: 565px; height: 334px;"></td></tr></tbody></table><p><br>3. <strong>Onion Samosa: </strong>While many are familiar with aloo samosa, onion samosa is a unique delicacy. Let this monsoon be a memorable one with this recipe, which is a specialty of Hyderabad. All that you need to do to prepare this snack is just replace the potatoes with onions. Heat oil in a pan and add sliced onions and fry till they turn pinkish in color. Add turmeric powder, red chili powder and salt, and cook for two more minutes. Turn off the gas stove and put some poha (flat rice) and mix it well. Make small chapattis and fill them up with the onion mixture. Deep fry all the triangle shapes. Serve hot with tomato ketch-up.<br><br>4. <strong>Masala Idlis: </strong>This staple food from south is famous for its healthiness and instant cooking. It can be presented as an attractive evening snacks by pricking them with tooth picks. Pick up 30 button idlis or four normal size idlis. Cut normal size idlis into eight even sizes. In a kadai crackle mustard seed with heated oil and add urad dal, curry leaves, milagai pod and mix it well. Instantaneously add button idlis/cut idli pieces and mix well until the milagai podi mixture coats the idlis nicely and it becomes dry. Serve it with hot coffee.<br><br>5.<strong> Baked kachori:</strong> This non-fried version of kachori should suit health conscious people. In a bowl add some wheat flour, sugar, water, little oil and yeast to make dough. Leave it for an hour to get it firmed. Make patties of the dough by stuffing urad daal pithi and roll these into small chapattis. Bake all the small chapattis in a preheated oven at 160 degrees till the kachoris are crisp and brown. Serve with masal chai.<br><br><em>- Poonam Kumar</em><br><br>poonam@businessworld.in</p>
