recipe of sepu wadi, a delectable rustic treat from Himachal Pradesh

Sepu wadi is a rustic yet aromatic recipe from Himachal Pradesh, cooked mostly for wedding feasts as it is supposed to have been a recipe from the royal kitchens of Himachal Pradesh. The recipe of Sepu wadi was closely guarded by the royal cooks as I have heard some Himachali folks say but now that this wadi is available in the market even in dry form, it proves how popular it has become with everyone in the region, and with those who get to taste it. Count me in.

I used to cook sepu wadi after I had seen the recipe on one of the TV shows I used to follow long long time ago. And then I lost the recipe and used to crave for the same taste. Then I saw dry sepu wadis at Himachal stalls at trade fair and wondered if those are the same as in the TV show the wadi was made fresh.

I was puzzled about this dual identity of sepu wadi for a long time until I saw it again when it was being cooked at the home stay (Raju's Cottage) at Goshaini. Lata ji, the lady of the house cooks all meals for the guests and is a great cook. I had requested her to cook some of these Himachali dishes and she obliged. That's when I saw her soaking dry sepu wadis to cook them with spinach. The wadis are deep fried and sold in markets for convenience. A genius enterprise of the local cottage industry I must say. I had only seen dehydrated Amritsari wadis or wadis from other regions of India but deep fried sepu wadis are a step ahead regarding convenience of desi foods.

This is what I saw at Raju's cottage.

I loved the wadis cooked in spiced spinach puree and took the recipe too. Thankfully there is loads of spinach growing in the garden and needs to be used a lot.

I prefer freshly made sepu wadi as I find the texture better suited for my taste. Of course I wouldn't trust the quality of oil they use to deep fry the ready to use sepu wadis. So I make my own fresh sepu wadis. Once you have planed your work well and work on it rightly, this recipe wouldn't be so time consuming as it looks.

Recipe of sepu wadi..

ingredients for the wadis...
urad daal (skinned black lentils) 1 cup to be soaked overnight
(this makes a lot of vadis for about 6-8 servings, the leftovers can be frozen for later use)
cumin seeds 2 tsp
peppercorns 2 tsp
ginger grated 1 tbsp
dry red chillies 3-4
mustard oil to deep fry the wadis

ingredients for the spinach gravy (2-4 servings)
spinach cleaned, chopped roughly and steamed 2 cups packed
yogurt 1 cup
mustard oil 2 tsp
cloves 4-5
black cardamoms 2
cumin seeds 1/2 tsp
coriander seeds 1 tsp
asafoetida (hing) a pinch
fennel powder 2 tsp
turmeric powder 1 tsp
chilli powder 1/4 tsp or more to taste
dry ginger powder 1/4 tsp
salt to taste

Procedure..

To make the wadis, you can divide the work into 2-3 days. Soak the lentils overnight and grind with the cumin, peppercorns, ginger and dry chillies without adding any water to it. Blend well so the paste gets fluffy. The paste can be left to ferment for a few hours or you can go ahead and make the wadis right away.

The wadis can be made the next day and even after making them they can be refrigerated and used whenever required.

To make the wadis, boil about 2 liters of water in a deep vessel with a little salt. Make smooth balls the size of ping pong balls from the lentil paste and drop them in the boiling water. Let them all boil for about half an hour. Fish them out and let them cool down.

Once cooled, cut them into bite sized pieces and deep fry in hot mustard oil. These deep fried wadis can be refrigerated for a week or frozen for a few months to be used when required.

To make the spinach gravy, blend the spinach along with yogurt and salt and keep aside.

Mix the powder spices with a little water to make a paste and keep aside.

Heat the mustard oil and tip in the whole spices. Let them splutter and get aromatic before pouring in the powdered spices soaked in water. Mix well and let them fry till a bit fragrant.

Pour the spinach yogurt mix, add sufficient water to make the gravy of desired consistency, keeping in mind that the wadis will soak up a lot of water. You can also add water as the curry cooks.

Let the green gravy come to a boil. Add required number of wadis, 4-5 wadis per head should be enough but go by your choice. It will be good to chop the fried wadis further if they are too big or too hard.

Simmer the curry till the wadis soak up the juices and become bigger and spongier. Adjust seasoning and serve hot with plain boiled rice or rotis of your choice.

We loved it with makki ki roti more than rice.

Note how this curry looks almost devoid of any oil in it. Not that it is a low fat recipe but there is not much oil even if the wadis are deep fried. The reason is that the the urad daal wadis don't soak much oil while deep frying and if we use less oil for the gravy, the overall fat percentage will not be too much. Although you can always use more oil for taste and convenience of cooking.

This sepu wadi curry is so flavourful you wont feel like having any other side dish with it. Just a few raw slices of tomatoes and onions will be great, just like the frugal desi meals we love so much.

The flavours of fennel, cloves and black cardamom is so potent in this curry and the tartness of yogurt just balances everything nicely. I like this curry slightly hot with a god chili kick but you can always tone down the heat to your preference.

Apart from the taste and texture of the wadis in this curry, I love the spinach gravy a lot. And since I have loads of spinach in the garden right now, I have been making this same gravy with boiled rajma (kidney beans) as well.

For the same amount of spinach gravy I add a cup of boiled kidney beans and simmer till fragrant. This becomes a filling meal with just a spoon of rice in it. I don't want to dilute the flavours I like it so much.

Cook the spinach curry sometime even if you don't have the patience to boil and deep fry the sepu wadis. You can use chickpeas or mixed lentils for this curry and see how much you like it. This will give you an idea of what flavours sepu wadi packs in.

These are some of the desi flavours that I love and you would be glad to know how healthy these meals are. Out traditional food is mostly gluten free and uses the seasonal produce so efficiently and optimally.

I always feel we don't need to use any produce being transported from faraway places or out of season as we can cook so much variety or flavours with just the few produce we get in every season in every place. I have experimented enough to conclude this.

Sepu wadi will remain a favourite for several reasons. Thanks to Lata ji at Raju's cottage, Goshaini for reviving sepu wadi in my kitchen.

travel and food stories : Raju's cottage in Goshaini, Himachal Pradesh, a quite serene place to unwind and enjoy great home cooked food too

Unwind the distress of urban life, unlearn the acquired circadian rhythm and undo the toxic damage done by the city life is what you intend when you head to such a place. I feel we do so much damage to our circadian rhythm in our working city life that it needs a repair in between. Heading towards the hills just to stay put for a few days is such a relief we experienced while spending time in Goshaini. Yes, we had planned we will not do any treks and hikes and just laze around for 5 days. Although we ended up doing a few impromptu hikes around the valley.

Goshaini is a small village located in Teerthan valley (Post Banjaar, State Himachal Pradesh) and falls in the Ecozone of The Great Himalayan National Park. Can you imagine we did not even go the the National Park while we were stationed there. But we had a plan to rest and that we did, planned the National Park visit for a few months later.

Last May a blogger friend Dhiren had gone to Goshaini and had come to my home driving back from there. And the way he praised this home stay at Raju's cottage both of us felt like going there at once. We tried to find a booking during our holidays but Raju's cottage is so popular it is always full, so we booked for the extended Holi weekend almost 8 months in advance. It was totally worth the wait and the commute. Note that we had to wait this long because both of us could not get free dates in the coming months due to work and other travel plans, and in the summer when we had time the homestay was busy mostly with families with school going kids. You can get bookings for your choice of dates if you are lucky. You will fell like going there right away once you know what it is. Read on.

And this is how you cross the gurgling Teerthan river to reach Raju's cottage. The fun begins. And mind you, not the city life kind of fun, this is for real, with real elements of nature thrown in for good measure.

Raju's cottage is a green roofed, wooden cottage that looks like this from the main road just a kilometer short of Goshaini bazar.

Our abode for five days, a peaceful home stay located at the base of apple orchards of Raju Bharti's family. That terraced landscape in the background of the cottage looks barren as it was just after the snow season and all the apple, pear, cherry, apricot and many other fruit trees were all barren.

We would sleep, read books, eat great food cooked by Lata ji (Raju Bharti's wife) and just laze around in the sun. But almost everyday we would go for long walks that would turn out to be at least 3-4 hours hike in the forests or neighboring villages. Just loitering around aimlessly and return for a late lunch.

Look at the people we met and talked along the way every day.

Huge pumpkins and hill cucumbers perched on slate tiled roofs, kids peeping from windows, coming to greet us and offering candies was common. Where do you find such simplicity and honest smiles in the cities?

Raju's cottage looked like this when we went up to the forest on one side.

And like this when we climbed steep hills and some concrete steps to reach Bandal village. The view below is when you climb about 30 minutes from Goshaini towards Bandal.

We found several birds and photographed loads of them. Will share more pictures of birds really soon. These are Russet Sparrows (a couple) enjoying their lunch.

Some of the Apricot and Plum trees had just started blooming. I even found Himalayan raspberries blooming, the one with Arvind's thumb is raspberry blossom. Himalayan raspberry is called Hisalu in Uttarakhand, might have a different name in Himachal.

It was first week of March, still freezing cold after a bout of snow in the valley and everyday we would see fresh snow on the neighboring peaks. It was raining a lot quite uncharacteristic to the month of March but was sunny enough to see the spring knocking at the door. Many stretches along the Teerthan valley had Plum orchards that looked painted white by the fresh blossom. Although there was a real danger of the pollens washing away and destroying the plum harvest this year.

We walked and hiked, finding new openings into the valley, witnessing new peaks, some shining with snow and some crowned with conifers, a lone house perched on a cliff, few kids playing cricket on any plain stretch of land available. We wold stop, breath in the crisp fresh air, ruffle the hill dogs and move on.

We were always late for the designated lunch time but would get a hot and fresh lunch served in the common dining room. I must mention that Raju's cottage has a common dining room, a vibrant place decked up with books, wooden artifacts and painted pebbles kept on the windowsills. The most interesting thing that I found were the huge crystal rocks placed everywhere. There were a few crystal rocks even in our rooms.

All the artwork is made by the guests staying there or is sent by them as a gesture of gratitude.

Food is served fresh, the curries and daal placed in hot plates, rice served in hot case casseroles and hot rotis being brought to each guest as you eat. Indian home style food and some local regional food with vegetarian and non vegetarian choices is what you would expect in such places but the warmth that you find here is something to cherish.

Absolutely home style meals served just like food is served in joint families, I loved this part quite a lot, more so because food is always a special experience for me. Raju's cottage and Lata ji's cooking didn't disappoint me even taste wise.

See what all we had. Traditional Himachali sidu, the steamed (leavened) whole wheat bread stuffed with poppy seed paste, served with a dollop of home made ghee.

The ghee had such an intoxicating flavour of nostalgia, reminded me of the ghee my grandmother would bring from our village. Slightly smoky and so flavourful, the sidu is steamed over leaves of galgal lemons (large pahadi lemons).

Ghee is made by the milk they get from the cowshed they maintain. All the milk, yogurt and paneer they use come from their own cows. How cool is that.

I spotted morels growing in Raju's orchard, it was the first time I had seen them growing wild like this.

Seeing my interest in morels, Lata ji cooked guchhi pulao (morel pilaf) one day. Her chciken and mutton curries are to die for.

Look at this gucchi pulao (morel pilaf). And that is a lot of morels considering it is so costly.

Here is sepu wadi (urad daal dumplings in spinach gravy) which is a popular recipe served in Himachal Dhams (wedding parties). A uniquely aromatic curry that I learnt cooking and recreated in my own kitchen after returning. Sepu wadi recipe will be shared shortly.

Getting breathless climbing mountains, returning hungry and being treated with such warming food is bliss. We did not want to come back.

Did I mention that each room at Raju's cottage has a small bookshelf too. At least our room had one and three extra rooms around the bedroom to laze around. Two of those rooms were river facing, the bathroom was also river facing and very very cold due to that. But thank God they rarely have power cuts so hot water was not a problem. They have installed solar heaters for the main kitchen and guest bathrooms too. There are solar lanterns for the guests if they have to go around in the night.

Raju Bharti is an interesting person, his father was a local MLA as he told and seems to have done remarkable work in the area. Raju himself has filed cases against corporates who wanted to build dams up the river and had arranged government sanction too. He was able to stop the making of dams on the Teerthan river and considers the river as her Goddess. He is a member of various committees overlooking the management of The Great Himalayan National Park and takes active interest in conservation of the mountain ecology. In fact if I write about all that we talked with him it will be a full fledged article here.

Raju's family has a few dogs and cats who are very friendly to the guests and the dogs are even trained to accompany them if they go to hikes alone. The dogs are named Goju, Bhalu, Bulbul and Yeti. They walk along and keep looking back to assure you are following them, else they will come back and sit with you while you gaze at the mountains and birds and the scalloped sky all around this valley.

The mountain goats will be curious about you but oblivious to the beauty surrounding them. You feel like you are the odd one in this beautiful place and then you wish to come back and fit in better.

I appreciate what Raju's family is doing at his fruit orchard too, growing everything organically and rearing cows for milk for the family as well as for the guests. Raju's cottage is run completely by his family members and they take pride in it. His two sons, Karan and Varun manage the everyday operations and his wife Lata ji cooks all the food with the help of lady who comes from the village to help in the kitchen chores. His nephew Vicky serves food to all guests and keeps asking for tea and coffee in between. All done with a smile.

Karan and Varun will coordinate with you once they confirm booking. You can get an overnight bus from Delhi, a few buses start from Himachal Bhavan (Mandi House) and others from ISBT, deboard the bus just before the Aut tunnel and Raju will arrange a cab pick up from there. You need to tell the bus driver in advance about your destination so he will let you know when it is time. You can contact Raju and his sons at his facebook page here to book and coordinate for cab pick up.

They feel like an extended family to me now. Isn't that a great achievement? No, not for them, I am talking about myself.