I love Felicity Cloake's "how to cook the perfect..." series in the Guardian because she does a lot of research (which I then don't have to) in order to serve up the best possible version of various recipes. Her explanations also make a lot of sense.
Her aloo tikki recipe is referenced below but I only used it as a guideline. Aloo tikki is typically a street snack (and I might just make her version to serve with cocktails at some point) but I was looking for something less stodgy and more substantial that I could serve as a vegetarian main course.
I therefore added more vegetables and made a few spice changes to meet the needs of my cupboard - I dislike having to buy a whole slew of spices that I will probably not use again in order to make one recipe. In fact, you could probably omit the turmeric if you had none since the curry is the star player here; I add turmeric for anti-inflammatory purposes. I also added egg as a binder to make the dish more filling for L. but that could be omitted for vegetarians who do not eat egg and the proportion of flour then reduced by half.
Makes 12 patties (3 per person) for dinner or 36 bite-sized canapés
2 cups cold riced or mashed potatoes (I tend to make this recipe when I have leftover baked potatoes but boiling potatoes specifically for this recipe is lovely as well; you will probably need 3-4 large ones to make 2 cups of riced potatoes)
1 cup mixed vegetables, whatever you have in your fridge and freezer (I used peas, diced mushrooms and grated carrots for texture in this version)
2 Tbsps chopped green onion
2 tsps grated fresh ginger
1/2 tsp curry powder
1/4 tsp turmeric
2 eggs
4 Tbps flour
4 Tbsps cornmeal + 1/2 cup for dredging
1 Tbps + 1 tsp vegetable or olive oil
Salt to taste
Heat 1 tsp of oil in a frying pan over medium heat. When the oil is hot, add the onion, ginger and spices and warm through, stirring constantly. Add the vegetables, reduce heat to low and cook until tender. Allow the vegetables to cool to room temperature.
Place the potatoes, eggs, flour and the 4 Tbsps of cornmeal in a bowl. Mix well.
Add the vegetables. Mix well and salt to taste.
Place the remaining 1/2 cup of cornmeal on a large plate. Form the potato mixture into balls and roll in the cornmeal until covered on all sides, slightly falttening it from ball to patty as you do. Repeat this until all the potato mixture is used. Place the alloo tikki in the fridge, still on the plate with the remaining cornmeal, for about an hour to firm up.
Remove the dish from the fridge about 10 minutes before you intend to cook it. Wipe out the pan that you used to cook the vegetables and heat the remaining oil over medium heat. Roll each potato patty in the remaining cornmeal again. Cook for 3 minutes on each side until golden and crispy.
I served this with a salad with yogurt dressing and dashed some cucumber vinegar on top. A dollop each of Grey's mango chutney and plain yogurt would taste really nice as well.
Recipe inspiration, here.