This Soft Dahi Vada Recipe makes the best flavorful, melt-in-your-mouth dahi vadas, a popular Indian street food, that is loved by many due to the burst of flavors, sweet, tangy, spicy, and everything in between. This dish is a true delight for the taste buds, refreshing, satisfying, and flavorful. You’ll find yourself craving more, especially on those hot and humid summer days to beat the heat and indulge your senses.
The name 'Dahi Vada' is derived from 'Dahi', which translates to yogurt, and 'Vada', which means deep-fried fritter.
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Why you'll love this?
- They are very tasty with the tangy, sweet, and spicy chutneys and yogurt, and the crisp fritters on top.
- Great for parties and get-togethers, your guests will love them. Some other appetizer recommendations are Indian vegetable puffs, parippu vada, fried sabudana vada, and veggie cutlets with beets.
- Make them in advance, and add the chutneys just before serving.
- You can get creative and add pomegranate seeds and any other toppings that you like.
- One bite into it and your taste buds will get an explosion of flavors.
- In the making process, soak fritters in hot water and squeeze, and drain off all the oil. So you can still enjoy this dish guilt-free. You can also shallow fry the lentil fritters in an appe-pan like in making vegetarian malai kofta, so it appeals to the calorie-conscious as well.
- Dahi Vada can make a great authentic appetizer or a meal in itself, as they are quite filling.
- The soaked, ground, and deep-fried lentils paired with yogurt are a great source of nutrition too.
Ingredients needed
- black gram split (urad) - soaked in water for about 3 to 4 hours
- moong dal yellow split - soaked in water for about 3 to 4 hours
- ginger, green chillies, coriander leaves
- yogurt, sugar, salt
- Sauces - tamarind chutney, mint chutney
- Spices - red chili powder, chaat masala, cumin powder
- crunchy lentils, pomegranate seeds
How to make Soft Dahi Vada?
Soak the lentils for about four hours in a large pan. Grind in a mixer with very little water, ginger, and green chilies to a smooth but thick paste. Whisk the batter well with a fork or spoon for about 4 to 5 minutes so it aerates.
Deep fry a spoonful of batter and dish it out into a bowl lined with a paper towel. Once the Vadas or fritters are cool, submerge them in a large container with hot water for about 20 minutes.
In a bowl, beat the yogurt, salt, and sugar; keep it aside. Dish the fritters and squeeze the water and oil from them by compressing between two spoons. Transfer them to the bowl with sweetened beaten yogurt. Add crunchy toppings, chutneys, and serve.
- Step 1: Grind the soaked dals with ginger and green chillies with very little water to form a thick batter. Add salt and beat well so it turns fluffy and aerated.
- Step 2: Heat oil and add a spoonful to the heated oil and deep-fry the fritters.
- Step 3: Fry on both sides until they turn golden brown.
- Step 4: Cool and transfer the fritters to a large bowl of hot water and keep the fritters submerged with a heavy lid or plate.
- Step 5: Squeeze the fritters out using 2 spoons and dip them into beaten sweetened yogurt sauce.
- Step 6: Add sweet and spicy chutneys and crispy fritters. Serve immediately.
Soft Dahi Vada Recipe - How to Serve?
Drizzle the vadas soaked in yogurt with green mint and coriander chutney, tamarind chutney, pomegranate seeds, and crunchy bites of fine sev(crispy bites made with chickpea flour) if you like.
The sev and chutneys are available in the grocery aisles or can be made at home. You can also sprinkle a little red chili powder, cumin powder, and chaat masala if you wish.
Useful Tips
- There are certain tips to follow to make the Dahi Vadas soft, so they melt in your mouth with the first bite. We use two types of lentils, split black gram dal and split yellow moong dal, in the ratio of 1 is to ¼ in this recipe. Alternately, you can use split black gram alone, which will also work.
- Whisk the batter well with a fork or spoon for about 4 to 5 minutes so it aerates. This step is very important to make the Dahi Vadas soft.
- To check if the batter is well aerated, drop a spoonful of it into a bowl of water and see if it floats.
- When the Vadas are ready to be submerged in water, make sure to place a plate and a heavy container on the top to ensure the Vadas are submerged in water.
If you love this recipe, you may also love other delicious Indian Street foods like Street Pav Bhaji and Spicy Vada Pav.
Recipe FAQs
Homemade yogurt made with live cultures gives the best taste when used in making Dahi vadas. You can easily make yogurt in an Instant Pot by adding live cultures and setting it to yogurt mode.
If you are unable to make it at home, buy the plain yogurt with live cultures from the grocery store. The consistency should not be very sticky; it should be thick and a little runny. It is better to use curd that is not sour.
The batter can be made and stored in the refrigerator in advance and taken out just before using. If refrigerating, make sure to add the salt only just before frying. Try to use the batter within two days else it can get sour.
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Soft Dahi Vada Recipe
Ingredients
For Vadas
- 1 cup black gram split (urad)
- ¼ cup moong dal yellow split
- ½ inch ginger
- 2 green chillies or as desired
For Yogurt sauce
- 4 cups yogurt beaten well
- 5 tsp sugar or more if you prefer sweeter
- 1 tsp salt or to taste
- 2 cups water
For garnish
- 2 tbsp mint chutney
- 2 tbsp tamarind relish chutney
- 2 tbsp lentils dev
- ¼ cup pomegranate seeds
- 1 pinch red chili powder
- 1 pinch chaat masala powder
- 1 pinch cumin powder
- 1 tbsp coriander leaves finely chopped
Instructions
- Soak the lentils for about four hours in a large bowl of water.
- Grind the soaked dals with ginger and green chillies with very little water.
- Add salt and beat the batter well for about 5 minutes until it aerates well.
- In a deep fry pan heat oil and pour a spoonful of batter.
- Fry the lentil fritters and drain them into a bowl with paper towel.
- After it is cooled transfer the fritters to a large bowl of hot water and keep the fritters submerged with a heavy lid or plate.
- Keep a flat bowl of yogurt beaten with water, a little salt and sugar ready .
- Squeeze the fritters of oil and water and transfer to the bowl filled with beaten yogurt .
- Drizzle with mint chutney, tamarind chutney, pomegraranate seed and top with crunchy sev if desired.
- Sprinkle a pinch of red chilli powder , cumin powder and chaat masala all over if desired.
Notes
- There are certain tips to follow to make the Dahi Vadas soft, so they melt in your mouth with the first bite. We use two types of lentils, split black gram dal and split yellow moong dal, in the ratio of 1 is to ¼ in this recipe. Alternately, you can use split black gram alone, which will also work.
- Whisk the batter well with a fork or spoon for about 4 to 5 minutes so it aerates. This step is very important to make the Dahi Vadas soft.
- To check if the batter is well aerated, drop a spoonful of it into a bowl of water and see if it floats .
- When the Vadas are ready to be submerged in water, make sure to place a plate and a heavy container on the top to ensure the Vadas are submerged in water.
This looks very good! I love that it can be made ahead of time and stored in the refrigerator. Thank you for sharing!
Wow! This looks good. This is the first time I heard about Dahi Vada but I love how you described this food delight. Would love to try this in the future. Thank you for sharing the recipe.
Thank you so much for reading, happy to hear that you would love to try it ! Enjoy.
I love Dahi vada, and especially the Delhi wali type. This recipe made me wanna go back there!
Aww I can imagine that, this dish definitely brings memories of the yummy snacks and food back home .Thank you so much for the comment!