Sundried in the summer sun

The hot summer months were meant for industriously drying different things in the sun and then storing them for use during the rest of the year. The annual sun drying home-factory started around mid-April and continued till the end of May. 

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Many different things were sun-dried. Large potatoes were peeled and grated and then dried in the sun. The dried potato gratings would be stored and used through the year to make a fried snack. The 'batatyacha kees" as it was called in Marathi would be fried to make a quick, spicy  chivda that would taste really good. To make the chivda, sundried potato gratings would be fried in piping hot oil. To this a little salt, chilli powder, ground nut powder, a pinch of sugar added and mixed well. It makes a great snack with tea, Of course, it is fried and so would not be made very often. It was reserved to make as one of the dishes served if you had guests for evening tea.

Then there were the moong (green gram) vadis and the udad (black gram) vadis. Moong dal was soaked and ground on the grinding stone with green chillies, salt and cumin. Tiny vadis were made on a greased plate and left to dry in the sun. The udad dal vadis (black gram) were made by soaking and grinding the dal on the grinding stone with green chillies, salt and cumin. For each cup of soaked udad dal, a cup of grated ash gourd was added and the mixture used to make vadis to dry on a greased plate in the hot sun. These vadis were used during the rainy season to make yum, sweet and sour curries.

This was followed by drying making different papdis (a small poppadum), like sabudana (sago) papdis and rice papdis. Plump green chillies were filled with a mixture of masalas and curd and sun dried to be fried crisp and served with meals. Beans and ladies finger would also be dried to be consumed during the monsoon when vegetables were scarce. 

And then the most awaited! Jack fruit pulp and mango pulp were sun dried to make sticky phanas (jack fruit)  papdi and aam (mango) papdi that were chewy and absolutely  delicious and were devoured with great relish and very quickly so there was no need for any storage.