This weekend is the festive weekend. It’s the festival of lights, cards, sweets, savouries, drinks and being together with family. I’m amongst some of the best chefs of my family: mummy, taiji and chacha. So I thought what better than to dedicate this week to them. Be it meal times or in-between meal times, there always were lip-smacking dishes or home made titbits to munch on. Chacha is an occasional cook, but when he does people from far and near are invited. While everything he puts his touch in is amazing, I bring you one of our (the ‘kids’ of the family) all time favourite: pav bhaji
Pav Bhaji has always been an occasion to bring everyone together and so it is never prepared for less than 10 people. A symbol of Mumbai street food, pav bhaji is now common all over India. Bread bun fried in butter and spicy potato bhaji served with chopped onions and dollops of butter. Mouth watering…
Pav Bhaji
By Ashima Goyal Siraj
Preparation time: |Cooking Time: |Serves: 10-12
for the spice mix
2 tsp Ginger paste
4 tsp Garlic paste
2 inch Cinnamon stick
2 Black Cardamom
1 inch Peepul
1 Mace
1/4 Nutmeg
3-4 Cloves
6-8 Black peppercorns
3-4 Dried whole red chillies
1 tsp Cumin seeds
a pinch of Asafoetida
1 tsp Kashmiri red chilli powder
5 tsp Pav Bhaji masala
Salt to taste
7-8 (~ 750 gms) Potatoes, boiled and mashed
6-7 (~1 kg) Onions, finely chopped (1/2 of the onion is for garnish and to serve on side)
4-5 Tomatoes, finely chopped
1 cup (~250 gms) Peas
1 cup (~250 gms) Cauliflower, finely chopped
2 (~200 gms) Green Capsicum, finely chopped
Juice of 1 lemon
Pav or bread buns (~ 3 per person)
3 tbsp Oil
150 gms butter
10-12 lemon wedges and fresh coriander for garnishing
- Soak all the spices (except cumin seeds, asafoetida, salt and 2 tsp pav bhaji masala) in 1 cup water for 20 minutes
- Grind the soaked spices to a fine paste
Step 2:
- Heat 2 tbsp of Oil in a large deep wok
- Add asafoetida and cumin seeds and 2 tsp of the pav bhaji masala
- Add 100 gms of butter
- Add juice of one lemon
- Put all vegetables (except for tomatoes) in the wok and cook covered for about 15minutes until they are tender
- Add tomatoes and salt
- Cook for another 10 minutes and put aside
Step 3:
- Take a tava or flat pan and heat 1 tbsp of oil
- Add the spice paste (prepared in step 1) and cook for 2-3 minutes
- Add 1 tbsp of water and cook for 2 minutes
- Add the cooked vegetables
- Stir and mash completely with a masher
- Cook for 10 minutes
Slit the pav sideways and toast with butter on tava until the insides are golden brown.
Garnish the bhaji with a drop of butter and coriander leaves. Serve with finely chopped onions and a piece of lemon.
Note:
- If you don’t have a big enough pan, then cook the bhaji in parts in the proportion of approximately1 tbsp of spice paste: 5 cups of cooked vegetables
- The pre-prepared pav bhaji masala is a recent addition to the recipe. In case you don’t have it: add 2 tsp coriander pwd; 1 tsp haldi pwd and 2 tsp kashmiri mirch pwd
- The recipe looks overly complicated but that’s only in writing! Feel free to email me in case of any question
- The most important ingredient, according to chacha, is patience!
What is the peepu?
Hello Snehul,
Peepul/ peepal is the spice from peepul tree… If you don’t have it you can opt it out in the recipe…
hi,
if need to make pav bhaji for 30-35 persons than what would be the ratio of ingredients. please mail.
regards alka chugh
Hello Alka,
Thank you for your query. I have sent you an email.
love,
ashima
hello Ashima,
I need to make Pav bhaji for 30 people how much vegetables I need. please mail me
Hello Kawal,
Sorry I was on vacation and couldn’t check my messages. The recipe above is for about 10 servings. I would suggest you triple the quantities for 30 people.
Hope I wasn’t too late.
Have a great gathering!
love,
ashima
Hi
I need to make pav Bhaji for 40 persons. What would be the ratio of ingredients. Please mail.
Regards Aswini
Hello Aswini,
have sent you an email.
love,
ashima
I will be serving pav bhaji to around 80 peoples in that case what would be the ratio of my ingredients… pls help me with this
Hello Deepak,
The recipe is for about 10-12 people. If pav bhaji is the only main course for your meal, I would suggest you make the ingredients 8 times but if it one of the dishes; keep them 5 times.
hope that helps,
ashima
Hi ashima
Please send me the same paav bhaji ingredients quantity for 25 people.
hello
how much quantity should i use for bhaji against 55-60 buns.
we r bachelors here n wud kill fr an awesome home made food.
thanx in advance
Vipul Kumar
Hello Vipul,
The recipe should suffice for around 35-40 buns with a little to spare. For 60 buns, I would suggest increasing everything by ~1.5.
Use 10 potatoes, around 6 onions to cook and more to serve, 1.5 cup peas and cauliflower and so on.
I remember my bachelorette days. We were 3 girls sharing a flat in Bangalore and it was always us feeding the bachelor boys! I wish we had friends like you who would have invited us over for home-made pav bhaji! 🙂
God Bless you guys!
Hi ,
I need to prepare Pav bhaji for 200 person. Can you please mail me the amount of ingredients.
Thank you
Pankaj Mishra
wow 200! 🙂 Good Luck!
this recipe is for 10-12 people. I wouldn’t really suggest making the ingredients 20 times.. but you can possibly make them 10-15 times. Still use a bit of your discretion.. for example, you might not really need 15 kg of onions as half of it is for garnishing and you can reduce that amount when cooking for 200. Similarly, apart from potatoes, tomatoes and onions; there are 3 cups of vegetables here which you can probably make 25-30 cups but you can add more veggies than just peas, cauliflower and capsicum. Add some carrots, add some beans etc.
I really hope your even goes great! Pav Baji is a big hit amongst kids and adults so a good choice! 🙂
hi,
if need to make pav bhaji for 30-35 persons than what would be the ratio of ingredients. please mail.
Regard,
Narendra
Hello Narendra,
The recipe above is good for 10-12 people as main.. I would suggest you triple the ingredients for 30-35 people gathering.
Let me know how it went! 🙂