Kara Urulai roast is a potato roast with flavours of onions, garlic and red chillies. You can pair this with curd rice or rasam rice.
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Kara Urulai Roast
Urulai Roast is a lip smacking, garlicky, spicy potato dish with flavours from South India. This dish can be a dry potato side dish or even served as a special potato dish at weddings.
The potatoes are first parboiled, followed by deep frying them and finally adding them to a sauce containing the lovely flavours of onions and garlic.
You can pair this up with curd rice, rasam rice or for rotis as well.
Ingredients for the Urulai roast
This recipe is a three-step process, so each stage requires different ingredients.
The first stage requires potatoes that need to be parboiled. You can pick 5-6 medium-sized potatoes for serving 2-3 people.
Depending on whether you choose to deep fry or air fry them, you will need an appropriate quantity of cooking oil. For deep frying, you will need 200-250 ml oil, and for air frying just a couple of teaspoons.
For the final stage in which you make the base sauce, you will need mustard seeds, curry leaves, split urad dal, curry leaves, lots of cloves of garlic with the skin on and finely sliced onions.
The spice powders that I have used in this recipe are asafoetida powder and red chilli powder and pepper powder. You can choose to increase or decrease the quantity of each of these depending on your taste buds.
Finally, you will need finely chopped coriander leaves for garnish.
How to make Urulai Roast
Wash the potatoes thoroughly and place them in a small pressure cooker. Allow for 2 whistles to pass and turn off the cooker. The potatoes will only be partially cooked with just 2 whistles. After the pressure has naturally released, you can remove the potatoes and peel the skin. Cut the potatoes into small cubes and keep aside. The next step is to fry the potatoes.
You can either deep fry the potatoes or roast them in an oven or air fryer. I prefer the air fryer.
Deep frying
Place a kadai with 250ml of cooking oil. Once the oil is warm, add the cubed potatoes to the oil slowly. Deep fry the potatoes until they have a golden colour. Remove from the oil and drain them on a kitchen tissue paper.
Air Fryer
Add the cubed potatoes into a bowl and add 2 tablespoons of oil. Sprinkle some salt and give it all a good mix. Add the potatoes to the air fryer basket and close it. Air fry for 20 minutes at 170C. At the ten-minute mark, remove the basket and give it a shake so that the potatoes roast evenly. Remove from the air fryer basket into a bowl and keep aside.
Making the Uruali Roast
Now, place a kadai on a medium flame and add 2 teaspoons of oil. Once the oil is warm, add the mustard seeds and allow it to sputter. Next, add the split Urad dal and curry leaves. Give it a good mix for 10 seconds.
Now add the cloves of garlic and roast them until they are brown. This process will take 5-7 minutes. Once they are brown, add the finely sliced onions and roast them along with the garlic until they are slightly brown. You can add 1/2 a tsp of sugar to hasten the browning process of the onions.
Now add all the spice powders – red chilli powder and asafoetida powder. Give it a mix until the onions are garlic ware well coated. Add 1/4 cup of water to the pan and clove it with a lid. Let the masalas cook for 1-2 minutes. Once most of the water has evaporated, add the roasted potatoes to this base masala and mix well.
Adjust the seasoning – salt and pepper. Taste one or two pieces to adjust the spice and salt levels.
Turn off the heat and garnish with finely chopped coriander leaves.
Shelf Life and Storage
Urulai Roast is best eaten right off the pan. If you do end up storing it in the fridge, eat it up in the next meal without reheating it again.
You can keep parboiled potatoes ready for this recipe by making them the previous day.
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Recipe
Urulai Roast
Ingredients
- 5-6 Potatoes medium sized
- 2 tsp Cooking oil
- 1 tsp Mustard seeds
- 1 tsp Split Urad Dal
- 2 sprig Curry Leaves
- 10-12 cloves Garlic small size, or 3-4 of the large cloves
- 1 Onion small, sliced thin
- ½ tsp Asafoetida powder
- 1 tsp Red Chilli powder
- ½ tsp Salt
- ½ tsp Pepper powder
- 1 tbsp Coriander Leaves for garnish
Instructions
Prep Work
- Wash the potatoes and pressure cook them for 2-3 whistles. It is ok if the potatoes are par-boiled. Remove from the cooker and peel the skin. If you are boiling the potatoes on the stove, add the whole potatoes with the skin into a pot of boiling water. Cook until the outer part of the potato is tender. Remove from the water and peel the skin once they are cool enough to handle.
- Chop the boiled potatoes into cubes. The next step is to fry the potatoes.
- Chop the onions into thin slices and keep aside. Take a whole bulb of garlic and separate out the cloves. You can retain the skin of the garlic – this adds to the flavour.
- Frying in oilPlace a pan with 250 ml oil and allow it to warm up. Once the oil is warm, add the cubed potatoes and fry them until they are golden brown. Drain the potatoes on a kitchen tissue and season them with salt. Air fryerAdd the cubed potatoes to a bowl and drizzle a tablespoon of oil on it. Season with salt and add them to the air fryer basket. Roast the potatoes at 180℃ for 15 minutes. At the 10 minute mark, pause and give the basket a shake to allow even roasting. Remove from the basket and keep aside.
Making the Uruali Roast
- To a kadai, add a teaspoon of oil. Once the oil is warm, add mustard seeds and allow them to sputter. Next add the split urad dal.
- Follow it up with some curry leaves and give it all a good stir.
- Next, add the cloves of garlic and roast until they are soft and browned slightly. Keep pressing the garlic so that they pop out of their skins.
- Once the garlic is brown, add the sliced onions and saute them together, At this stage you can add some sugar to help with browning the onions. This process might take 10 minutes. You need not caramelize the onions but just brown enough to add some flavour.
- Its now time to add the spice powders – asafoetida and red chilli powder. Mix them well and add ¼ cup of water. Close the lid and allow the spice to cook.
- After all the water has absorbed, add the fried potatoes and give them all a good mix. Season the potatoes with salt and pepper.
- Have a taste of the potatoes and adjust the seasoning accordingly.
- Garnish with chopped coriander leaves and serve hot.
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