Pakoda: chickpea onion fritters

Pakodas (aka pakoras) is one of my favorite tea time snacks, along with some home-made mint chutney, sweet-and-sour tomato chutney or tamarind-date chutney. Pakoras can be used in kadhi, a gujarathi dish.

There are quite a few variations of this recipe and am sure all of them turn out fine... this here is just one of the versions I default to. Adjust the proportions of rice flour to chickpea flour to suit your taste. Also, I've tried making these fritters with all-purpose flour and some cornstarch plus maybe some rice flour... it is quite flexible and depending on how crunchy or how soft I want it, I adjust the flour. So, this recipe is not quite set in stone - as with all my recipes ;)

Ingredients
1 cup chickpea flour (besan)
½ cup rice flour
1 medium onion finely diced
1-2 Tbsp red chili powder (more or less, adjust to taste)
salt to taste
water as needed
vegetable or canola oil for frying

Preparation

1. heat oil in a pan for frying
2. meanwhile, add the chickpea flour, rice flour, onions, chili powder and salt to a mixing bowl
3. add water a little at a time and knead to form a slightly loose dough, but not watery or runny
4. when oil is about 350-370° F, fry the dough in batches: without crowding the pan drop about 5-8 tablespoonful of dough in the oil, one tablespoonful at a time, and fry till they are nice and brown on the outside and cooked through on the inside.
5. drain on a paper towel and keep warm till all the pakodas are done
6. experiment with the chickpea-rice flour ratio till you find a satisfactory mix: i like the pakodas a bit crunchy on the outside and a little chewy on the inside - the crunchiness i believe comes from rice flour.