Breakfast Traditions of Bharuch & Rajpipla

Diwali was spent with friends in Bharuch and we visited Rajpipla for a day.

Observing breakfast traditions of these cities and after sampling their breakfast i have decided to write this.

Bharuch is situated on the banks of the river Narmada, after a blissful night of sleep soaking in the scenes around my friends inlaws flat from where 1 can see the river clearly, i woke up to a debate of what to have for breakfast, not to be left out i joined in and voiced my opinion and we finally decided on Bhoongada Bataka & Sev Khamani for breakfast. After an impatient wait of 45 mins finally we were ready to gorge the fill.

Bhoongada Bataka (Rice Flour Tubes & Garlic Potatos) are a unique dish and i have not had it in Ahmedabad till yet, Bhargav introduced it to us when he was coming back from Rajkot one time and he got 3 plates of these packed for us, we gorged it down like hungry sharks not caring about our surroundings, any ways, its basically plain rice Tubes deep fried (See picture) and spicy garlic potato vegetable tampered with mustard seeds and these 2 have to be eaten together by filling the potato's inside the tubes. These rice flour tubes which are yellow in color take me back to school days where we used to buy it from a hawker outside of our school and put them on our fingers and eat them.

Sev Khamani, is crushed chana dal, cooked by adding lots of garlic, Coriander and Fresh Pomegranate and is served with topping sev on it. This is served with flied green chilly's and a special chutney on the top. This is sweet, salty and fiery all at the same time and is really yum to eat. As an add-on papdi was also ordered and we devoured it with complete dedication and at 9:30 in the morning we also shamelessly had a nice cold beer to wipe it all down. 

Bhoongada Bataka on the left & Sev Khamani on the right and Papdi in the back.

Rajpipla is a princely city in the south of Gujarat about 70 klms from Bharuch we decided to do a day trip to the forests around Rajpipla and the Sardar Sarovar Dam, we were treated to something completely different for our breakfast adventures here.

We left Bharuch exactly at about 7 and it was a 2.5 hour ride to Rajpipla, we entered the city and had to pay respects to Goddess at a temple and then everyone pronounced that they were hungry and we spotted a shop with lot of crowd around it, i decided to get out and investigate, it was named RAJAN Samosa and Dalwada's and had a small Cart on the side that served Sev Ussal, with stomachs running on empty we decided to call everyone here, there were 9 people and we ate heartily. Samosas were fresh, crisp and hot, served with chutney and fried chilly's.

Sev Ussal is typically a Maharashtrian breakfast / snack item and is a curried dish made with legumes/sprouted legumes or mixed sprouted legumes and is had with pav (bread) hence it is popularly known as ussal pav or sev ussal and is served with sev on top, it is served with rassa which is made of garlic and it fiery hot and spicy, also there is vinegar or lemon juice if you like your ussal tangy. As an addition we got to eat Tam Tam khaman and Dhai Khaman from a shop bang opposite the Samosa Shop. We ate like there was no tomorrow and I would recommend anyone who visits these cities to try these breakfast adventures.

Samosas on the Left and Sev Ussal on the Right to be Eaten with Bread as seen in the Picture.

Food experiments continue in various parts of Gujarat and India and I hope what i write is good to read.