Sannas ~ The Goan Idli

Sannas complement most goan dishes, the fluffy rice cakes that go amazingly well with the pork vindaloo and sorpotel. Although the traditional Sannas have toddy as an ingredient, due to the lack of availability and for the sake of convenience we have Sannas without toddy.

Goa rice is preferred to get the right texture and color of the Sannas or it will end up looking like Idlis.

Ingredients :-

2 Cups Raw Goa Rice (Can make with normal rice as well.)

1 Tablespoon Fresh Yeast OR 1 ½ Tablespoon (leveled) Yeast Granules

½ Grated Coconut

2 to 3 Tablespoons Sugar

2 Teaspoons Salt

Method:

Wash the rice and put it in a container

Soak the rice overnight

The next day you can start off with getting the yeast ready by addingg the yeast and a teaspoon of sugar in a small vessel.

To activate the yeast, add ½ cup warm water

Mix it up and keep covered for 10 to 15 minutes till the mixture ferments.

While the yeast is getting nice and bubbly, lets proceed with the rice.

Strain and grind the soaked rice with grated coconut.

Add the remaining sugar to the coconut and rice mix, time to blend it all together.

Add a wee bit of water, not much at all, if you seem to have a bit of difficulty with the grinding and voila, your blending is done.

Pour the mixture in a container and lets get back to the yeast.

Your yeast should look frothy like the picture below.

Give the yeast mixture a stir.

And then add it to the blended rice, coconut and sugar.

Once that’s done add the salt and mix it up well.

Keep the mixture covered for 2 hours, till it rises.

Your Sanna mixture is ready when it begins to look like this.

Fill your steamer (idli/sanna maker) with water and put it on the fire.

While that’s happening, oil each of the containers and pour the sanna mixture into them

Don’t pour up to the brim as they will rise, so a little more than half way for the first lot and adjust accordingly.

Once your steamers nice and hot, put in the containers and steam for 15 minutes. Remove the sunnas with the help of a knife if necessary and there you have your fluffy goan idlis 🙂

Now while the sunnas are in the batter form before the steamer, you can also add jaggery and coconut, similar to the pancake filling. This makes Goddachiim sannas, the batter is shown below a tea time snack 🙂