Rava dosa is a thin, lacy and crispy South Indian savoury crepe made with semolina, rice flour and all purpose flour. This dosa does not need fermentation, yet it has a characteristic porous and crispy texture. I am sharing two methods for this Rava dosa recipe. While soaking method is the one I prefer for its texture and consistent result, the Instant rava dosa is handy when you want it without waiting for the batter to soak. Let's see how to make with step by step pictures and videos for easy understanding, even beginners can make it.
You can prepare this for a quick breakfast or dinner, anytime of the year.
Check out my easy sambar recipe and mint coconut chutney recipe in this website, that goes well with this.
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About Rava Dosa
Rava dosa is a popular South Indian dosa made mainly with rava and rice flour. It is thin, crisp and full of flavor from black pepper, cumin, ginger, green chilies and curry leaves. The rava dosa batter is much thinner than traditional dosas batter and is poured over hot tawa rather dhan spread in the usual circular motion. As the thin batter hits the hot pan, it forms little holes throughout the dosa. This gives rava dosa its lacy, porous texture and crisp edges.
Soaking Method Vs Instant Rava Dosa
If you have time, I go for the soaking method. I used to make the instant version, that I learnt from my friend Sangeetha regularly, but after learning this method from my co-sister, I prefer the consistent result and deep flavors of the dosa we get.
For either method, the most important thing is batter consistency, a properly hot, seasoned tawa and patience while the dosa cooks.
Rava dosa Ingredients
- Rava - Semolina, Suji - sooji, cream of wheat however you call it is available in many varieties like Bombay rava, ceroti rava, roasted, double roasted. I use unroasted rava and it gives best flavor.
- Rice flour - Is the ingredient for crispy results.
- All purpose flour- Maida - Binding agent in this recipe.
- Black pepper - Gives main flavour in rava dosa, also adds spice.
- Green chilli - For spice and flavour.
- Cumin seeds - Gives flavour, helps with digestion.
- Ginger - Adding lots of ginger is good for digestion as well as gives great flavour.
- Asafoetida - Gives unique flaovur
- Curry leaves - Adds flavour
- Coriander leaves - Gives good flavour.
- Oil / Ghee - For cooking
Please check out my recipe card for full recipe and exact measurements.
Rava dosa method 1
1. Firstly, in a large mixing bowl, place ½ cup rava, ½ cup rice flour, ½ cup maida and mix well with approximately 2 cups water. Keep aside for minimum 1 hour to 3 hours covered. You can also soak overnight and make in morning. Or soak morning and make for dinner.
2. After three hours, blend the batter in a mixer. (I used my hand blender)
Note: Instead of blending the batter, you can also grind the flours together dry and then make a batter without lumps using a whisk, let it soak.
3. Then, add roughly crushed black pepper, cumin seeds, ginger, finely chopped green chilli, finely chopped onion, salt, asafoetida and mix well.
4. After that, adjust the water quantity, approximately 2 more cups.
5. Then heat a dosa tawa and drizzle with oil. Let the pan be hot, then pour the batter (do a round as you pour) quickly filling the pan from outer to inner.
If you use non- stick pan, hold the pan in you hands, slightly in slanting way. Pour a ladle full of batter in an arch. Then tilt to make it spread evenly everywhere. Fill any large gaps. You can watch my video for easy understanding.
But if you are using a heavy iron pan, just pour as I have told eariler.
Drizzle little more oil or ghee over.
6. Cook furthermore in medium heat until golden crisp. No need to flip.
Serve hot with sambar and coconut chutney the best accompaniment.
Instant Rava dosa Recipe
The instant version is useful when you want without the resting time. This is the version I first made regularly and it was one of the popular recipes on my blog in my early blogging days.
Rava dosa is one I learnt making only after I started exploring the blogging world and got hooked to the recipe from Prema's cookbook. It always comes out perfect and gives me a relief if I run out of dinner ideas for Aj. It is instant version which calls for no resting time…that's the best part!
Onion rava dosa recipe
Crispy, tasty and lacy rava dosas, that can be made instantly.
Prep Time 10 minutes | Cook Time 5 mins
Course: Breakfast | Cuisine: Indian | Servings: 3 people | Author: Raks Anand
Instant Rava dosa Ingredients
- ½ cup Semolina(rava/ sooji)
- ½ cup Rice flour
- ¼ cup Maida (All purpose flour)
- 1 tablespoon Ginger, finely chopped
- 1 Green chillies, chopped
- 2 teaspoon Whole black pepper
- 1 teaspoon Cumin seeds, heaped
- 1 Onion, finely chopped
- 1 tablespoon Coriander leaves, chopped
- 1 sprig Curry leaves, torn
- Salt
- ¼ teaspoon Sugar, for browning
- Oil/ ghee - as needed
Instant Rava dosa Instructions
- Keep onions aside. Take all the other ingredients in a bowl and mix water with it. Use a whisk for easy mixing.
- The batter should be very thin of running consistency. Then only your dosa will come thin and lacy.
- Heat a non stick dosa pan preferably. It should be really hot. Drizzle some oil and pour the watery batter, first to form a outer circle and then fill in the centre. Do not overlay. That is don't pour over and over,just one layer.
- Immediately top the chopped onions in a sprinkled way. Add a teaspoon of oil over it. Let it cook in medium flame until the dosa browns to a golden colour.
- It takes some time in medium flame but be patient. If you cook in high flame you may not get the crispy dosa. So cook slowly in medium flame. Do not flip, just fold and serve hot.
Tips for crispy rava dosa
- There are few important things to keep in mind. The batter should be thin and watery enough. And after one or to dosas, the batter tends to get thick, add water and salt (very little) accordingly. Otherwise may not get the lacy holes in the dosa.You can also try resting the batter for ½ hour and then make the dosa, after ½ hour, sure the consistency of batter would have thickened, so use water to dilute more.
- Proportion to easily remember is equal measures of rice flour and sooji and half the measure of maida.
- Ghee adds a great restaurant touch to the dosa.
- Even coriander leaves, ginger are important ingredients for the flavour. Needless to say pepper and jeera are main one.
- No need to flip the dosa, since we cook slowly the dosa it gets cooked and gives crispier results.
- As I said earlier, the onion can be sprinkled before pouring the batter, but sometimes-only sometimes, the dosa gets torn easily if we use more. Also it gets browned sooner than the dosa.
- If your dosa is not giving lacy patterns, then add more water. Make sure the tawa is hot when you are pouring.
- Non stick gives better lacy dosas, while iron gives porous texture.
Instant Rava Dosa making Video
Substitutions & Variations
- Instead of maida, you can use atta (wheat flour). You can also make with or without onion.
- You can also temper the batter with mustard urad dal, curry leaves followed by chilli and onion. Saute and add to batter for a different flavor.
Storage
You can store the leftover batter in fridge for a day or two. Before using, strain the water above and mix fresh water, a handful of rava and a little salt to make it fresh.
My notes
- Be generous with oil or ghee at least for first few dosas. I would say this make rava dosa will give you a flavour close to restaurant style rava dosa.
- For crispy and perfect golden results, cook it medium flame for long time. If you cook in high flame it may get dark fast but wont be crispy.
- Do not flip! That's my secret tip for a perfectly crispy rava dosa.
- Use a tablespoon of yogurt in the batter for beautiful browning. Do not add more as dosa will become sticky.
- Soaking with the spices adds more flavour. So you can add half the spices while resting, the remaining while making too for fresh flavours.
Faqs
Make sure the tawa is hot before addin gthe batter and use enough oil or ghee.
If using a cast iron pan, seasoning and heating the pan properly can make a big difference.
Beginners, please use non-stick pan, which makes the work easier.
Let it brown well before you take it out from the tawa
Can I make Rava dosa without onion?
Yes onion is optional.
Can I make Rava dosa without fermenting?
Yes, rava dosa does not require fermentation. Just soaking time, which makes it better for consistent results.
Serving suggestion
Check out my Rava dosa Breakfast platter with 5 different side dishes.
Recipe card
Rava Dosa Recipe | Instant Rava Dosa | 2 Ways
Ingredients
- ½ cup Semoline Suji/ Rava
- ½ cup Rice flour
- ½ cup Maida All purpose flour
- 2 teaspoon Black pepper
- 2 teaspoon Cumin seeds
- 2 Onion
- 2 Green chilli
- 1 teaspoon Ginger finely chopped
- 1 Pinch Asafoetida
- Salt
- 1 Sprig Curry leaves
- Oil/ ghee - As needed
Instructions
- In a mixing bowl, place rava, rice flour, maida and mix well with water (2 cups approx). Keep aside for 3 hours covered.
- After three hours, blend the batter in a mixer. (I used my hand blender). You can grind the rava when it is dry and then proceed with soaking. But I opted to blend the batter.
- Add roughly crushed black pepper, cumin seeds, ginger, finely chopped green chilli, salt, asafoetida and mix well. You can add finely chopped onion to the batter and mix.
- Adjust the water quantity, approximately 2 more cups.
- Heat a dosa tawa and drizzle with oil. Hold the pan in you hands, slightly in slanting way.
- Pour a ladle full of batter in an arch. Then tilt to make it spread evenly everywhere.
- Fill any large gaps. Drizzle little more oil or ghee over.
- Cook in medium flame until golden crisp. No need to flip.
Video
Notes
- You can reduce maida as ¼ cup in this recipe.
- Add a tablespoon of rava while making the dosa for rava to be seen.
- Blending is for getting a homogenous batter. You can skip too.
- Using ghee gives maximum flavour.
- You can sprinkle onion and pour batter over it too instead of adding in the batter itself.
- This can be made without onion too.
- Make sure to cook the rava dosa in Medium fame, so that it cooks slowly and turns crispy.
Medini ツ says
If you dry fry rava, maida and rice flour before mixing in water dosa turns out to be super crisp... Slurrppp
afreen fazil says
Can we cook without soaking it for 3 hours
afreen fazil says
Can we cook without soaking it for 3 hours
Raks anand says
Yes, I have posted one instant version, please check in recipe index page.
Dharani says
I tried it and it was either stuck or burnt.though it tasted gud.i halved the ingredients since it s only for me.what could have been wrong?
Dharani says
I tried yesterday but it was either stuck to tawa or burnt.i halved the ingredients because it's for me alone.though it tasted gud.what did I miss out?
Raks anand says
Water quantity more or your tawa is way too hot!
Unknown says
can I soak it overnight.???
Raks anand says
Yes, but slightly it gets fermented.
Gomathi says
Looks perfect raks!!Never seen such a crispy home-made rava dosa like this!
AKHILA SHETTY says
can we put black pepper powder instead of crushing roughly
Raks anand says
Both lends different flavour. For me pepper powder is too strong. SO may be if you want you can add, but add carefully.
Malar says
Finally made the rava dosa yesterday. It's my 1st time. Everyone loved it. Thanks alot Rajes.
I had made abit too much of the batter. Currently have kept the excess in the fridge. Pls do advise as to how long I can keep it in the fridge. Thank you.
Raks Anand says
Thanks for your feedback. You can keep for couple of days. Just drain the water that is there on top clear, and use fresh water plus a hand full of rava, salt accordingly to make it fresh.
Lakshmi Vishy says
Just loved your recipe, Raks.
Tried it out today and it was perfect. The measurement was accurate and my dosas came out so good. Thank you! 🙂
Raks Anand says
Thank you so much for taking time to give feedback 🙂