Delicious Air Fried Chana Dal Recipe for Healthy Snacking

The other day I was wandering around on my favourite recipe place – secondrecipe.com and came across the recipe for Air fried Chana Dal. We have always tried to buy snacks that didn’t have a lot of salt or were not fried. I immediately wanted to try this out.

Soaked one cup of Chana Dal for a couple of hours. The recipe says we need to drain and put the soaked chana dal into boiling water and let it cook. Instead I did what I always do, boiled the chana dal and removed the foam. Do read my earlier blogpost – Traditional Wisdom & Modern Cooking Tools.

I then used a sieve to remove all the water and put the semi-cooked dal on a plate. Enter Amma and she immediately commented saying, my grandmother would make these kind of snacks but she would remove the water and put the semi-cooked dal on a clean piece of cloth. I air-fried one batch of chana dal without putting them out on a piece of cloth, but it took a little longer for them to crisp up.

The next batch I used a piece of cloth and immediately the results were better. Note : Please air-fry the semi-cooked chana dal for 12 minutes or so and take a small quantity out to test if they crisp up. One batch got really a little crisper and the mouth feel was not as great. The next batch was just the right amount of crispiness. So adjust the timing as you go along.

This is a really simple recipe and the taste is awesome. You can adjust the spice level, salt, oil etc to your taste and there is no need to buy the readymade namkeen anymore.

The steps to make this delightful protein snack are as follows –

1. One cup of Chana Dal to be soaked for 2 hours.
2. Drain and cook the dal for ten minutes or so. Remove the foam.
3. Use a sieve to remove the water and spread the semi-cooked Chana Dal on a plate lined with a clean cotton cloth.
4. Use your Air fryer’s basket and line it with parchment paper or use one of the trays if you have an air-oven like me. Spread a layer of the chana dal and air fry at 170 deg C for 10 to 12 minutes. I sprayed some oil and every four or five minutes, turned the dal around on the tray.
5. Once they are fully roasted, take them out and add salt, red chilli powder or any spice mix of your choice. Mix well.
6. Store them only after they are fully cooled down

Enjoy making this protein filled yummy snack and ofcourse do eat it :).