Puran Poli

Puran Poli, Boli in Tamil Nadu is a golden yellow sweet pancake from South India. It is eaten during a traditional Sadhya along with Payasam. Several varieties of boli are prepared including: Thenga (coconut) boli and sharkara (brown sugar). Boli is especially famous in the southernmost districts of Tamil Nadu and Kerala, India.

Boli is eaten mostly after lunch or as an evening snack. Boli looks like a flattened chapathi and golden yellow in colour. It is popularly sold in trains by the hawkers. "Kadambur boli" is a famous one and it is available in both coconut and brown sugar flavors.

Different varieties of Boli are available throughout the deccan states.

The method of preparation varies from place to place. Sometimes grated coconut is added in Konkan. Coconut palm jaggery may sometimes be used. Similarly a mix or sugar and jaggery both can be used as a sweetening agent. Normally nutmeg is used as a flavoring agent along the coast which is replaced by cardamom or sometimes both elsewhere.

Methods of rolling the stuffed dough also differ. It can be rolled using rice flour which makes the rolling very convenient. On the other hand, in some recipes flour is not used at all, oil or ghee is used to roll it into a flatbread instead. The rolled bread can be roasted with our without any ghee or oil, which sometimes is smeared after its completely cooked.In some places All purpose flour dough is used after adding a pinch of turmeric which gives it the traditional yellow color.

Pooran Poli is a Maharashtrian dish. The poli is in itself a delicious sweet meal and is often eaten as such. It may be served with a spoonful of ghee. Poli is often served with milk, which may be sweetened or flavoured with almonds and pistachio. In certain areas, polis a tangy, tamarind-based sauce is served with the poli, to enhance the experience by combining very disparate flavours. In Maharashtra, the tangy sauce is called katachi amti.

In Goan cuisine and the cuisine of the Konkani diaspora in Karnataka and Kerala, punn-poli or Holgi, is generally served with coconut milk flavored with nutmeg and sweetened with jaggery.

In other parts of Karnataka, holige or bele obbattu is served with ghee and hot milk. A variant of the bele obbattu is the crunchy kai obbattu that is prepared with jaggery and coconut. This is usually eaten dry with ghee.

In Andra Pradesh, bobbattu is served with ghee(clarified butter).

In the Vidarbha region of eastern Maharashtra, the puran polis are soft, since the stuffing is made with jaggery. In western Maharashtra, the powdered white-sugar version is preferred, resulting in a crunchy puran poli.

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Recipe for Puran Poli.