Sift besan, rice flour, salt, turmeric powder, red chilli powder and baking soda through a strainer into a mixing bowl. Add cold water slowly to avoid lumps. Keep adding water and beat it to a smooth and lump free batter. Make sure you get the thick and smooth batter which can stick with eggplant slices . It shouldn’t be too thick , about the consistency of good pancake batter. add one tabletablespoon hot oil in the batter and mix it well.
Step 2
Using a knife or a slicer to cut eggplant lengthwise to 3mm thin slices. The slices should neither be too thick nor too thin. Slice uniformly to ensure even cooking.
Step 3
Coat the sliced eggplant with 1/2 tsp salt. Spread the slices over a strainer. The salt will help draw moisture out from the eggplant. This step , while seasoning the eggplant also helps keep the eggplant crisp longer.
Using a tissue, dab the eggplant slices to soak up any excess moisture.
Step 4
Heat vegetable oil in a frying pan or kadai for deep frying. Wait until the oil heated up.
Once the oil is well heated ( that is , it has reached a temperature of ~190C) dip an eggplant slice in the batter. Shake off the excess and gently lower it into the oil. Wait for 5 seconds and then flip it. Fry both sides evenly on medium heat for about 4 minutes.
Step 5
Once uniformly golden in color, remove from oil and serve hot with a sauce or chatni.
Notes
Beguni may be a simple recipe but creating a crisp beguni every time requires an understanding of various factors that go into making the beguni crisp. In this recipe, we explain our personal favourite way of making the batter using besan (gram flour) and rice flour. The proportion between the besan and rice flour in the batter makes a lot of difference to the final product. Also important is the ratio of water to the dry ingredients. As always, we recommend weighing your ingredients to be able to confidently produce a perfect batter every time. In fact, this batter recipe will work for any other kind of besan-based telebhaja.
This dish is special because...
Beguni or begun'er chop is one of the most popular 'telebhaja' (snack fried in oil) loved all over Bangladesh and in many parts of eastern India. Beguni is served as a snack in the evenings with tea. It is also popular as a Ramadan snack in Bangladesh and as a side with dal-torkari-rice or khichuri in India. though a similar European dish is known as aubergine fritters.
