• Drain the husked black gram lentils.
• Grind it with ginger, green chillies and asafetida in a blender till you get a smooth paste.
• Preferably use just about 1-2 tablespoon water.
• The mix should not be runny just smooth.
• Add salt and mix well with a spoon about 3 minutes till the lentil mix becomes fluffy. This is important so that the vadas are soft and fluffy.

For deep frying

• Heat oil in a kadhai/pan. Deep fry the vadas till golden brown. I just use a spoon to make roundish vadas. Drain them and keep them aside.

For Air Frying

• Add 1 tsp. oil in the lentil batter and mix well to aerate. Preheat Air fryer to 150 C or 300 F for 4 minutes.
• On a parchment paper, using a spoon make flat roundish balls leaving some distance in between as these grow in size when cooked. Air fry at 150 C or 300 F for 8 minutes.
• Vadas will be half cooked by now. Brush oil on both sides and flip vadas.
• Then air fry at 180 C or 360 F for 6-8 minutes so that they get browned and well cooked. Your air fried fluffy and soft vadas are ready. what we do sometimes. :) Or keep them aside and proceed further.
• You can have them as it is with chutney which is

To assemble dahi vada

• Take some lukewarm water in a bowl and dip the vadas in them. They will absorb water, swell up and become lighter in colour.
• Soak them for about 10 minutes.
• Now take them out and drain each vada in between your palms to take out all the water.
• Arrange the vadas in a shallow dish.
• Now take the yogurt and beat it well. Add salt, black salt, sugar, chat masala, red chilli powder and cumin powder. Mix well and taste. Adjust seasoning as per taste.
• To serve, pour the sweetened yoghurt all over the vadas so that they are completely covered.
• Pour green chutney and tamarind chutney on top as per taste.
• I also sprinkle a little cumin powder and red chilli powder on top.
• Serve cold.

Tamarind chutney recipe

• To make tamarind chutney, take 1 tsp. oil in a pan. Heat it and add 1 tsp. of cumin. Let it sputter. Now add 1 bowl tamarind juice extract. Add ½ tsp. dry ginger powder, 1 tsp. chilli powder and one pinch asafetida. Add some salt as well. Cook for some time and add 5 tbsp. of jaggery to this. Let it cook till this dissolves and the chutney bubbles. Take it off the stove and cool down. Serve cold.