- Is this YouTube video
gonna just be me looking through my phone?
- [Interviewer] Yeah.
- [Chris] Yeah.
- Cool, a great first impression!
[giggling]
Oh but this is worth it!
- [Interviewer] Phone
call with Clementine,
like that needs to happen.
- [Interviewer] Tilt it down a little bit.
- [Chris] We'll need to get
materials released for this.
- [laughing]
- [Interviewer] Give me a break.
- I know.
She's so pretty.
Hi.
I'm Sohla.
I'm usually back there.
Today I'm here.
All right, so I made
the traditional version
of these which is called piyaju
when I first interviewed here and
it's a lentil, blended lentil paste
just like we're doing today but instead
of the zucchini, it's all onions
and it was spring, so I put
all kinds of allium's in there
and Chris really liked it,
so much that I got the job
and then he had an idea of using those,
the lentil fritters, as a batter
for zucchini fritters to like,
update, update that old, stodgy mess
and make it cool and sexy and Bon Appetit.
Okay, so here I've got some red lentils
and we start by just
rinsing them really well.
Always rinse them until they run clear.
Clear enough for you to see
your hand through the water.
About three, three changes.
Yeah, so you can see
it's still a bit cloudy
but its much more clear than it was before
you can totally see my hand.
So, while we wait for the lentils to soak
we're gonna prep our zucchini and onion.
So, traditionally for a zucchini fritter
we shred the zucchini on a box grater.
Instead I want like, nice
and chunky pieces of zucchini
so I'm cutting them into
skinny, french fry shapes.
So, I've lopped of the ends.
This is a nice, medium zucchini.
I'm gonna cut them into three,
about two inch segments.
That's really just to
make it easier to handle.
You don't want this guy rolling around
so I'm gonna take off a
quarter inch slab right here
and then I have a nice flat place to work
and we're gonna cut this into
quarter inch thick planks
and then once you have your planks
you just like, stack
them up and you go back
and you make little batons.
With the shredded
zucchini, it's pretty hard
to even tell that it's zucchini.
It's just kind of wet and mushy in there
so here, you've got.
You can see the skin clearly,
you've got these big chunks.
You're gonna like, know
what's inside of your fritter.
If you can get good zucchini,
it's gonna make this better
but, but we're frying it
so anything will be fine.
Like, you can fry anything
and it will be fine
if I'm being perfectly honest.
All right, so I'm gonna cut the onion
into thin slices.
I need my compost bowl
[laughs]
Right, so we started composting.
I'm not gonna throw my onion peels away.
I'm gonna cut the onion
and put it with the squash.
They're gonna get salted,
it's gonna pull out some of the moisture
so we end up with like, nice tender pieces
that aren't wet.
There's a lot of ways to cut an onion.
We're only gonna use half this onion.
I got a little crazy and cut it all
but we'll make more fritters later.
Onions going into the
bowl, with the zucchini.
Now, I'm gonna salt the veg.
This is gonna help draw out moisture.
I'm adding one teaspoon of kosher salt.
This zucchini and onion is gonna hang out
for about an hour and we're gonna watch
it's gonna wilt.
Liquid's gonna pool at the bottom
and it's gonna transform.
Okay.
So we passed some time.
The lentils you can see
they've gotten really plump.
Lightened in color and Aye yai yai.
My hands are shaking
because I've been drinking
coffee with Chris.
You sucked me in.
I don't.
You can also tell because you can kind of,
if you smush them in your hands
they'll crack pretty easily.
Now we're gonna drain it.
All right, drained.
Now I'm gonna blitz this into
a paste in the food processor.
You don't wanna do it in a blender
because the blender will
make it a bit too smooth
and if it's too smooth
it'll fry up really heavy and dense
so food processing it ensures
that you won't take it too far.
I'm gonna add to this, three quarter's
of a teaspoon of salt.
A bit of tumeric and
Kashmiri red chile powder.
This is a pretty mild
and fruity chile powder.
It's more flavorful than hot
but if you don't have it,
you can just use half as much of cayenne.
All right, here we go.
[engine murmurs]
So, you wanna get in
there a couple of times
and scrape down the sides.
Make sure you get all
the way under the blade
cause sometimes that's where you end up
with like, rogue lentils
that aren't blending.
That's why I love these tiny spatulas.
Okay.
I think that looks good.
Um, okay, so.
This is our zucchini
and onion after an hour.
And you can see it looks
super like, floppy, squishy.
It's almost like you steamed
it but without any heat.
We've got like, at least
a table spoon of liquid
that's come out of that
so I'm gonna dump this out and then I can
go right back into this bowl.
So you can see the
lentils have broken down
but it's not like a smooth puree.
It still looks a little
bit chunky and coarse
and that's exactly what you want.
This texture is gonna mean
that when you fry it up
it's gonna feel a little bit
like, light and airy on the inside.
Whereas if you did this
with like, a chickpea flower
it would just be like a pancake.
We wouldn't have improved
the original which is,
which is defeating the
point of doing this.
So, into the bowl.
I could scrape a bowl forever.
Sorry, guys.
Okay.
Okay.
[laughs]
Okay.
So, next before I add the
zucchini and onion into here.
I want to just make sure
I get every bit of liquid
off it it by draining it on a towel.
You don't wanna break apart
the vegetable at this point
so don't like, get in there.
You don't wanna wring it out but you know
just kind of, blot it.
That's the word.
Now we're going to fold the veggies
into our lentil puree.
At this point, you just wanna make sure
that all the veggies are evenly
distributed in the puree.
It's not gonna look at all like
you're typical batter
for a zucchini fritter
and just like, just trust in the recipe.
Believe me.
I'm gonna zest this lemon into here.
We want about a tablespoon of zest.
One cup of parsley.
I like to do like, big
pieces with the stems
because it looks really pretty
when it fries up in there
and once again like, with
the big chunks of zucchini.
You want to know what's in there.
So that's about, that's a hefty cup.
You know, why am I gonna
leave this guy behind.
Let's just, this is, we're
gonna go parsley heavy.
I'm going rogue.
It's gonna be okay.
I'm gonna fold this up
and like, once again
it's gonna look like a crazy
amount of stuff in there
but it will be okay.
And now were gonna fry.
Okay, so I'm frying in a
ten inch cast iron skillet.
I want to fry it in
about, like a quarter inch
to a half inch of ghee
and this is, by using
a smaller pan we'll need
less ghee to fry it.
You could also use neutral
oil but I really like ghee
because it adds a nice nutty
flavor to the whole thing
and if you don't let the ghee
get to like smoking point
you can strain it out and use it again.
And you know that it's
hot and ready to go by
plopping a little bit in there
and see how it immediately
starts bubbling.
That means this is ready to fry.
On a thermometer it's about 375
but that's pretty hard to temp
with such a small amount of fat.
So, I'm gonna get like a big spoonful.
About a quarter cup.
Pop it in.
Dip your spoon in a bit of
the ghee so it doesn't stick
and then use it to flatten
it into a little pancake.
We'll put that little
bitty bit on there too.
A little parsley leaf.
Dip and squish.
You want these to fry until they're
really deeply golden brown.
It's gonna be about
three minutes per side.
It's gonna seem like it's darker
than you think it needs to be
but we wanna make sure the
lentils cook all the way through.
Otherwise, when you bite
into it, it's gonna have
a weird little starchy aftertaste.
Okay.
We can see this guy is like, ready to flip
cause' the outside is
looking nice and toasty.
I like to do a little two spatula method
but you know, one will work.
Use a spoon, whatever.
And there you go.
You can see the onions get
like, really caramelized
from contact with the cast iron
so they're going to be
nice and sweet in there.
Okay.
So, that's what were looking for.
I don't know what you call that.
It's brown.
I don't think it's golden brown.
It's brown.
Another two minutes.
Cut.
No.
I'm not supposed to say that.
Okay.
So, you can see the second side is nice
and deeply, deeply browned.
Immediately after taking
it out of the oil.
You want to season it
with a touch of salt.
You gotta do it right away
or it's not gonna stick.
And we've got number two
and our little guy lagging behind
who made it though.
Next Batch.
[sizzling]
Okay.
He made it.
With his, with his pack.
- [Interviewer] Chris, how does it feel
to be in the background of a Sohla video?
- It feels good.
It's like, if being in
the background of a video
is like a series of
wines like, this is like
a real like, robust you
know, kind of number.
[laughing]
Um, just like a lot going on.
- Like, a Syrah?
- A lot of edges, like a Syrah.
You know, like a big, big,
big northern Rhone Syrah.
Yeah, they're not like,
giving you a hard time
though or anything?
Like, first video kind of hazing ritual's.
- No.
- Any bullshit like that?
- No.
No.
All right, so I've got my last batch
of zucchini fritters frying up
and in the meantime I'm going to whip up
a really simple Raita
just to dip on the side.
Just with, I've got
three quarters of a cup
of whole milk yogurt.
Not Greek.
I kind of like the regular stuff more
for this because it's got a bit more tang.
I think a half teaspoon sugar.
A big pinch of salt.
And this is my lemon that I zested.
I'm gonna juice it now and
use about two tablespoons of juice.
Whisk it up.
Super simple.
All right.
Back to the fritters.
They're probably ready to flip.
Oh yeah.
They are ready to flip.
Such timing, it's like
I've made this before.
I can feel it in my bones.
Or it's the coffee with coconut oil.
[laughs]
All right.
Two minutes.
Okay.
So, I've just finished the last batch
and you wanna salt it as soon as
it comes out of the fryer so the salt
sticks to it while it's nice and hot.
Okay.
Let's eat.
Yeah?
- [Interviewer] Yeah.
- We're ready to go.
We're still rolling?
Oh, I forgot.
Okay.
So we're gonna plate it
up, all nice and fancy.
Plate up some of these fritties.
What do you think?
Is that pretty?
- [Interviewer] Oh my god.
Look at the calvary.
- All right.
How did you know?
- What are the odds?
[laughing]
- Look who's here.
- Oh my god.
Are these basically
just zucchini pakora's?
- They're piyajiu.
So, it's blended lentils.
There you go.
Fresh from the sheet pan.
- So I need to eat one of these.
Can I just dip it directly in?
- Yeah.
- What did you season the zucchini in?
- So the zucchini and onion get salted.
- Holy.
- To pull out some of the water
and then it it it's just
tumeric and Kashmiri red chile.
- Oh my god.
This is so good.
- Thank you.
- Yum.
- Crunchy?
- Oh my god.
- Can you hear the crunch?
[crunching]
- It like, shatters.
Mmm.
It's interesting.
I feel like pakora,
I love pakora but it's
often very one note.
This has just got like,
a lot of stuff going on.
You can taste like, the
brightness of the zucchini
like, you actually taste
the flavor of the vegetables
whereas pakora is more about
encasing the vegetables in fried batter.
Like you can taste like, the vegetleness.
- Cool.
- Ooh, that's so fresh and delicious.
- Thank you.
- Mmm.
I've never had your food before.
This is amazing.
- Thank you.
- I'm just gonna linger
for two more seconds
and then I will leave.
- You should just, you should
finish the whole thing.
- I'm gonna finish the whole thing.
[laughing]
and then I'll leave.
Okay, bye.
[laughing]
- Chris, you're up.
Come on down.
There's gonna be a family melt here soon.
[crunching]
- Sohla, you spoil us all.
- Mm, the onion. Ah.
- This is why I got the job, right?
- Yeah.
- Basically.
- Because I get a lot of messages
"How'd you get this job?"
This is how I got this job.
So go make this and
maybe you'll be here too.
[laughing]
- So well done.
Texture.
Incredible.
Flavor.
Incredible.
I love the parsley and I've become like,
a little bit of a parsley agnostic in life
at this point but like it fries up so well
it becomes part of that texture.
All right.
Well done.
So, yeah.
These are the zucchini lentil fritters.
It's what happens when Chris
and I combine our powers.
With a little sprinkle of inspiration
from my mom so you should go make this.
It's delicious.
- [Sohla] Is that good?
- [Interviewer] It was until
you asked, is that good?
[laughing]
- Uh, okay.
I forgot what I said.
All right.
Okay.
