Berbican Bara

Berbican Bara Recipe

(This recipe is Copyrighted and owned by Nanda Sahadeo. Anyone reposting it on their site without permission from Nanda Sahadeo is committing an infringement.)

Bara is basically a fritter/pakora made from ground dal/split peas and flour. Guyanese use mostly split peas to make all of their pakoras.  A pakora is a  deep fried fritter made from besan/gram flour or in the case of Guyanese/Trinidadian cooking--ground split peas. Some say that a pakora is a pholourie. However pholourie is the split peas batter alone while a pakora also include various vegetables. In these parts, we also add bhaji/spinach to the batter which then makes it a form of pakora but pholourie is made minus vegetables. There is eggplant/baigan/balanje that is dipped in the pholourie batter and then fried but then it is called baigani.

This style of Bara was made mostly by Berbicians.* These day, almost everyone makes them as they are very easy. This style is very popular at Maticore/dye nights and other ceremonies where large quantities of food/snacks are needed. The other styles of Bara recipes will be posted later.

Aunty Baba is an Ace Bara maker and taught me how to make this style of Bara recently in New York City--yes, I learnt to make Berbican Bara in New York!! Aunty Baba is from Tain, Berbice and moved to New York City decades ago. She is showing my Mom how to make the Baras in a photograph below. Thank you so much Aunty Baba.

Ingredients:

3 cups all purpose flour

1 cup fresh ground dal

2 teaspoon baking powder

2 teaspoon yeast

2 teaspoon salt/or to taste

1 teaspoon ground jeera/cumin

1/2 teaspoon haldi/dye powder

2 cloves minced  garlic

1/4 cup minced onions

pepper to taste

2 teacups water

Oil for frying.

Method:1. Mix all the ingredients together in a deep bowl. The mixture must be sticky but not runny.

2. Cover with cling wrap or a damp towel and allow to rest for 1 hour. Check the batter after and 1 hour, it must be stretchy when pulled.

3. Heat oil.

4. Keep a small bowl with water nearby as you will need to constantly dampen your hands in order to stretch the batter before frying.

5. Wet hands then pull off a small piece of the batter. Pull it with your hands to stretch it into a flatish shape.

6. Carefully drop it into the oil. Continue doing this until there is enough in the pan.

7. Allow to fry on one side until it is golden brown the flip and allow to cook on the other side.

Do not over  cook as it will become saturated with oil.

8. Remove the cooked bara from the pan when both sides are golden light brown and drain on paper towels. 

Serve hot with any chutney of your choice.

*Berbice is the eastern most Region/State of Guyana that borders Suriname.