FOX NUTS (MAKHANA) TRAIL MIX

30.08.2020: I had 50 gms of Makhana remaining after I had made Caramel Makahana. Though Skip insisted that I make the Caramel ones again, I wanted to try a different recipe. “I need content for the blog”.

I decided to make a savoury version this time.

I’ve had some moments in the kitchen where I’ve frozen in panic after tasting my dish. I tend to add too much salt at times. A trick to pull out excess salt from gravy-based dishes is to drop a few raw potato slices in it. Let it soak in the excess salt and fish the slices out just before serving. What do you do with excess salt in your trail mix?

Skip ate a mouthful and said this wouldn’t have happened if I had just listened to him and used sugar instead of salt.

Barring the slight overdose of salt, which gradually settled at the bottom, we did manage to finish these in good time. If you like "namkeen" of the sweet and savoury kind, you will definitely enjoy this too.

Do not season the fox nuts again, immediately after you take it off the flame. Give it a good mix, let it cool down and then taste and decide if you need to add more salt. 

I’ve used ingredients that were available at home, feel free to use whatever seeds, nuts, dried fruits you have at home and eyeball the quantities. Just don’t add too much salt.

FOX NUTS TRAIL MIX

Ingredients:

Fox nuts (Makhana) – 50 gms

Butter / Clarified butter (ghee) – 2 tbsp

Cashews /Peanuts (or both) – 3 tbsps

Almonds (whole) – 3 tbsps

Raisins – 1 tbsp

Sunflower seeds – 2 tbsps

Watermelon seeds – 2 tbsps

Powdered sugar- 1 tsp

Pepper – ½ tsp

Turmeric – ¼ tsp

Chaat masala / Aamchur powder – ¼ tsp

Salt – to taste

Method:

1.     Add butter/ghee to a pan and roast the nuts and seeds separately. Set aside.   

2.     In the same pan, toast the fox nuts until they begin to brown (for about 10 minutes). Add the salt, sugar, chaat masala and turmeric and give it a good mix.

3.     Dump the roasted nuts, seeds and raisins into the pan and mix it well for about 2 minutes more. (Keep an eye on the fox nuts, you don’t want them to burn)

4.     Let it cool. Store in an airtight jar.

5.     Done.