#BlogchatterA2Z-“A- Amaranth Paratha”- An Ancient Grain Healthy and Tasty recipe!

March 31, 2020 /

Hello everyone

Warm welcome to “Healthy eating for busy moms”. This is my first post for the series. I am so excited to start this 26 days journey with you awesome guys. hoping you liked this series and recipes.

As the alphabet “A”, I am sharing “Amaranth paratha recipe with tomato chutney”

What is Amaranth?

You know, sometimes I feel so amazed and surprised with fancy names of our well-known ancient grains. Amaranth is our very own Indian ancient grain “Rajgeera” that is also called ramdana in some state. It is famous as a fasting food and people usually make different dishes like amaranth kheer, amaranth ladoo during fasting.

Nowadays, when many people are suffering from gluten allergy and many want to eat gluten free diet for losing weight, in this scenario, rajgeera or amaranth sounds like a perfect option. It is a highly nutritional substance that contain many vital ingredients like protein, vitamin and minerals. Also, it is high in fiber, so helps in weight loss too.

Nutritional value of Amaranth

Amaranth is a highly nutritious ancient grain. Uncooked Amaranth contains:

12% water
65% carbohydrate
7% dietary fiber
14% protein
7% fat

Uncooked Amaranth is the rich source of protein, dietary fiber, vitamin 6, folate and other dietary minerals. Though cooking decreases the nutritional value of Amaranth, still it is a good source of nutrition. Cooked Amaranth contain a good amount of vitamin A, Vitamin C, Calcium and magnese.

Health benefits of Amaranth

Here are some great health benefits of Amaranth.

It improves metabolism and digestion.
Helps in preventing osteoporosis.
Great for hair health.
It helps in controlling blood sugar level, so it is a good option for diabetics.
Good for heart health.
Helps in controlling weight.
Provides good nutrition to our body.
Decreases plasma cholesterol level
Helps in improving the condition of hypertension and anemia.
Great option for people who have wheat allergy.
Stimulate the immune system as well.

As I had said earlier, there are various ways to use Amaranth in your routine diet. In fact, it is also a great food for breakfast.

In this post, I am sharing one of my favorite Amaranth recipes that is called “Amaranth paratha” and we will serve this with Tomato chutney. If you want you can eat this with any vegetable gravy or with curd or veg curd raita.

You can enjoy this recipe for fasting too.

As this is the first post for the series, so, I want to start with a tasty one (because it is a preconceive notion that healthy is boring. But with this series, I will try to make healthy is tasty)

So, let’s start with the recipe.

Amaranth paratha

Ingredients

Amaranth flour 2 cup
Boiled potato 1
Green chilly 3-4 finely chopped or you can use green chili paste too.
Cumin seed 1 teaspoon
Dry spices (red chili powder, coriander powder)
Rock salt as per your taste
Ghee as needed
Coriander leaves a bunch
Mixed finery grated vegetables (cucumber, carrot)- 1 cup (optional)

Method

First take amaranth or Rajgeera flour in a bowl.
Add boiled potato in this flour and mixed both things properly. You can adjust the quantity of potato after checking consistency of dough. It should not be too soft nor too hard.
If you want you can other grated vegetables of your choice (like carrot, cucumber) at this stage. But make sure there should be no additional water in this, otherwise the flour will become too soft.
Now, add salt, cumin seed and other dry spices.
Next, add green chili and finely chopped coriander leaves.
Add, 2 teaspoon ghee as a moin(for softness)
Now, mixed all things properly. And knead the dough by adding little water.
Prepare the dough and keep it aside for 10-15 minutes.
Now, heat the tawa and make small balls from the dough.
Roll the parathas like a routine way.
Shallow fry it on a medium flame by adding little ghee.
Shallow fry is from both sides, until it turns golden brown.
Your healthy and tasty amaranth paratha is ready to eat.

My mom usually serves this with potato sabzi or tomato chutney.

Here I am sharing the tomato chutney recipe that is so tasty and healthy as well.

Tomato chutney

Ingredients

Finely chopped tomato 3-4
Green chilly finely chopped 3-4
Onion finely chopped ½ (skip onion, if you are making this as a fasting food)
Cumin seed for tempering
Dry spices (red chili powder, coriander powder) as per your taste
Salt, sugar as per your taste
Oil 1-2 teaspoon

Method

First wash the tomato and cut them finely, and keep it aside in a bowl.
Now, heat the oil and add cumin seed as tadka,
After spluttering, add green chilies.
When green chilies change its color, add tomato.
Add dry spices and salt.
Cover the lid and wait for 5-10 minutes.
Stir in between and check the consistency of tomato.
When it becomes soft and tender, add 1 teaspoon sugar.
Turn off the gas, and garnish the chutney with green coriander leaves.
Now, serve this tomato chutney with Rajgeera paratha.
Your delicious fasting or routine meal is ready to enjoy.

There are various other ways to enjoy Amaranth as routine meal. Check out these recipes to learn more about it.

Special tip

In India, ancient grains like Amaranth, and Barnyard millet is mostly considered as a “Fasting food”, and most of the people consume these nutritional grains only during fasting. But this thing needs to be changed. These ancient grains are highly nutritious and contains less calories than our routine grains like wheat and rice.

They are an excellent healthy alternative that nourishes our body with good nutrition and taste equally good.

So, we should try to use these grains in our routine diet by using innovative and creative recipes.

So, this is all for now.

Hoping you liked this recipe.

Stay tuned, for next post.

Will share another healthy and tasty recipe for busy moms and their families.

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photo credit: NA.dir Paratha via photopin (license)