Gobi Manchurian Recipe | Cauliflwer Manchurian

Gobi manchurian recipe- Learn to make crispy, amazingly delicious, super flavorful best gobi manchurian at home with this easy step by step photos and quick video. Vegan recipe.

Cauliflower manchurian is a popular Indo Chinese dish where fried crispy cauliflower florets tossed in a super flavorful spicy and sweet manchurian sauce. The manchurian sauce is made of soy sauce, chilli sauce, vinegar, ginger garlic and few other ingredients.

It tastes best as appetizer or as side dish with fried rice, hakka noodles. For more recipes from Indo Chinese cuisine please check chilli paneer, crispy chilli potatoes, schezwan noodles, veg spring rolls recipes.

Do you love cauliflower? Then this Manchurian with gobi or cauliflower is sure to please your palate. This crispy fried appetizer is such a favorite among Indians.

You will find this snack in almost all makeshift shops, Indo Chinese restaurants, wedding buffets and parties.

While chicken manchurian is most popular one, gobi manchurian or cauliflower manchurian is most loved among vegetarians. This recipe is also vegan.

Crispy deep fried cauliflower florets, tossed in hot manchurian sauce made of soy sauce, bell peppers and served with a generous dose of spring onion greens is surely a treat for everyone.

There are two variations with this recipe. Dry and gravy versions. Here I am sharing the detailed recipe for dry version and a quick recipe for gobi manchurian gravy.

About This Recipe

Gobi manchurian is a popular Indo Chinese appetizer made of cauliflower, plain flour, soy sauce, bell peppers, chilli sauce, vinegar, ginger and garlic.

It is easy to make gobi manchurian at home. I have divided the recipe into three steps to make it easier.

1. Make the crispy fried cauliflower
2. Make the manchurian sauce with stir fry vegetables or green bell pepper alone.
3. Finally toss them together and serve hot.

This recipe of crispy gobi manchurian I am sharing is from a reputed chef who was kind enough to share the recipe with me in a buffet.

I tasted this amazing manchurian many years abck in a buffet and have been making it at home ever since.

Over the years I have altered the recipe and the one I am sharing now is a real keeper.

I keep this as base recipe and make paneer manchurian, baby corn manchurian, veg manchurian and this amazing idli manchurian too.

So you may ask why this recipe works? First of all it is super tasty, crispy, remains crispy for quite sometime and tastes just like the restaurant ones.

Next this is a clean recipe for gobi manchurian. I have not added any colorants, ajinomoto or msg in this recipe. Still we can get the street flavor by adding generous seasoning and increasing the amount of ginger garlic.

I have used naturally fermented low sodium soy sauce here and I highly recommend the same.

Here I have deep fried the cauliflower but included instructions for baking and pan frying them

Next this recipe is super simple to follow and you need very basic ingredients for this. I have also added step by step photos and a quick video.

Do try out this super tasty crispy cauliflower manchurian that is

insanely delicious and addictive

vegan and can be easily made gluten free

crispy and fresh

delicious with fried rice, noodles or as starter

always a hit with kids 🙂

Two Versions Of Cauliflower Manchurian

This classic manchurian dish comes in two forms

• crispy dry cauliflower manchurian
• gobi manchrian gravy

While both are delicious and have their own fan base I personally love dry version. But that’s just me I like all curries a bit dry 🙂

Here I am sharing with you all the detailed recipe for dry cauliflower manchurian but making gravy version is super easy.

You just have to make the sauce by adding corn starch slurry, see my instructions as you read.

How To Make Gobi Manchurian Dry Recipe

Here I have divided the recipe into three parts.

1. Preparing the sauce
2. Batter coat and fry the cauliflower florets
3. Tossing them together and preparing gobi Manchurian

step by step photos

How To Make Manchurian Sauce For Cauliflower Manchurian Recipe.

Heat 3 teaspoons oil in a wok or pan to make the sour sauce. Add the crushed ginger and garlic. Saute till the raw smell goes off. You can also add 1 tablespoon ginger garlic paste here.

Add the 1/2 cup spring onions and saute well. Next add chopped onions 1/2 cup, 2 green chilies, 1/2 teaspoon red chilli flakes and saute well for 2 minutes in high heat.

Now add the 1/2 cup chopped bell pepper, 1/4 cup cubed onion  mix well. Saute in high heat for 3 minutes.

Add  1 tablespoon soy sauce, 1 tablespoon vinegar, tomato paste, 2 tablespoons hot sauce or red chili sauce. You can also add 1 tablespoon tomato sauce or tomato ketchup for a sweeter flavor.

Add 3/4 cup water salt to taste and add 1 teaspoon freshly cracked black or white pepper. You can also add black pepper powder or white pepper powder.

Bring the sauce to a boil and simmer for 3-4 minutes in medium heat. Set aside the tangy manchurian sauce until we make the crispy fried gobi florets.

Making Crispy Fried Cauliflower Florets

Rinse and separate the cauliflower into bite size florets. Next we will clean cauliflower florets.

Bring water to rapid boil in a large pan. Add salt and the rinsed cauliflower florets. Let cauliflower florets cook for 3 minutes.

Drain the cauliflower florets in a colander and rinse immediate in cold water to stop over cooking.

Into a mixing bowl add 3 tablespoons plain flour or all purpose flour, salt, 1 teaspoon Kashmiri red chili powder, 1/4 teaspoon black pepper powder, 1 tablespoon corn flour or corn starch, sesame seeds if using. I sometimes add 1/2 tablespoon rice flour too for more crispiness. You can also add corn starch or tapioca starch.

Add the par boiled cauliflower florets.

Toss well and add 2-3 tablespoons water to just coat the flours. You can also make a corn flour slurry and dip each cauliflower floret. I find this way more easy.

Heat oil for deep frying. Once the oil is hot but not smoking, maintain medium flame.

Add 4-5 gobi florets depending on the size of the pan to the hot oil. Cook evenly from all sides. You can also pan fry. If you want to make baked cauliflower manchurian refer my notes below.

Deep fry the cauliflower from all sides until crispy and golden brown, about 2-3 minutes for each batch.

Drain excess oil on a kitchen towel and set aside. Deep fry the remaining florets in the hot oil in the same way.

How To Make Gobi Manchurian Crispy

 Add the fried cauliflower florets in the prepared sauce and toss well. Garnish with more sesame seeds and chopped spring onions greens. You can saute in high heat for a minute to get that smoky flavor.

Serve gobi manchurian immediately topping with reserved scallion greens & 1 teaspoon finely chopped capsicum. You can also add few drops of toasted sesame oil. You can also add chopped celery, green onions, toasted sesame seeds as toppings.

Expert Tips

Though this is a super simple dry gobi manchurian recipe , here are few tips that will help you make this recipe perfectly.

1. Use fresh and tender cauliflower with dense florets. The quality of gobi is super important in this recipe.

2. Make the sauce first and fry the gobi florets just before serving to retain the crispiness.

3. My sauce recipe does not use any corn starch. Use good quality soy sauce, if possible use dark naturally brewed soy sauce for good flavor.

4. Good vinegar is a must in this manchurian recipe. I prefer to use rice vinegar but you can use any good quality one like apple cider vinegar.

5. To get the authentic flavor of gobi manchurian use sesame oil. As with an indo chinese recipe good sesame oil adds flavor leaps and bounds.

6. To make gobi florets more crispy, you can double fry them too.

7. Once you toss the fried gobi in sauce serve it immediately.

8. Be generous with spring onions in this recipe for that signature Chinese flav0r. I like to add both spring onion whites and spring onion greens. They both add a wonderful unique flavor.

Instead of bell peppers you can also use chili peppers.

Can You Make Gobi Manchurian Without Maida?

To make gobi mancurian without maida you can easily use wheat flour or chickpea flour. There may be slight difference in taste but surely a healthier.

How to make baked gobi manchurian?

• To make gobi manchurian in oven mix the flours mentioned for batter in the recipe well
• Add the blanched cauliflower florets and toss well. Just sprinkle some water for flours to coat the gobi.
• Arrange the batter coated cauliflower florets on a large greased baking sheet as single layer.
• Bake in the preheated oven at 220C for 25-30 minutes.
• Prepare the manchurian gravy as mentioned in the recipe and toss the baked gobi. Serve.
• You can also make gobi manchurian in air fryer following the same method.

How To Make Gluten Free Cauliflower Manchurian

To make this recipe gluten free just skip plain flour in the batter and use chickpea flour in the batter

Make sure the soy sauce you use is gluten free.

How To Make gobi manchurian Gravy Version?

The only change you will need to make in this recipe to make it into a gravy is a add cornflour slurry to the sauce and make it like gravy. The recipe ingredients are the same only.

Mix 1 tablespoon corn flour in 2 cups cold water and mix well without lumps. while making the sauce as mentioned in the recipe, add this slurry instead of 3/4 cup water and bring the sauce to boil. Simmer until the gravy thickens.

Also make sure to double the quantity of all the sauces lie soya sauce, red chilli sauce and vinegar. Adjust seasoning as per taste.

This gravy version tastes good with fried rice, noodles.

How To make semi dry version?

To make semi dry gobi manchurian again double the quantity of sauces and make a cornflour slurry with 3/4 tablespoon corn starch and 1 cup water.

Add this slurry while making sauce and simmer until it thickens.

Can I make this recipe in instant pot?

You can make the sauce for gobi manchurian easily in instant pot. Follow the recipe exactly in saute mode.

One more advantage is after making the sauce you can utilize the keep warm mode and keep it hot until serving.

How To Serve Gobi Manchurian

You can serve this dry gobi manchurian as appetizer or snack with sweet corn clear soup.

This also tastes great with hakka noodles, sesame noodles or fried rice , paneer fried rice, too. We love this with all sorts of vegetable fried rice.

You can also eat gobi manchurian as side dish in any Asian meal.

More Gobi Recipes

Baked sesame cauliflower bites

Gobi 65

Aloo gobi

Crispy Gobi Pakoda

I hope you will try this recipe and enjoy as much as we did. Please give a star rating ★ in the recipe card below if you have tried this recipe. Follow us on Pinterest , Instagram, Facebook   for more recipes and ideas.

Recipe Card