Love munchies with coffee? Make kara boondi, the perfect crispy and spicy snack to go with your coffee. These are crispy tiny deep fried balls made from spicy chickpea flour or besan flour batter. Tossed with fried cashews and curry leaves, these can get real addictive! With this easy recipe you can make this vegan and gluten free kara boondi easily at home!
Boondi is a popular Indian snack made with chickpea flour. It is usually made just with salt to add in Indian chaats or plain boondi for making ladoo.
Kara boondi is the south Indian snack version where you spice the chickpea batter with chili powder. Also few mix-ins like fried cashews, curry leaves and peanuts are added. It is an addictive snack with coffee just like poha mixture, mullu murukku, cheese sev.
Kara Boondi Recipe
Perfect snack with coffee
Vegan and gluten free snack
Quick and simple recipe
Gets ready under 30 minutes
Delicious and kid friendly.
Usually we make kara boondi to add in Mardas Mixture for Diwali. We also set aside a batch to munch especially for kids. It is in fact a very straight forward and easy recipe to make, with few tips and tricks. If you get the hang of perfect batter consistency and pouring technique, you can make perfect kara boondi.
One common problem most of us face while making kara boondi is forming of tails. I have given few tips and tricks in the notes section to avoid tails, why boondi turn flat and how to make crispy full boondi.
To make kara boondi recipe you will need gram flour and rice flour. Rice flour makes the boondi light and crisp. There is absolutely no need to add baking soda. I used kashmiri red chili powder for spicing. The other add ins are fried cashews, peanuts and curry leaves. Finally you can add a dash of pepper powder fried in 1 teaspoon ghee or oil . It gives an amazing flavor to the kara boondi.
Serve this masala boondi as snack with coffee or use to make Madras mixture.
How To Make Kara Boondi Step by Step
1.Heat oil for deep frying.
2.Take besan flour, rice flour, salt and chili powder. Add 2 teaspoons hot oil to the flour mixture. Mix thoroughly.
3. Add water gradually and make a thick yet flowing batter. The batter should be very slightly thin than bajji batter. Batter consistency is the most important factor to get perfect boondis.
4. We need two perforated ladles to make kara boondi. One for tapping the batter and one for draining the fried boondis.
5. Take a ladle with round holes and hold it above the oil. Now with a big spoon take some batter and pour over the perforated laddle. Tap slightly. Batter will fall as round balls.
6. Deep fry till the sizzling sound stops and boondis turn golden brown. Remove to a kitchen towel.
7. Once all the batter is done, deep fry peanuts, broken cashews and curry leaves.
8. Take all the fried ingredients in a bowl and toss very well.
9. Add some pepper powder roasted in ghee if you wish. Toss well. Store kara boondi in airtight box and serve as required.
Tips For Making Perfect Kara Boondi
- The key for perfect kara boondi is to get the batter consistency correct.
- If the batter is very thick, boondi will or tail when you tap the batter. When that happens, just add few spoons of water, mix well and try again.
- If the batter is thick, the boondi will become fat while you fry. In that case just add 1 or 2 teaspoons gram flour and mix well. Now make boondi.
- You can use ghee or oil for frying the pepper powder.
More Diwali Snack Recipes
I hope you will try this easy kara boondi recipe and enjoy as much as we did.
Kara Boondi Recipe

Kara boondi recipe | Diwali 2016 snack recipes
1 CUP = 250 ml
Ingredients
- 1 cup gram flour
- 2 tablespoons rice flour
- 2 teaspoons chili powder
- 1/4 teaspoon asafoetida
- Salt
- Oil
- 2 tablespoons peanuts
- 2 tablespoons broken cashews
- curry leaves
Instructions
- Heat oil for deep frying.
- Take besan flour, rice flour, asafoetida, salt and chili powder. Add 2 teaspoons hot oil to thi flour mixture. Mix thoroughly.
- Add water gradually and make a thick yet flowing batter. The batter should be very slightly thin than bajji batter. Batter consistency is the most important factor to get perfect boondis.
- We need two perforated ladles to make kara boondi. One for tapping the batter and one for draining the fried boondis.
- Take a ladle with round holes and hold it above the oil. Now with a big spoon take some batter and pour over the perforated laddle. Tap slightly. Batter will fall as round balls.
- Deep fry till the sizzling sound stops and boondis turn golden brown. Remove to a kitchen towel.
- Once all the batter is done, deep fry peanuts, broken cashews and curry leaves
- Take all the fried ingredients in a bowl and toss very well.
- Add some pepper powder roasted in ghee if you wish. Toss well. Store kara boondi in airtight box and serve as required.
Notes
2. If the boondis form tail while tapping, it means water is less in the batter. Add 2 -3 tablespoons at a time, mix well and try again.
3. If the boondis go flat it means batter is thinner than required. Add 1-2 tablespoons gram flour and mix well. try again.
4. After pouring the batter do not rub the batter. Just tap gently.
Nutrition
Janaki says
So picture perfect kara boondi. ooks just like what we get in shops without tails. So tempted to try!