Hondwo (Vegetable Cake)

This is probably one o.f my most favourite snacks! It’s a savoury cake and you can load it with veggies and its just delicious. My mum makes this and batch cooks loads before me and my brother come to Houston so we can feast on it during our stay. It freezes really really well and you can change any of the veggies in it. My mum tends to make hers with kale, courgette and carrots as she tolerates them well but I like to add lots of cabbage to mine and a diversity go any veggies for gut microbiome health. Talking about gut microbiome diversity it’s a brilliant food for so many reasons. You have anti-inflammatory turmeric that gives it a gorgeous golden hue, cabbage and kale for supporting hormone, liver and detox, the probiotic goodness and protein from the yoghurt, spices, etc

It’s delicious by itself but we all love it with tamarind and some greek, protein rich yoghurt. Will share my tamarind recipe too below.

Ingredients

1 cup grated cabbage

1 cup grated courgette

1 cup grated greens (1/2 kale 1/2 coriander)

1 cup grated carrot

1 cup grated potato

1 onion grated

1 tsp turmeric

2 cups chickpea flour

1 cup rice flour

2 heaped tsp baking powder

2 cups yoghurt

1 cup EVOO (3/4 for the mix and 1/4 for tempering with spices)

For the tempering:

1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil (taken from the one cup above)

1 chilli sliced

1 tsp black mustard seeds

8-10 curry leave (if you have them, optional)

1 bulb or garlic (6-8 cloves) thinly sliced

1 tsp sesame seeds (for sprinkling over the cake)

1- Start by grating all you vegetables. If you have a food processor that is amazing and it will take just seconds to prep all the veg! I don’t own one so it took me a few minutes to grate all the vegetables. You should add in a total of 5 cups. I have 5 cups of grated/ finely chopped veggies plus one small onion.

2- Once grated all in 2 cups of chickpea flour, 1 cup of rice flour, the turmeric, baking powder and salt to this and mix. Set aside

3- in a shallow pan heat up your EVOO with the mustard seeds. As they start to pop add in your garlic, curry leaves and chilli. Once the garlic starts to take some colour put the heat off the heat and set aside.

Now go back to your bowl/ veggies mix  and add all the yoghurt and 3/4 cup of EVOO, plus everything in your shallow pan/ the tempered oil with spice and mix everything up well. Mix very well. Should be the consistency of a cake batter. . Empty into your baking dish . I then added a sprinkle of sesame seeds on top. about 1 tablespoon

4- Mine was a large pan and it took 90 minutes at 180 fan in the oven. I would suggest 2 smaller pans to reduce the time. It’s ready when your knife comes out clean. Let it cool completely before cutting and enjoying. It’s also delicious toasted before enjoying and I usually warm mine up a little.

5- Best served with some tamarind sauce. I buy ready made tamarind that I buy from amazon. Will link it here and add some maple syrup tot sweeten, a rich of cumin and chilli powder and a little water to get the consistency desired.

(1 heaped tsp tamarind paste, 1 tablespoon maples syrup, pinch of cumin and chilli powder, 2 tablespoons water).

Watch the video here: