Shikran poli

Hello folks,

If you are wondering what Shikran poli is, I totally get you as I felt the same when I first heard of this last year. Then I went to our most favourite destination for finding any information, yup, you are right, it is Google! One hit at the search button and there landed many images and blogs describing this simple Maharashtrian recipe. I then found that Shikran is a dessert prepared with mashed banana with milk, sugar and cardamom powder that can be served as is or with roti. When served with roti/ poli, it becomes Shikran poli.

That’s an easy- peasy recipe, isn’t it? I thought to myself what could be so special about this recipe. And boy, was I impressed. It turned out to be a treat to the palate and not to forget the gut health promoting prebiotics from banana makes it a frequent appearance at my breakfast.

I always give dishes my own twist and so did I with this. I generally prefer jaggery over sugar, so this was pretty obvious for me and I actually liked this version more because of the rustic flavour from jaggery. In fact, I skip it at times and let the natural sweetness of banana to shine. Then, came in the addition of some seeds. Every time I tried this, I added either roasted sunflower seeds, roasted watermelon seeds, soaked sabja seeds or soaked chia seeds. I found it to be quite filling with roasted sunflower/ melon seeds and soaked chia/sabja seeds. I didn’t have cardamom powder in my pantry shelf so skipped it, but you can add it if you have.

 

Who can try this?

• Anyone who wants a change from the routine breakfast options.
• When you are looking for a way to finish those overripe bananas.
• You like breakfast cereals but are concerned about lack of healthy options in the market.
• If you a bachelor living alone/ in a hostel/ PG and are looking for a super quick yet healthy dish.

 

Without further ado, let’s jump into the recipe.

 

Ingredients:

Chapati/ roti- 2 nos

Milk- 1 cup

Banana- 1 medium size (I used Robusta banana as that is locally available)

Sugar/ jaggery- 1 tsp

Dry roasted sunflower seeds/ watermelon seeds- 1 tbsp

Chia seeds/ sabja seeds- 1 tsp 

 

Method: 

• Soak chia/sabja seeds in 2-3 tbsp water at least 30 minutes prior.
• Take a serving bowl and tear the chapatis into it.
• Add in the mashed or chopped bananas.
• Add milk, sugar/ jaggery, roasted and soaked seeds and mix it well. You can adjust the quantity of milk based on the desired consistency. I prefer it lukewarm, so I use milk that’s a lil hot so it cools down by the time I have it.

It’s time to dig in with your spoon and relish each bite of this heavenly tasting dish.

 

Pro tips:

• I also came across a variation of Shikran poli with mango, that’s gonna be my next try once mango is available in the market.
• If you do not like/ have these seeds, you can replace with soaked, peeled and chopped almonds or chopped cashews. I haven’t tried it yet.

Do give this recipe a try and let us know how it turned out in the comments.

Thanks for stopping by.

Subhashini