Raj Kachori with Chhole / Puffed fried bread with spicy and tangy chickpea filling

Raj Kachori is a popular street-food in India. Back in my hometown in India there is a small hole-in-the-wall store that makes them the best I've ever had and these kachoris are definitely in the list of a few things that I do make sure to get my fix of whenever I am visiting. They are basically a crispy and flaky puffed fried round flat bread filled with a spicy and tangy chickpea filling and topped with different chutneys. They makes for an awesome and filling street food. I came across this recipe while I was going through one of my cookbooks from Sanjeev Kapoor. It immediately triggered all the memories and I knew I had to make it. The kachoris are a little tricky to make but you should be able to get it right in a couple of attempts.

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Khasta Kachori/Flaky spicy lentil pastries

There is a small 'hole-in-the-wall' store in my home town. They have lines a mile long outside their store of people lined up to buy their goodies. What do they sell, you ask? Just one basic item, 'Mixture' (of course they have different varieties of it). Mixture is basically your trail mix done indian style. The store was started by this one guy who used to sell his product around town on a bicycle! Now he is a multi-millionaire. Talk about a success story. You will not find a soul in my town who is not crazy about his stuff. Even people from neighboring towns and cities come over and line up. Personally, I am crazy about that mixture too and a few other products he has now..my most favorite being the khasta kachori. A flaky deep fried small round kachori filled with spicy, slightly sour and sweet lentil mixture is just to die for. I can basically just live off of them. Whenever I visit India I make sure to pack my stock to bring back. Due to baggage limitations, I have even compromised on a dress or two so I can pack an extra set of his goodies. That probably gives you an idea how serious this is, right?
Unfortunately since I like it so much I run out within the first few weeks, okay maybe a couple of months, after getting back and always crave for it.
Here comes Sanjeev Kapoor to the rescue. I saw this awesome Kachori recipe on his site the other day. Just reading his recipe it sounded good and I bookmarked it.
Khasta basically means flaky and kachori is basically a fried dough ball filled with a spicy lentil based mix. Got around to trying it a couple of days back and let me tell you, I now have a solution for at least my Kachori craving (still looking for mixture though :)
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