Vada Pav is a popular street food snack from Mumbai, India. It has a fantastic combination of flavors where batata vada or fried potato dumpling is sandwiched between pav or bread rolls with a spread of green mint chutney, garlic chutney, and dates or tamarind chutney, green chili.
Some occasionally refer to this snack as an Indian slider or Bombay burger 🙂
What is Vada Pav?
Vada means deep-fried potato patties, and pav means burger buns or homemade dinner rolls.
Every state has its version of vada pav. Vada Pav requires four basic ingredients vada, dry garlic chutney, green mint chutney, and dates chutney.
For a quicker yet tastier street-style vada pav, make the vadas, dry garlic chutney, and green chilis. Add dates and mint chutney if you like the sweet and spicy kick. But you can skip mint and dates chutney if you feel it's time-consuming.
I love to keep a fried green chilli between the pav as it gives an additional burst of heat (this is optional - frying green chilies ensures that its spiciness gets mellowed down, you can even deseed them before frying).
Yes, making vada pav is time-consuming, but it is worth it. I generally make everything from scratch, including the pav. Instead of making everything on the same day, I also make chutneys and keep them in the refrigerator as I can use them for a week.
I hope you guys are having fun with me in this chaat series. This post is a build-on recipe that uses Batata Vada / Fried Potato Dumplings I posted yesterday.
Ingredients
Batata Vada / Fried Potato Dumplings
Homemade rolls / pav - 9 to 10
For Coriander Mint chutney to Green chutney
1 cup Coriander leaves or Cilantro
¼ cup Mint leaves or Pudina
3 to 4 Green chilies
1 inch Ginger
1 Garlic clove
Juice of ½ lemon
½ teaspoon Salt
2 tablespoon Water
For Tamarind Chutney or Imli
1 teaspoon Oil
½ teaspoon Cumin seeds
⅛ teaspoon Asafoetida or Hing
½ teaspoon Ginger or ginger powder
¼ cup Tamarind (soaked in one cup of water and strained, see instructions below)
½ teaspoon Chile powder
½ to 1 teaspoon Chaat masala
½ cup Sugar or Jaggery, in increments, to taste
For Garlic Chutney
8 to 10 Garlic cloves
2 tablespoon Roasted peanut
½ cup Grated coconut
1 ½ teaspoon Red chile powder
Salt - to taste
How to make Coriander Mint Chutney or Green Chutney
In a mixie or blender jar, add cilantro, mint leaves, green chilies, ginger, and garlic cloves, and pulse to form a coarse paste. Now add lemon juice, salt, and water, and grind to a smooth paste. Keep this aside.
How to make Tamarind Chutney or Sweet Dates Chutney
In a pan on medium flame, add oil. Once hot, add cumin seeds, hing, and ginger, and saute for a few seconds.
To this, add strained tamarind pulp with juice, chile powder, chaat masala, and mix. Finally, add sugar as needed and bring it to a boil. Simmer for 5 minutes and set it aside. You can check the video here.
How to make Dry Garlic Chutney
Heat oil in a pan, add garlic cloves and saute until light in color. Transfer this to the plate.
To the same pan, add coconut and toast until light for less than 2 minutes.
Add garlic cloves, peanuts, coconut, red chili powder and salt to taste in a blender. Blend it to form a thick, coarse paste. Preferably do not add any water, but if you must limit it to 1-2 tbsp, we are aiming for a relatively dry chutney that can be spread on pavs or bread rolls without making them soggy.
How to make Vada Pav
Slice the pav into halves. Spread mint chutney on one half of the pav. On the other half spread dates chutney and garlic chutney.
Place the batata vada between the pav and a fried green chili if desired.
Serve and enjoy.
Pro Tips
- If pavs or bread rolls, or buns are unavailable, you can use regular bread slices for this recipe.
- Adjust the amount of chutneys you add on each vada pav as per your liking.
Some more Indian Chaat Recipes
FAQ
I have also tried using 2 tablespoon of apple butter instead of the dates chutney on some of my pav or rolls. Even this turned out tasty. To 2 tablespoon of apple butter, I added ¼ cup of water and mixed well, and then to this, I added ¼ teaspoon of chili powder, ½ teaspoon of chat masala and a pinch of black salt.
It is popular as Indian burgers or Indian Potato Sliders.
Vada in vada pav is a patty made of mashed potatoes, spices, and green chilies, which are then deep fried by dipping them in gram flour batter.
Recipe card
Best Vada Pav Recipe | How to make Mumbai Vada Pav
Equipment
- 1 Mixie
- 2 Pan
- 3 Bowls
Ingredients
For Batata Vada
For the Batter
- ½ cup Chickpea flour / Besan
- ½ teaspoon Red chile powder
- 1 teaspoon Cumin seeds
- ¼ teaspoon Turmeric powder
- Pinch of Hing (Asafoetida)
- Salt, to taste
For the Filling
- 3 Medium potatoes, boiled
- 2 Green chilies, finely chopped
- 1 tablespoon Ginger, grated
- 2 tablespoon Cilantro or Coriander leaves, finely chopped
- 1 teaspoon Mustard seeds
- 1 teaspoon Urad dal
- 3 Garlic cloves, finely chopped
- Asafoetida, pinch
- Turmeric powder, pinch
- 1 Sprig Curry leaves,
- Salt to taste
- Oil for frying
For Garlic Chutney
- 8 to 10 Garlic cloves
- 2 tablespoon Roasted peanuts
- ½ cup Grated coconut
- 1 ½ teaspoon Red chile powder
- Salt, to taste
Other Ingredients (Click on the link or full recipe in the post)
- Mint Chutney
- Dates Chutney
- 9 Homemade Pav or Store bought
Instructions
How to make Batata Vada (Prepare the filling)
- In a small pan, heat oil on medium to low flame. Add mustard seeds, and when they start to splutter, add urad dal, garlic cloves (and hing and sauté till the raw smell of garlic goes off (about 1 minute) and urad dal becomes light in color.1 teaspoon Mustard seeds, 1 teaspoon Urad dal, 3 Garlic cloves, finely chopped, Asafoetida, pinch
- Next add turmeric powder, curry leaves and saute for another few seconds.Turmeric powder, pinch, 1 Sprig Curry leaves,
- Mash the cooked potatoes. To this, add green chilies, ginger, coriander leaves, salt, and sautéed ingredients prepared above and mix well.3 Medium potatoes, boiled, 2 Green chilies, finely chopped, 1 tablespoon Ginger, grated, 2 tablespoon Cilantro or Coriander leaves, finely chopped, Salt to taste
- Divide this into 9 or 10 portions or to desired size bonda or vada and make balls out of it.
Prepare the batter
- In a bowl, add chickpea flour, red chilli powder, cumin seeds, turmeric powder, asafoetida, salt, and mix. To this, add water little by little and whisk to form a batter that is thinner than pancake batter. See that there are no lumps and batter is not too thick or too thin.½ cup Chickpea flour / Besan , ½ teaspoon Red chile powder, 1 teaspoon Cumin seeds, ¼ teaspoon Turmeric powder, Pinch of Hing (Asafoetida), Salt, to taste
- The amount of water I added was approximately ⅓ cup but not more than ½ cup. This also varies based on brand of flour, weather conditions and water.
- Your vadas should be coated easily in this batter. If the batter is too thick then add water, and if it becomes too watery then add chickpea flour and adjust accordingly.
Frying Vadas
- Heat oil in a heavy bottomed pan for frying.Oil for frying
- Once the oil is hot, dip each potato ball in the batter and drop it in oil. Add 4 to 5 balls depending on the size of your pan. Deep fry them till they are golden brown in color.
- Transfer this to paper towel to absorb any excess oil. Repeat the process for remaining potato balls.
Making of Garlic Chutney
- Heat oil in a pan, add garlic cloves and saute until light in color. Transfer this to the plate.8 to 10 Garlic cloves
- To the same pan, add coconut and toast until light for less than 2 minutes.½ cup Grated coconut
- Add garlic cloves, peanuts, coconut, red chili powder and salt to taste in a blender. Blend it to form a thick, coarse paste. Preferably do not add any water, but if you must limit it to 1-2 tbsp, we are aiming for a relatively dry chutney that can be spread on pavs or bread rolls without making them soggy.2 tablespoon Roasted peanuts, 1 ½ teaspoon Red chile powder, Salt, to taste
Assemble Vada Pav
- Slice the pav into halves. Spread mint chutney on one half of the pav. On the other half spread dates chutney and garlic chutney.Mint Chutney, Dates Chutney, 9 Homemade Pav or Store bought
- Place the batata vada between the pav and a fried green chili if desired.
Notes
- The consistency of batter plays a very important role in making perfect vadas. If the batter is thick, vadas will become hard, and If batter is thin, then stuffing will come out, and it's going to be messy.
- If you do not like pieces of green chilies and ginger, you can also make a paste out of it and add it to the recipe.
- Some people add a pinch of baking soda to the batter to make it fluffier. I generally skip adding it and find no difference.
- If pavs, bread rolls, or buns are unavailable, you can use regular bread slices for this recipe.
- Adjust the amount of chutneys you add on each vada pav as per your liking.
Nutrition
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Beth
What a delicious treat. The whole family loved them!
Luci
This was so good! I made it for a dinner with friends and everyone loved it!