Upma is a savory and hearty Indian breakfast dish, usually made with roasted dry semolina though I have made variants with quinoa and steel cut oats. As it turns out, sometimes sticking to the original can produce the best results as my recent effort with ground semolina or sooji found.
I purchased the sooji, roasted so I didn't need to roast it at home, at our local Patel Brothers. I followed Saranya Mandava's cookbook recipe with a few critical modifications from my mother.
First was that I added fresh curry leaves (maybe 7 -8), which I ripped in half, to the cooking vegetables. Second, I slightly reduced the oil to 5 – 6 tablespoons. Third, I added the ginger toward the end of the onion / tomato / chile cooking time so that it wouldn't burn as the others cooked.
I also increased the salt to 1.25 tsp. and the water to 3 cups instead of the 1.5 – 2 called for in the recipe (semolina stayed the same at 1 cup).
Finally, after the semolina fully cooked after 3 – 4 minutes, I took the pan off the heat, stirred in juice from 1/4 fresh lemon and some diced cilantro. I then let the upma stay covered for approx. 5 minutes before serving.
This finished upma was quickly consumed in our home. The mixture was well-spiced from the mustard seeds and dals; tart from the lemon, tomato, and cilantro; slightly sweet from the ginger and semolina; and featured the unique deep flavor of the curry leaves. Yum!
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