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Vella Seedai, also known as Sweet Seedai, holds a significant place as a neivedhyam dish during both the Krishna Jayanthi and Thirukarthigai festivals. This delectable treat is a deep-fried sweet creation crafted from a blend of rice flour, urad dal flour, and jaggery. What sets Vella Seedai apart is its delightful combination of a crispy outer shell and a melt-in-your-mouth interior, offering a truly unique flavor and texture.

During Krishna Jayanthi, alongside Vella Seedai, offerings like Uppu Seedai, Aval Puttu, and Nei Appam hold immense importance as Prasad offerings to Lord Krishna. In our quest for perfection in preparing Vella Seedai, we've gathered some invaluable tips to ensure your sweet seedai turns out just right.

Table of Contents

Tips for making Vella Seedai:

Texture of flours: Rice flour and Urad dal flour should be smooth without any lumps. Pass the flours through the sieve twice to ensure there are no lumps in the flours.
Homemade rice flour Vs Store bought rice flour: I have used store bought rice flour in this recipe. Usually for Prasad we prepare rice flour at home and use that. Follow the link to see how to prepare homemade Rice flour. We can also use store bought rice flour.
Roasting Rice Flour: Whether its Store bought or home made rice flour, we need to dry roast the rice flour till its warm. We don't need to roast till it change to red. Just roast till the flour feels warm in your hands.
Ratio of Flours: The ratio of rice flour to urad dal flour is 1 Cup : 1 tbsp. We just need 1 tablespoon of urad dal flour, but grinding 1 tablespoon of roasted urad dal in mixer grinder is hard. Lesser quantity doesn't get grind to smooth powder usually. So dry roast ½ cup of urad dal and grind it to smooth powder. Use only 1 tablespoon of urad dal for 1 cup of rice flour. Rest of the urad dal flour you can use it for making Uppu Seedai, thattai and thenkuzhal.
Jaggery Syrup Consistency: There is not particular consistency like one-string for this Vella Seedai. We just need to melt the jaggery and bring it to rolling boil. Then strain the jaggery and add it to flours.
Butter: Soften the butter at room temperature and add it to flours. Do not add cold butter or melted butter.
Consistency of dough: While we prepare vella seedai dough, knead it to a smooth dough using the strained jaggery juice. If you feel the jaggery syrup is not enough to make a dough, try sprinkling water and knead it to dough.
Allow the dough balls to dry for 5 mins before adding in hot oil.
Deep Frying: Ensure the oil is hot enough before dropping the vella seedai. Once the oil is hot, add 1 vella seedai ball and ensure its not splitting in oil. Do not panic if it splits, just adjust the dough by adding little roasted rice flour and then once again roll into ball and vella seedai will not split in oil.
Oil Temperature: We need to maintain right temperature of oil while frying. After adding vella seedai balls in oil, keep the flame in low and fry till the vella seedai becomes golden brown color. Between the batches adjust the flame to medium to ensure the oil is at right temperature.

Other Gokulashtami Recipes:

Recipe Card for Vella Seedai

Method with Step by Step Pictures :

Prepare the rice flour as given in the link here. Heat a pan and dry roast the rice flour in low flame for couple of minutes. Do not fry the rice flour till they become over burnt. Just heat the flour till they are hot and if you take a pinch of rice flour you should be able to draw or put little kolam. Take the roasted rice flour in a mixing bowl along with uriddal flour. Dry roasting is an important step in vella sedai preparation. Do not use freshly ground rice flour as it contain some moisture which will make the seedai to burst. You can also use store bought rice flour. IF you are using store bought rice flour, then dry roast it for couple of minutes and then sieve it and again dry roast it for another couple of minutes without burning the rice flour.

Take a pan, add sesame seeds and grated coconut and dry fry them till they become golden brown color. Add these fried sesame seeds and grated coconut to the rice flour along with butter. The butter should be in room temperature. Mix everything well.

Take grated jaggery in a bowl and add water just to soak the jaggery. I have added 2 tablespoon of water. Allow the jaggery to boil till it is dissolved. Pass this jaggery juice through a strainer to get rid of sand and other impurities

Add the strained jaggery juice to a pan and keep in flame till it comes a rolling boil. We don't need any string or solid consistency. Add this jaggery juice to the rice flour and mix the rice flour well with a ladle or spoon. Make it to a right dough. If the dough is loose and soft then the seedai will dissolve in hot oil. So when you get a tough pliable dough then stop adding the jaggery syrup. Sometimes we might end up with dry dough where we may need to again sprinkle water and make it little soft. If the dough is too dry, then also the seedai will start to dissolve in oil. I have add 2 teaspoon of water to make the dough little soft.

Make gooseberry sized balls out of the seedai dough. Keep it aside for few minutes before dropping in hot oil. Heat oil in a pan. When the oil is hot enough, just drop a single seedai ball into the oil and in low flame deep fry them. Check if the seedai is not getting dissolved or not getting burst in the oil. If it does we may need to alter the seedai mixture.
- Seedai is getting dissolved, it may be because of very dry ball and in that case, we need to sprinkle warm water little by little and make the dough little soft
- If the dough is already very soft, then sprinkle rice flour little by little and mix well.
- Seedai is bursting, then it may be due to the very coarse rice flour or uriddal flour.

When you are sure that the seedai is not getting dissolved or burst, then drop 4-5 seedai in one batch and in low flame deep fry them till the seedai are crispy and light golden brown color.