Indian Potato Pancakes for Weekend Cookbook Challenge #36: 5 Ingredients or Less

This is a quick, easy recipe for Indian Potato Pancakes from Moosewood Restaurants Low-Fat Favorites, a current favorite in my cookbook line-up. Made in a non-stick pan, they are low in fat and calories and make a great little appetizer or accompaniment. 

This simple recipe has just five ingredients so I am sending it along to Sara at i like to cook for her Weekend Cookbook Challenge #36: 5 Ingredients or Less. If you want to participate and have a cookbook, magazine or Internet recipe using 5 ingredients or less (the 5 ingredients don't have to include water, salt or pepper), you have until January 30th to get your dish in to Sara. Details are on her site and at the Weekend Cookbook Challenge site (here).

Indian Potato Pancakes

Moosewood Restaurant Low-Fat Favorites

Makes eight 3-inch pancakes 

1 1/2 cups grated white potatoes

1 1/2 tsp garam masala or curry powder

1/2 tsp salt

1/4 cup finely chopped scallions

1 egg white lightly beaten

Combine the potatoes, garam masala or curry, salt, scallions, and egg white. Warm a large non-stick skillet.  Drop the potato batter by a scant 1/4-cup measure onto the skillet and gently flatten into a circle with a spatula.  Make as many pancakes as will fit in your skillet, but leave enough room to flip them.  (Moosewood Note: to save time, you may want to cook all of the pancakes simultaneously in two large skillets).  

Cook on medium heat for about 5 minutes, or until browned.  Flip the pancakes over, cover, and cook for 3 minutes on the second side. Then uncover and cook until browned, about 3 minutes.  

Variation:  Replace the white potatoes with sweet potatoes and use 2 egg whites.

Per 1.80-oz serving: 42 calories, 1.4g protein, .1g fat, 9.1g carbohydrates, 161mg sodium, 1.0g total dietary fiber.  

Notes/Results: I made a half batch (yielding 4 small pancakes) and used my favorite curry blend, which gave them a nice spice. They go together quickly and taste great. One tip is to make sure you pat/squeeze your grated potato to remove most of the liquid before mixing in the rest of the ingredients. I did end up using just a bit of olive oil flavored PAM as I don't really trust my non-stick pan. I served the potato pancakes along with some leftover homemade dolmades with yogurt sauce, and a simple salad with arugula, local tomatoes, avocado from my CSA box and drizzled with this tahini sauce. A delicious, healthy and satisfying vegetarian dinner. (Using up those leftovers!)  This is a keeper recipe for sure.

"Souper Sunday" is tomorrow so if you made or are making a great soup, stew, chili, chowder, etc. this week, send me a comment or email and I'll add you to this Sunday's round up. Stop by tomorrow to check out the unveiling of the swanky new Souper Sunday logo!