Roti Jala is a popular roadside snack often served with curry dishes. It’s common to find Roti Jala at the pasar malam – or night market – but today we’ll show you how to make it at home. With this Roti Jala recipe, and the right techniques and tools, you can make fresh and delicious Roti Jala to rival anything you could find outside. And as you control the ingredients, you can customise it to suit your style. So read on and prepare to wow your family and friends!
Roti jala has a beautiful name in English – lace crepe/pancake, which derives from the delicate, lace-like texture and appearance of the crepe/pancake. It is also called “net pancake”, translated from the Malay word “jala”. The batter section of this Roti Jala recipe is almost the same as a crepe, except that we use coconut milk in place of cow’s milk. The most challenging part of the Roti Jala recipe is to make the crepe into a lacy net – with lightning speed – to prevent the crepe from being burnt.
The yellow colour of the Roti Jala often comes from artificial yellow colouring. If you’re lucky, stalls will do it the old fashioned way and use turmeric powder Our Roti Jala recipe uses turmeric powder so it is healthier (turmeric has many health benefits such as lowering cholesterol, anti-inflammatory etc.) and infused with light turmeric flavour. Roti Jala is always served with curries, the most popular ones being chicken curry, followed by beef or lamb. But your can of course enjoy it with the curry of your choice, such as vegetable or fish curry.
Ingredients
| 50 ml | thick undiluted coconut milk |
|---|---|
| 300 ml | water |
| 150 g | plain flour |
| ½ - 1 tsp | turmeric powder |
| 1 tbsp | cooking oil + extra for greasing pan |
| 1 | QL Deli Fresh or QL Omega egg |
Method
- Blend coconut milk, water, plain flour, cooking oil and turmeric powder with a blender until smooth. (If you don’t have a blender you can do this with a wire whisk, but make sure you whisk until the batter is smooth.)
- Strain the batter through a fine sieve into a measuring jug, making sure to remove all lumps. The batter should be able to sieve through smoothly. This is a very important step so there’re no lumps to clog up the spout of the squeeze bottle (or roti jala mould if you are using one).
- Pour the sieved batter into a squeeze bottle with a tiny spout.
- Heat ½ teaspoon of cooking oil on low heat in a non-stick pan or griddle. Use a paper towel to wipe off excess oil so that the crepe will not get burnt or browned by excess oil.
- Work as swiftly as you can, squeeze the squeeze bottle with one hand to create net-like strips on the pan.
- Let the crepe cook and firm up, it will take 1 – 2 minutes. Watch over the crepe carefully so that the bottom does not brown or burn or the crepe will break when you fold. Lift up the crepe with a spatula and transfer to a large plate, set aside to cool.
- Repeat with the remaining batter and stack the cooked crepes on the plate. If the batter is too thick to flow out from the spout bottle, adjust the consistency by adding water one teaspoon at a time.
- Fold the two sides of the crepe and roll up like a spring roll or triangle quarters. You can do this while the crepe is cooking on the pan/griddle or when you have finished cooking all the crepes. Just be watchful over the crepes cooking on the pan - they burn easily!
- Serve with your favourite curry: chicken, beef or lamb!
QL Omega & QL Deli Fresh eggs are available at major hypermarkets and supermarkets. For more information on QL Eggs, click here.
