Q. What is beaten rice? Is it something you buy or do you have to make it? A.Beaten rice is also known as Poha, flattened rice or flaked rice. It is easily available in most of the Indian grocery stores. Transfer this to a mixer and blend to a smooth paste using approx. 1 cup of water. Make sure that the grains are ground to perfection.

Add a spoonful of batter to the pan and immediately twist so the batter coats the base and slips up the edges. As soon as the moisture on top starts to cook away and there are lots of bubbles, add a few heaped teaspoons of potato filling and gently spread across the dosa.

It's yummy. Dosas are by far the most beloved of a plethora of Tamil crepes, and part of that has to do with their utter simplicity and versatility. They need just a handful of pantry ingredients, can be eaten for breakfast, lunch or dinner, and they make every meal an occasion. This recipe is delicious and makes perfect-tasting dosas you will fall in love with.

Crush the boiled potatoes – do not mash completely as you still want some texture. Add the crushed potato to the pan and mix to combine evenly. Taste and season with salt. Set aside to reheat before serving or keep warmAfter trying this batter, and seeing how easy it is, you will never buy dosa batter from the store. Fermentation is, of course, a bigger headache in British kitchens than in Indian ones: chef and food writer Roopa Gulati, author of India: The World Vegetarian, published in spring, remembers Laxhmi, the south Indian home help of her childhood, leaving “the dosa batter out in the sun for a full 24 hours (it was brought indoors at dusk) [and] longer in winter”, and muses that she may have felt the fermenting process was more important than the raw ingredients. In the absence of that helpfully hot sun, to encourage things along, Sharma advises starting when you soak the rice and dal, then holding the batter at between 21C and 27C, either in a sous-vide machine or a warm place (El-Waylly also favours a sous-vide or a slow-cooker with a yoghurt mode). If you don’t have such machinery handy, Basu suggests covering the bowl with a damp tea towel and putting it in the oven with the light on; a blob of fermented batter should, Sharma explains, float in water, which is a reassuring test. I’m also going to add a pinch of sugar to get things going. It’s not traditional, but then neither are Britain’s freezing temperatures. (Mixing it with clean hands will also help in this department, thanks to the natural yeasts on your skin.)