Before You Start
Uttapam starts from the same fermented rice and urad dal batter as dosa, yet the method and the outcome are nearly opposite. A dosa is spread thin and cooked hot and fast until it crisps; an uttapam is poured thick, mostly left alone, and covered with chopped vegetables pressed gently into the surface so they cook into the pancake instead of sitting on it. It comes out soft and a little spongy inside, like a savoury pancake, with a lightly crisp, caramelised underside where it touched the pan.
Thick and slow-cooked, uttapam forgives more than dosa does on a first try, because there is no need to learn the single smooth spreading motion that catches out many beginners. It also puts to use batter that has fermented a little longer than you would want for a crisp dosa, since a more sour, bubblier batter suits the softer texture of uttapam well.
Where It Comes From
Uttapam belongs to the same South Indian family of fermented-batter dishes as dosa and idli, and like them it has no single documented beginning. The practice of fermenting ground rice and urad dal and cooking it on a hot griddle developed over a long period across Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh and Kerala, and each region kept its own proportions and manner. Uttapam, as a thicker, vegetable-topped cousin of the thin dosa, is mostly linked with Tamil Nadu and with the Udupi-style restaurants that carried South Indian tiffin to the rest of the country from the middle of the twentieth century, though home versions with local vegetable combinations were there before that standardisation and continue beside it. Giving uttapam to one state alone would be inaccurate; it is better seen as a thicker regional variant inside the shared southern repertoire, spread across India mostly through South Indian restaurants and tiffin houses.
How to Make It
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Prep
Soak, grind and ferment
Soak the rice and the urad dal, with the fenugreek seeds added to the dal, in separate bowls for 4 to 6 hours. Grind each to a smooth, thick paste and combine them with the salt in a large container. Leave it somewhere warm for 8 to 12 hours, until it has about doubled, looks aerated and smells pleasantly sour. This is exactly the batter used for dosa and idli; uttapam asks nothing extra of the fermentation, only that it be poured thicker.
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Prep
Chop the toppings small and blot them
Dice the onion, tomato, capsicum, chillies and carrot small and to a similar size, because pieces of mixed size cook at different rates after being pressed into the batter. A very watery tomato is worth blotting with paper towel after chopping, since extra juice stops the batter from setting where it touches the topping.
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Prep
Check how thick the batter is
A thicker pour than for dosa is right, but the batter should still run off a ladle, resembling heavy pancake batter. If batter has thinned out after long fermenting, do not dilute it any more for uttapam; use it close to its natural thickness.
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Cook
Heat the griddle to medium
Put the tawa on a medium flame, not the higher heat that dosa asks for. A gentler, longer cook lets the thick middle set before the base scorches. Wipe the surface with a film of oil.
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Cook
Pour a thick circle and leave it
Ladle batter into the middle of the griddle and spread it outward only slightly, to a round roughly half a centimetre thick, clearly thicker than a dosa. You are not aiming for a thin, even spiral here; a slightly uneven, pancake-like round is correct.
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Cook
Scatter the vegetables and press them in
While the surface still looks wet and shiny, scatter a small handful of the diced onion, tomato, chilli and other vegetables across it and spread them evenly. Press them in lightly with the back of the ladle or a flat spatula so they sink into the batter rather than rolling loose.
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Cook
Add oil and cook slowly
Trickle some oil or ghee around the edges and over the toppings. If you have a lid that fits, put it on. Cook on medium heat for three to four minutes, until the base is deep golden and the top is set, no longer wet and shiny.
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Cook
Turn once, briefly
Slide a wide spatula under the uttapam and turn it over carefully, so the vegetables face the pan. One to two minutes is enough here, only to soften the toppings a little and give them some colour; the second side takes much less time than the first.
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Serve
Serve hot with chutney and sambar
Serve at once, vegetable side up, with coconut chutney and sambar. Because of its thickness, uttapam holds its texture somewhat longer than dosa, yet it is still better hot than left standing.
Swaps That Work
Nearly any finely chopped vegetable works on top. Grated cabbage, chopped spinach and sweet corn are all common home variations on the classic onion, tomato and chilli mix. If you would rather not ferment your own batter, packaged dosa or idli batter, sold fresh or frozen in Indian grocery shops, behaves exactly the same for uttapam and only needs to be used at its natural, slightly thicker consistency. A little grated cheese pressed in with the vegetables is not traditional, but it is a familiar modern restaurant variation.
Turning the Heat Up or Down
Nothing in the batter is hot, so the topping decides how spicy the uttapam is. If you want it mild, omit the green chilli and rely on onion, tomato and coriander. If you want more kick, add extra chopped chilli to the topping, or dust red chilli powder or cracked black pepper over the vegetables right before you press them down, so the heat stays on the surface and does not vanish into the batter.
Where Cooks Go Wrong
Pouring the batter as thin as a dosa is the most frequent problem; there is then nothing for the vegetables to sink into, and the result is closer to a dosa with toppings than to a true uttapam. Cooking over too hot a pan is another, as it browns the base before the thick centre has cooked, leaving a doughy middle beneath a dark crust. Vegetables chopped too large or too wet cause trouble as well: big pieces fall off when you turn the pancake, and wet ones, especially tomato, leave the surrounding batter gummy. And skipping the lid during the first side lengthens the time the centre needs to set and dries the top unnecessarily.
Keeping and Warming Up Leftovers
To keep: Batter that has finished fermenting stays good for three to four days in the fridge, and it freezes for a month. Let it return to room temperature and stir well before cooking, because it thickens as it chills. Make the toppings fresh when you can; onion and capsicum may be chopped a day ahead and sealed in the fridge, but tomato should be cut just before cooking because it leaks juice as it waits. Cooked uttapam is not a keeper and tastes best straight from the pan.
To warm up: Leftover uttapam reheats reasonably well in a dry pan over medium-low heat, a minute or two per side, which brings back some of the crispness underneath without drying the centre too much. That beats a microwave, which leaves it soft and a bit rubbery throughout. When reheating several, do them one after another in the same pan and not stacked, because warm uttapams piled together trap steam and soften each other.
Safe Handling
As with any fermented batter, refrigerate it once it has finished fermenting and do not leave it at room temperature indefinitely, especially in hot weather, where it can move from pleasantly sour to over-fermented and eventually unsafe. Wash all the vegetables for the topping before chopping, and if you prepare them early, keep them covered in the fridge, particularly chopped tomato and onion, which can harbour bacteria when left out for long. On the stove, use fresh oil on the griddle instead of letting it scorch and darken over a long session, since oil that has been overheated repeatedly tastes bitter and is a poorer choice to eat regularly.