Kolkata street style special Bengali jhal muri recipe or Masala muri recipe

Making Kolkata street food jhal muri recipe with a special Bengali muri masala and describing it in detail with simple step by step pictures. Jhal muri(ঝাল মুড়ি) is a very very popular street food of Kolkata, basically a puffed rice snack. Jhal muri is a Bengali term, where “Jhal” means Spicy, and Muri means puffed rice in English, so Jhalmuri describes just spicy puffed rice. However, jhalmuri is not spicy at all, but rather so tasty that I always drool a lot whenever thinking of it. Today, I will show you how simple to make Kolkata street style super tasty jhal muri at home.

Jhal muri is made by mixing crunchy puffed rice(muri), a special muri masala, chanachur(namkeen), boiled potatoes, roasted peanuts, chopped onions, tomato, mustard oil, mustard pickle(kasundi), cucumber, green chillies, coriander leaves and lemon juice. In Kolkata, this street food is served in a newspaper-made packet(কাগজের ঠোঙা), served with a sprinkle of chanachur and a fine coconut slice on top, as you can see in the picture below. Being nostalgic, I made this paper packet at home just to feel Kolkata’s street style vibes.

Although jhal muri originated on the streets of Kolkata, however, this puffed rice snack is also popular in Bangladesh, even West Bengal’s neighbouring states, Odisha and Bihar. As a result, you can see many Bihari vendors selling jhal muri along with their famous bhel puri chaat, in Kolkata streets.

However, Bihari vendors make the best bhel puri, no doubt, but can not make the tastiest jhal muri like a Bengali jhal muri vendor can make. Among those jhal muri vendors of the Sealdah South 24 Paraganas railway platform, make Kolkata’s best jhal muri.

Once you step into the railway station, you can see jhal muri stalls everywhere, wherever making jhal muri, its delightful flavour mixed in the air, simply no way to avoid. This is a mixed flavour of aam tel, Bengali kasundi sauce, mustard oil, and muri masala that makes you drool and attracts you towards those jhal muri stalls.

Seated far away from Kolkata, I would often miss their special jhal muri. So I started making it at home. To maintain their exact flavour of jhal muri, I started experimenting to make their secret ingredient, a special muri masala. After a few attempts, I succeeded.

So here I also shared how to make that special jhal muri masala using simple ingredients available at home. A few more secrets are aam tel(raw mango pickle oil) or mango mustard pickle(kasundi), or spicy mango pickle oil. Punch of muri masala, mustard oil and pickle oil creates the exact flavour of Kolkata jhal muri. However, you can even get aam tel and kasundi recipe on my website. No worries if one or two other ingredients(I shared in this recipe) are not available at home. Skip them, but do not forget to use our homemade muri masala.

Try this Kolkata jhal muri aka Bengali masala muri at home and let me know your valuable feedback about this snack by writing it in the comment section below. You can even ask me any questions regarding this recipe.

You may also try some of my other street-style Bengali snack recipes from my website, such as

Vegetable Chop

Beguni (Bengali Brinjal Fritters)

Ghugni

Aloo chop

Gobi Manchurian

North Indian-style Samosa recipe

Kolkata street style special Bengali jhal muri recipe or Masala muri recipe

Prep time: 20 mins

Served in: 25 mins

Total no. of servings: 3 people

Course: evening snacks

Cuisine: Bengali

Author: Moumita Paul

Ingredients

• 3-4 cups of Muri
• 2 tsp jhal muri’r masala
• 2 tbsp Roasted Chana
• 3 tbsp Sprouted Chana/ ankurito chola
• 2 tbsp Boiled potatoes/sedhdho aloo
• 2 tsp chopped Tomatoes
• 2-3 chopped Green chillies/kancha lonka
• 2 tbsp chopped Cucumber/kuchano sosha
• 2-3 tbsp Jhal Chanachur/spicy namkeen mixture
• 2 tbsp Papri Chanachur/papdi namkeen
• 2-3 tbsp Aloo Bhujia or sev or Jhuri bhaja
• 3 tbsp Roasted peanuts
• 1/2 Lemon juice
• 1/4 tsp Black salt
• 1/4 tsp Salt
• 1 tsp Bengali Mustard Sauce
• 3/4 tsp Aam tel/ Achar oil
• 1 tsp Mustard oil/ sorsher tel
• A handful of Coriander Leaves/dhone pata
• 1+1/2 tbsp Boiled White peas/sidhdho motor korai
• 1 tsp finely chopped Ginger/ kuchano ada
• 3 tbsp finely chopped Onion/ kuchano peyaj
• A few Coconut slices/ narkel er phali

Bhaja masala for jhal muri recipe

• 1 tsp cumin seeds/gota jeere
• 1 tsp coriander seeds/gota dhone
• 2-3 red chillies/shukno lanka
• 1 tsp fennel seeds/saunf/gota mouri
• 1 bay leaf/tej pata

How to make jhal muri recipe step by step with pictures

Instruction

Making jhalmuri’r masala

• Take a pan, dry roast 1 tsp whole cumin seeds, 1 tsp whole coriander seeds, 1 tsp whole fennel seeds, 3 dry red chillies, and 1 bay leaf.

• Keep the heat low, dry roast the spices for 2-3 minutes until the aroma of the spices comes out.
• Then immediately remove the spices from the pan and let them cool down.

• Once the spices cool down, grind them until you get a fine powder, and our special Bengali bhaja moshla(masala) is ready to use in jhal muri.
• As shown in the ground spices in the picture below. Store this spice powder in a small airtight container to keep it always fresh with the flavour intact.

Preparation

• To make jhal muri, first, boil potato/aloo(with its skin) and overnight soaked white peas. Pressure cook them with 2-3 whistles. 
• Once the pressure cooker cools down, peel the potatoes and cut them into small cubes.
• Then remove the peas from the cooker and strain the water.
• In the meantime, chop all the veggies like cucumber, onion, tomatoes into fine slices. Cut a lemon in half.
• Then finely chop the green chilies, ginger, and coriander leaves.
• For making sprouted chana or chola, just soak the chana two days back. After overnight soaking when the chana or chola is completely puffed up, then strain the water and cover the chana with a damp cloth for 1 day. Its sprout will easily come out.
• Cut the coconut into slices and finely chop it if you want to mix it with muri.
• Either use store-bought dry roasted peanuts or make it at home.
• For dry roasting at home, take a handful of peanuts in a pan and dry roast on a low heat with continuous stirring. When the peanuts started crackling, roast them for another 1 minute with a continuous stir. Then switch off the flame and remove the peanuts to a plate and let it cool down. Once it gets cool, just rub it and its skin will easily come out.
• Keep jhal chanachur(spicy mixture of fried chana dal, sev, peanuts, green peas), normal papri chanachur, sev or Jhuri bhaja or aloo bhujia, black and white salt close to your hand for quick mixing with muri.
• Even keep kasundi, aam tel or spicy achar oil, and sorsher tel or mustard oil nearby. 

Making kolkata street style special Jhal muri with step by step photos

• In a wide-mouth mixing bowl, first take 3-4 cups of muchmuche muri or crunchy puffed rice.

• Then add 2 tbsp of jhal chanachur or any spicy namkeen mixture and 2 tbsp of papdi chanachur/papdi namkeen in it.

• Then add 3 tbsp dry roasted peanuts or badam bhaja.

• Adding 2-3 tbsp jhal chola bhaja or spicy roasted chana.

• Add sev or bengali Jhuri bhaja/sev bhujia or even you may use Haldiram’s aloo bhujia too.

• Add 2 tbsp sprouted black chana or chola and 2 tbsp boiled white peas or matar.

• Then add chopped boiled potatoes or siddho aloo.

• Add chopped onion, tomatoes, and cucumber.

• Then add chopped coriander leaves, green chillies and finely chopped ginger.

• Then add white and black salt, respectively.

• Add jhal murir bhaja masala or ground roasted spices or powdered masala(prepared at the beginning of this recipe).

• Then add aam tel or achar er tel or spicy achar oil.

• Add normal store-bought kasundi(homemade aam kasundi) or Bengali mustard sauce.
• Though I used store-bought normal kasundi however you can use homemade aam kasundi too.

• Adding a drizzle of our pungent mustard oil or sorsher tel.

• Now, with a spoon, quickly mix the muri and other ingredients together.

• Lastly, squeeze half a lemon juice or add a tsp of tamarind water or tamarind chutney.
• Again, give it a good stir, and Kolkata street style jhal muri or masala muri is ready.

• Then immediately serve jhal muri; otherwise, the muri will get soft and not taste good.
• Can put a slice of coconut or can sprinkle the dry ingredients just on its top before serving.

Tips

• To make jhal muri, the very first condition is to have a perfect crunchy puffed rice or muchmuche muri. If the muri is not crunchy any more, slightly fry them in a dry pan or microwave them for a minute until the crunch is back.
• Basically, homemade thin, crunchy, slightly sweet puffed rice or “ghore bhaja lal chaal er soru-lomba misti moori” is perfect for making jhal muri. Though that lal misti muri is hard to get, outside West Bengal, including Kolkata. So, round or long-shaped white puffed rice can also be used, but that must be best at crunch.
• Keep all ingredients ready before making this jhalmuri recipe. Otherwise, muri or puffed rice gets soggy, and you will lose its exact taste.
• Here I used packet muri/puffed rice. I only have “Bordhoman er packet muri”, which is the only “Bengali muri(misti laal muri)” available in Bengali shops in Bangalore. But for the best crunch & taste, you can use homemade muri if available around.
• May use more types of chana chur/namkeen mixture, matar korai bhaja/roasted matar, even a little chire or chal bhaja too.
• You may add chopped coconut too. Though spiciness and tanginess are up to you, so you may add more green chilies and more lemon juice even add tamarind water too.
• Don’t waste your time once mixing is done, start eating to enjoy its delicious taste.
• You may use the same powdered masala for preparing any puffed rice recipes to make a quick evening snack.

Summary

Recipe Name

Kolkata special bengali jhal muri or masala muri recipe

Author Name

Moumita paul

Published On

2020-09-28

Preparation Time

20M

Total Time

25M

Average Rating

5 Based on 3 Review(s)