Kuttu Beetroot Tikki

Tips

• General practice: if the mixture is too soft to shape, work in a little more kuttu flour.
• General practice: kuttu is a common fast-day flour, but chaat masala often contains ordinary salt and other spices; families who fast should check the masala against their own practice.

Fresh atta: grind small, use soon

• Millets keep for months as whole grain; flour is best ground as it is needed, because it turns rancid. (FAO, Sorghum and millets in human nutrition (1995))
• Bajra changes fastest: its grain stores for months, but its milled flour has a very short shelf life. (ICAR-IIMR scientists, Food Chemistry Advances (2023) (DOI 10.1016/j.focha.2023.100190))
• In an Indian study, untreated bajra flour stayed within the quality limit only about 2 days at room temperature. (ICAR-IARI, Indian Journal of Agricultural Sciences (2016))
• Ragi flour keeps better than foxtail, barnyard or bajra flour (it carries less fat). (Planta (2024), review)
• Keep atta closed and cool: bajra flour kept best in polythene and worst in gunny sacks; grains should be dry and in airtight containers. (Chaudhary & Kapoor, J Sci Food Agric (1984); ICMR-NIN Dietary Guidelines (2024) (DOI 10.1002/jsfa.2740351113))
• Going off shows first as smell and taste — sour, musty or dusty, then bitter. (Lai & Varriano-Marston, Cereal Chemistry (1980))

So: buy the grain, grind a week’s worth at a time — less for bajra in summer.