To make the masala peanut, we need to prepare the spice mix first. For that, in a bowl add the gram flour / besan, rice flour.

Add the corn flour, kashmiri chilli powder. Kashmiri chilli powder is used to give nice colour to the peanuts. if not you can use a pinch of red food color. But in order to avoid the food coloring, I have used the kashmiri chilli powder. If you dont have the kashmiri chilli powder, you can use the normal chilli powder, but reduce the amount to half its quantity.

Then add the turmeric and the required amount of salt

Add the garam masala or the tikka masala. Adding tikka masala gives a light tangy taste to the peanuts. If you dont have, you can add the garam masala. But this step is purely optional.

Include little asafoetida and cumin seeds.

Also add the ginger garlic paste

Mix all the spices nicely.

Now add the peanuts and mix it nicely adding water little by little. The flour should be well coated with the gram flour mixture. Do not add more water which will spoil the crispiness of the mixture.

If you want you can add 1 tsp of ghee, which helps to retain the crispiness to the peanuts and gives very nice flavor.

In order to deep fry the peanuts, add enough oil and heat it.

Add some crushed garlic, and fry till it turns light brown colour. once it turns light brown, filter oil and remove it. though this step is optional, it gives nice flavor to the peanuts. so i have added the garlic.

Now turn the flame to low and drop the peanuts one by one slowly. Fry them for 1 min in low flame and then increase the flame to medium. (When the oil is very hot and when you are dropping the coated peanuts, oil might splash sometimes and inorder to avoid them, we do like this).

Fry the peanuts until it turns crispy and turns to nice red color. Filter the oil and remove them.

Repeat the process for the remaining peanuts.

Once all the peanuts are fried, add the curry leaves and fry in the same oil. remove from oil and add to the masala peanuts.

You can store or serve the peanut now. but I want my peanuts to be more spicy. So for that, I have added little salt and chilli powder and gave a quick stir.

If you like to add chat masala, you can add at this stage.

Store the masala peanuts | masala verkadalai in a air tight container or serve them with the masala chat. Actually you can store them for more than 5 to 6 days.