Bombay Masala Toast
The street sandwich made at home: green chutney, potato masala and raw vegetables between buttered bread, pressed on a tawa until the edges go crisp.
Drafted — not yet cooked in our kitchen
- Hands on
- 18 min
- Total
- 33 min
- Serves
- 4
- Difficulty
- easy
The whole sandwich rests on keeping water away from the bread. Butter goes on before the chutney, the potato masala goes on dry, and the tomato gets its seeds flicked out. Do that and it stays crisp for as long as it takes to eat; skip it and you are eating a damp sandwich with good flavours in it.
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Ingredients
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Method
Grind the coriander, mint, green chilli, ginger, lemon juice and salt with the water to a thick chutney. Keep it thick — a runny chutney soaks straight into the bread and the sandwich goes soggy before it reaches the tawa.
Look for: Bright green and thick enough to sit on a spoon in a heap. If it has gone khaki, the mint stalks went in — use the leaves only.
3–4 min · mixer-grinder
Boil the potatoes whole in their skins until soft, then peel and mash them coarsely while still warm.
Look for: A knife goes into the thickest part and back out cleanly, and the skins have begun to split.
15–20 min · medium-high heat · saucepan
Heat the oil in a small kadai on medium. Mustard seeds first, and wait for them to finish popping before the curry leaves and green chilli go in — thrown in together, the leaves burn while the mustard is still silent. Lower the flame, add the turmeric, then the mashed potato and salt, and fold it through until the yellow is even.
Look for: Evenly yellow with no white streaks, and dry enough to hold a shape on the spoon. A wet masala is the other way a sandwich collapses.
4–6 min · medium-low heat · kadai
Butter every slice right to the edge, then chutney on top of the butter — butter first is not fussiness, it is the waterproof layer between the chutney and the bread. Spread the potato masala on four slices, lay the tomato, onion and capsicum over it, dust with chaat masala, and close with the other four.
Look for: The stack should close without the filling squeezing out at the sides. Flick the tomato seeds out before they go in — they are the wettest thing in the sandwich.
5–7 min
Butter the tawa and put the sandwiches on over medium heat. Press down with a flat spatula and keep pressing, turning once. If you have a stovetop toaster clamp, use it — that is what the street version is made in.
Look for: Deep golden-brown on both faces with a crisp edge you can hear when you cut it. Press a corner — it should not spring back. Pale and springy means the heat was too low and the butter has soaked in instead of frying.
5–8 min · medium heat · tawa
Cut in half on the diagonal, dust with a little more chaat masala and scatter sev over the top. Eat it now — this sandwich has a working life of about ten minutes.
1–2 min
About this dish
Every stall in Bombay makes a slightly different version of this — some add beetroot and cucumber slices, some grate cheese over the top and grill it again, and the plain uncooked version served cold with the same fillings is sold alongside it as a sandwich rather than a toast. For a lunch box, leave the tomato out entirely and send the chaat masala and sev separately. Tomato is what makes a four-hour-old sandwich wet.