Steps of Vada, Sambhar vada and Dahi wada -South Indian style

Soak the whole urad dal- 1 cup for 1 hour in the fridge. Grind in the wet grinder adding 2 red chillies adding the cold water little by little say in a spoon, do not add at once. We need thick batter. Add 1 red onion finely chopped, 2 green chillies, curry leaves, pepper corns-1 tsp, ginger grated 1 tsp, salt, hing(asafoetida).

This is how it looks..

Then Heat oil in a pan and start deep frying the vada. Dilute Sambhar with hot water and dilute curd with water add salt.  Soak the fried vada in Diluted Sambhar and Diluted curd for 15 to 20 mts. This is to make the vada absorb sambhar and curd and remove excess oil. Then drop them in Sambhar and curd respectively.

Grinding a couple of red chillies while grinding the batter yields a bright color vada. This is my Mom's tip.

For dhein vado, as we call it in Sourashtra, grind 2 tbsp of coconut, 2 green chillies and 1 tsp of cumin seeds with small piece of ginger. Add this to the curd and to this add soaked vada. I learnt this from Chitra mami of Indusladies fame.
I learned the tip of soaking the vada in diluted sambhar and curd from a TV show of Mrs. Revathy Shanmugam.