Proto-idli (medieval black-gram balls, iddalige / iddarika, 920–1230) Period COrigin theory CVerified

An older layer of the black-gram dumpling existed in medieval South India, before the modern idli—the rice-and-urad-dal batter, long-fermented and steamed—was established.

In Kannada and Sanskrit texts from the tenth through the twelfth centuries, similarly named foods appear in succession: iddalige, iddarika. These are the concrete traces of this old layer. The main ingredient is urad dal, that is, black gram, with rice not yet joined to it. Urad dal was a long-established crop of South Asia, a staple on the everyday table from early on. Rice, too, was an equally ancient South Asian crop, though its joining to this dumpling came only later.

What separates this medieval dumpling from today's idli is the method. The three things that define today's idli—the full use of rice, the long fermentation, and finishing by steam—this old batter did not yet bring together. The tenth-century iddalige was urad dal combined with yogurt and spices, still without rice or fermentation, and the twelfth-century iddarika is recorded as a ball of urad dal fried in ghee. These techniques came together only later. As for its setting, it was rooted in the old layer of home and temple food in South India. The true nature of this old layer is a batter based chiefly on black gram—not the idli of today, which is defined by rice, fermentation, and steam.

To speak of idli's antiquity is to ask how to read the words that line up in the medieval texts. From the tenth through the twelfth centuries, the names iddalige and iddarika appear in succession, each based chiefly on urad dal and each lacking the full pairing with rice, the long fermentation, and the steaming. The tenth-century iddalige combined urad dal with yogurt and spices; the twelfth-century iddarika was a ball of urad dal fried in ghee. Their method differs from today's idli.

That old batter, similar in name though it is, is not the same thing as today's idli. The modern form—rice and urad dal, long-fermented and steamed—came together only from the mid-thirteenth century onward. The long-familiar ingredients had always been in the land, but the technique and style of pairing rice, fermenting long, and steaming fell into place only afterward. Even with the same name, a dividing line runs between the medieval dumpling and the modern idli.

The beginnings still hold room for differing views. One line of reasoning traces the steaming and fermentation techniques to an outside source (Indonesia); another holds that they arose independently in South India; and the matter is unsettled. What the older layer of this prehistory conveys is the antiquity of the dish as a genre. It is not to be folded onto the time when today's idli came into being on a single clock—reading the medieval black-gram dumpling apart from the modern rice-fermented-and-steamed form is what unlocks this dish.