Cabbage Koftas (Cabbage balls in tomato curry)

When I think of making koftas, I think of either mix vegetable koftas or lauki koftas; but this time when I wanted to make them I didn't have lauki and my DH didn't like the idea of mix vegetable koftas which have a primary base of potatoes. Hence started my search for a different kind of kofta. That's when I came across cabbage koftas. The credit for the recipe goes to Sunita's Kitchen. I used her recipe for the kofta (balls) and used my own for the curry. I made this for some guests and everybody seemed to like it a lot. The trickiest part when making a kofta is that the koftas shouldn't disintegrate while frying, which I've often encountered when making mix veg. koftas. However, that's the easiest part in this recipe. It uses besan as the binding agent and so your koftas will never disintegrate when frying. So if you've never made koftas then this is the recipe to try! Since I didn't quite measure all the ingredients while making this dish, I'll write it as I made it.

Here's how I made it:

For the koftas

1. Finely chopped cabbage (approx 3-4 cups) and 1.5 medium size onion (approx 3/4 cup). I also used some traces of carrot. The key part here is that the ingredient should be finely chopped so that when eating the kofta one can't distinguish between the veggies. My guess is that onion should be in much lower proportion as compared to the cabbage. So just use your intuition and go ahead with it. If the cabbage has lot of water after it's chopped, squeeze it to drain some water. Let some water remain.
2. Mix the finely chopped veggies in Step 1 with 1 cup of besan. Since cabbage already has some water, you wouldn't need to add any water. Even if you're skeptical that the koftas won't fry, wait till you actually fry a kofta. Only if you're having problems while frying should you add some more besan to the batter. Too much of besan will not taste good in the kofta. We want the veggies to be the primary ingredients and besan should only be the binding agent.
3. Add some salt and chilli to taste.
4. Mix well to form a batter. This batter wouldn't be runny; it'll be like a paste except more granular.
5. Heat oil at medium flame (for frying). Once the oil is hot, drop some balls of the batter in the oil and fry. You must cook at medium flame to ensure that the insides of the koftas get cooked properly. If you cook on high, it'll get cooked from outside but not from inside.
6. The koftas/balls are ready. You can also serve them as appetizers.

For the curry

1. Chop 1.5 onions. Saute them in a few tsps of oil alongwith a tsp of ginger-garlic paste and a tsp of chopped green chillies, till the onions turn golden brown.
2. Add approx 1/2 a tsp of turmeric, 1/2 a tsp of chilli powder and 2 tsps of coriander powder. Saute.
3. Add approx 2 tbsps of tomato paste (or approx 2 chopped tomatoes) and around 2 cups of water (enough water to form a gravy for the koftas). Cover and cook till the tomato paste has mixed properly or till the tomatoes have become mushy.
4. Add 1-2 tbsp of cream and cook for another 5-10 mins.
5. Turn off the gas and one by one drop the koftas into the curry. Keep for 20 mins or so.
6. Garnish with chopped fresh cilantro/coriander and serve.