Soaking: Wash rice, deals and fenugreek seeds. Rice has to be washed several times till the water is clear..it my take about 10 times. Udad dal must not be washed more than 3-4 times. Soak them all seperately for minimum 8 hours. Dal and fenugreek seeds can be combined. It's ok is poha is soaked just 1/2 hour before grinding. No need to soak cooked rice.

Grinding : grind using the water in which the udad dal was soaked. Grind rice first. Udad dal should be grinded last. Fill the mixer bowl till half level only or else it will get overloaded. Use only as much water as is required for the mixer to run smoothly while grinding. Too much water will make our batter watery and you won't get the desired smoothness of batter. Too little water will overload the mixer. Use warm water if it's winter or if you live in a cold country. Grind smooth.

If you are grinding using a proper batter grinder, do not use warm water for grinding. In fact you need to ensure that you refrigerate the water before grinding. The reason is that this grinder takes way too long to grind (around an hour) and hence the machine heats up. To balance that heat of the machine, you need to use cold water.

Fermentation: Transfer the batter into a big vassel as you grind it. At last add salt and mix everything very well. All different colour batters must be well combined to blend all the colours as one. The batter should have the ribbon consistency. Cover the batter and place it in a warm place undisturbed. During summer in hot countries like India & Dubai, fermentation will not take longer than 6 hours. But in cold countries or in winter it may take 24 hours, if the warm temperature is maintained.

5. Room heater: place it in front of the room heater maintaining a certain distance or else the batter will get cooked. Or keep it in the room where the heater is on.

Salt factor : It is important to add salt before fermentation as it helps with the process of fermentation. Batter with salt will rise well, whereas the one without it will just get sour and not rise. I use regular iodised salt and have never tried pink salt.

Interchanging the batters: yes, Idlee batter can be used for dhosa when diluted a bit, just that dhosa will not be crispy. Dhosa batter can be used for idlee so long as it's at ribbon consistency. Idlee will still be spongy and soft, but the one with idler batter will be extraordinarily spongy and soft. For spam, uttapa etc etc it doesn't really matter what batter you use, so long as it's thick at ribbon consistency.

Shelf life and Temperature of batter while using : this batter can be stored for a week if refrigerated and for months if frozen. However, it is very important that the batter is at room temperature at the time of use. Cold batter will result in robbery dhosa and flat/hard idlee.

Idlee / spam / yalappa / uttapa/ dhokla batter: this batter has more udad Dal than dhosa batter as udad Dal helps with sponginess. You need the batter at ribbon consistency for all these. Ribbon consistency is when the batter drops slowly, but smoothly forming a ribbon like pattern as it falls. It should be thick like cake batter. Do not break the air bubbles by mixing the batter briskly before making Idlee. The air bubbles will make Idlee soft and puffed without the use of soda or eno.

Dhosa: this batter has more rice, less udad Dal because rice gives the crispiness to dhosa. Poha, rice, fenugreek seeds, chana dal and all the other ingredients are for getting the crisp and golden brown colour. Methi seeds also help with fermentation. Batter for dhosa should be slightly thinner than Idlee batter. It should be thick, but easy flow consistency, not forming any ribbon pattern. If the batter is too thin, the dhosa will stick to the pan. If it is too thick it will be hard to spread.

Sugar in the dosa batter gives dosa nice golden colour and makes them Crispy.