Lemon Sevai – vegan and gluten-free lemon flavored Instant Rice Vermicelli recipe with instant store-bought sevai mix.

This recipe is perfect for those days when the time is pressing or when you want a light yet delicious meal. You can prepare this sevai for any meal, be it breakfast, lunch, evening tiffin or dinner even. Now let’s learn how to make this elumichai sevai or lemon vermicelli with step by step pictures and some tips to get perfect sevai.

Happy Tamil New Year wishes to all my readers. :-) Glad to share this lemon recipe, a no onion no garlic one on this festive day. Homemade sevai with the traditional Naazhi is always fun, and there is no doubt that homemade rocks. But it is time-consuming as well. But opting for semihomemade recipes like this doesn’t harm either. In fact, on busy, it makes our life easy.

I have already explained about sevai and idiyappam in detail in my Homemade Sevai post. So I am not going to repeat that. And for folks, who wanted to try making sevai from scratch, please refer to that post. For this recipe, I went with store bought rice vermicelli. But these days I see millet vermicellis, and I have tried them as well. You can opt for either one.

The lemon sevai recipe is straightforward. All you have to do is cook the sevai as per the package instructions and when done, do the tempering and add lemon juice. I always use coconut oil for lemon rice and sevai. It adds a unique flavor to this recipe. You can make coconut flavored sevai, masala sevai and what not? Lemon rice is one of our favorite lunch box recipes, so with sevai also, I make the same.

PS: I was chasing the sunlight. So right after mixing (that too in a hurry) the sevai I did not allow it cool and hurried to click the picture. You can find some sticky vermicellis but as it cooled down it was ok.

Now let me share how to make this lemon sevai with you.

Lemon Sevai or Instant Rice Vermicelli Recipe

Ingredients:

Instant Rice vermicelli – 100 g
Water – 4 cups
Sesame Oil – 1 tsp
Salt – 3/4 tsp + 1/4 tsp
Coconut Oil – 2 tsps
Mustard Seeds – 1 tsp
Urad Dal – 1 tsp
Channa Dal – 1 tsp
Chopped Cilantro – 1 tbsp
Curry leaves – 5 to 6
Green Chilli – 2
Lemon Juice – Half of the medium sized lemon or 3 tbsps (see notes for the lemon variety)
Turmeric Powder – 1/2 tsp
Hing – 1/4 tsp

Steps:

Instant Rice Vermicelli Preparation:

Cook the sevai as per the package instructions and this is what I did.
Bring 4 cups of water to boil by adding 1/4 tsp of salt and one tsp of sesame oil.
When the water boils, turn off the heat, add the vermicelli and cover the pot with a lid and let it sit for 3 to 4 minutes.
Then drain the water and sprinkle some cold water on top and set it aside. Make sure you remove the water thoroughly.

Tempering:

Heat a pan or kadai and add coconut oil.

When the oil is hot, add the mustard seeds, urad dal, channa dal, hing, curry leaves and green chili.
Then add the salt and turmeric powder and stir it before adding the cooked sevai.

Now reduce the heat to low, and add the cooked sevai and gently mix it.

Turn the heat off and add the lemon juice and mix again gently.
Finally, garnish it with chopped cilantro and serve hot with chutney or sugar.

Notes:

Adding a little bit of oil while cooking the sevai helps in non-sticky sevai.
If there is moisture content in sevai, then it will stick. I know its tricky but make sure that you drain the water as much as you can.
Mixing the sevai over low heat and gently helps for non-sticky sevai. I was hurrying this time and you can see a lot of small sevai pieces and that got to stick together.
I always add salt and turmeric powder before adding the vermicelli and mix it in oil.
Adjust the salt and spices as per your preference.
Coming to lemons, every lemon variety is different. If using Meyer lemons, you might have to add one entire lemon to get that tangy flavor. So try tasting a drop of lemon juice and then depending upon the tanginess, you can add.
Instead of coconut oil, you can use any regular oil.

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Have you made made this recipe?

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Lemon Sevai | Lemon Flavored Instant Rice Vermicelli