Rasagulla

This is a traditional bengali dessert made from chenna (freshly prepared cottage cheese/ moistened paneer). 
In any auspicious occasion this sweet spongy "Rasgullas" are a must for us. This is a sweet delicacy that is staple to the Bengalis and nor can they live without it. 
Many people have told me that it's difficult to make rasgullas, They've tried multiple times, either it breaks or they become hard. But trust me, if you follow everything step by step and take the right measures, ex: kneading the paneer properly, right consistency if the sugar syrup, Nothing can stop you from getting super soft, milky white Rasgullas!

INGREDIENTS:

• Full cream milk: 1 litre
• 2 small lemons: 3 tbsp of lemon juice 

      For Syrup

• 4 cups of sugar
• 1 litre of water

PROCEDURE: 

• First boil the full cream milk while stirring occasionally. When it's completely boiled ' turn off ' the stove and slowly add the extracted lemon juice. (requirement of lemon may vary according to the quality of your milk)
• Stir it well.The milk should start curdling during this process. Don't add the entire extracted lemon juice at once. Do it gradually.

  

• Continue adding the lime juice slowly and stirring after adding. Repeat this process. Once the milk is curdled ( separated ) and greenish whey (watery fluid part of the milk) is out pass it through a clean cloth lined on the colander/ strainer ( छलनी) as shown in the pic below.

• Then wash the chenna ( curdled milk that was just strained ) under running water very well (2-3 times). This step is very important otherwise you will get a lemony flavour from your Rasgullas and the sweet balls won't be soft either.

• Gather the edges of the cloth and gently squeeze out the excess water from the chenna. Don't apply too much pressure .

• Hang it for 30 minutes.

While your chenna is hanging prepare the sugar syrup:

• Take a pot with good depth and width. I took a big pressure cooker (since it's both wide and deep)
• Then add 12 cups of water into the pot and 3 cups of sugar.
• Stir it thoroughly so that sugar gets dissolved completely. (The ratio of sugar to water should be aroung 1:5 )
• After dissolving it turn on the stove and heat the syrup 

Note: The syrup should never become thick, or else your rasgullas will break or become too hard.

• Now take out the Chenna from the cloth and knead it for at least 10 minutes till it's texture becomes very smooth. It should be moist and not dry like the Paneer what we buy from the stores

• Knead the chenna until there are no lumps and cracks. As soon as some fat (oil from the chenna) starts releasing after kneading, start making the balls using your Palms. Try to restrict the size to 1 inch only as it becomes double after cooking.

• Now bring the syrup to boil and then add the chenna balls into the syrup carefully and cover the pot.
• The water(syrup) should be vigorously boiling.
• The process took me 20 minutes. (until the balls became soft and absorbed the syrup and enlarged )
• After every 5 minutes you should open the lid and stir cautiously as to not break the soft balls, Generally it should take around 15 minutes.
• Then turn off the gas and give the pot a standing time of 15 minutes.
• Then slowly transfer the rasgullas into a bowl along with the syrup, Making sure that all the rasgullas are submerged in the syrup.

• It is best when eaten after 8-9 hours. Only after 7-8 hours it becomes soft, juicy and spongy. that it melts in your mouth.
• Refrigerate it and serve it cool.

~ENJOY~

Besan ka Laddu (Chickpea flour sweet balls)

I wish all my readers a Very Colourful and Safe Holi, The Indian festival of Colors and harvest!

Every year I make these instead of  'bundi ke laddu' ( a type of sweet usually made during festivals and offered to God)  as my family and friends love 'Besan ke laddu' this. 

What are laddus? Ball shaped indian sweets

Ingredients:

• 1 cup: ghee
• 4 cups: besan (garbanzo bean flour/chickpea flour)
• 2 cups: powdered sugar
• 1/4 cup: chopped almonds
• 1 tsp: powdered cardamom 

Method:

• Keep the kadai/pan on low flame.
• In the pan mix the besan and ghee. Keep stirring continuously to avoid lumps from forming.
• Stir and fry till the mixture turns slightly brown. If required you can add little ghee. I have used 11/2 cups of ghee. (each cup is around 150-160 ml)
• Add the cardamom and sugar and mix thoroughly.
• Now allow the mixture to cool down.
• Apply some ghee on your palm and make into small balls.

~Enjoy~

Sweet Coconut Balls(laddu) -Narkol Nadu

Coconut laddus are made during many auspicious occasions. We celebrate Diwali, The Festival of Lights by worshipping Goddess Kali. Many different types of sweets are offered to the goddess on this day and these sweet coconut balls are one of the most common & important of the sweets that is defenitely offered by every bengali. Here is the recipe for how to make these sweet coconut balls at home!~

This is Goddess Kali. 

Ingredients:

• 3 coconuts (medium sized)-grated/shaved
• 400 grams of sugar 
• 3-4 cardamoms-finely powdered 

Procedure:

• Take a non-stick pan and put in all the grated coconut, sugar and powdered cardamom into the pan. Mix it well so that all the sugar gets mixed properly.
• Stir it continuously while on medium flame.
• Never cook this on high flame or else it will get burnt in the bottom due to the sugar.
• It takes almost 30-35 minutes until the consistency of the mixture becomes sticky. Once you get a sticky mixture, turn off the heat and remove the pan.
• Now you have to make the balls out of this mixture, by taking the mix in small amounts into your hand while hot and giving them a round shape by moulding the mix in between your palms.
• As a precautionary measure keep a bowl of water and keep on dipping your palm continuously so that you don't get blisters due to the hot coconut mixture.

This sweet has lot of calories but trust me it's so yummy that you will keep asking for more!

~ENJOY!~

Gajar ka Halwa (Carrot Dessert-Halwa)

Sweets Week!! The holy festival of  "GANESH CHATURTHI"is going on, So I'm making sweet dishes to offer to the Elephant God. This "Gajar ka halwa" (or) "gajrela" is basically a sweet carrot dish originally from Pakistan and Punjab.
This Dessert is always seen in their marriages.
Today I will be sharing with you my recipe for this sweet carrot halwa, which is a little tedious and takes almost 2 hours to make. But sometimes if you really want to save time you can also boil these carrots in pressure cooker (or) instead of grating the carrots, put them in the mixer-grinder! But honestly the taste gets hampered a lot!!

Video Recipe: 

Ingredients:

• Carrots-1 kg
• 2 litres of  full cream.milk.
• 500gms of  sugar
• Cashewnuts and raisins (Handful ea
• Ghee 5 Tbsp (Clarified Butter)

Procedure:

-Firstly grate all the carrots nicely using a grater, Please do not use a mixer/grinder as the texture of halwa will get spoilt and it will become frothy. 

-In a big pan start boiling the full cream milk. It should become almost half its original quantity  by condensing with time (This will take time). 

-In a separate pan heat up the ghee and fry the dry fruits in it and keep it aside.  

-Then saute the grated carrots in that pan really well.

-When the amount of milk has reduced considerably add the shredded carrots and keep cooking on medium flame. 

-Never cook in high flame as there is a major possibility of it getting burnt towards the bottom and sticking to the vessel.

-Keep on stirring now and then. 

-It takes almost one and a half hours to cook it completely until the carrots are nice and soft and absorb all the milk.

-Now lastly add the sugar and mix it thoroughly with your ladle until it's completely melted into it.

But the question arises, how will you know its done?
-When you notice the halwa sticking to your ladle and there is not a single drop of water coming out from the carrots. It's DONE!!
-Lastly add the dry fruits & mix it well. Serve hot.

~ENJOY~

Malpua (sweet bengali pancakes)

Here comes another authentic traditional Bengali Sweet- "MALPUA". They are sweet Indian-style pancakes without eggs. I remember eating them as I grew up. It was very popular in the 80's. Now that I stay far away from my birthplace (Kolkata) I really miss the taste of those home-made pancakes. But a few weeks back, I came across the recipe for this dessert and it made me so nostalgic. It really inspired me and I decided to give it a try!

This post is for the future generation. So that they remember there were desserts like this. My daughter can open this post and see it anytime in the future, when she remembers her origins. Its a favorite of mine. Here is the recipe:-

Ingredients:

• 1/2cup -White flour (maida/all purpose flour)
• Rice dust -4tsp
• Semolina (suji) -1 cup
• Full cream milk -1 cup
• Sugar -2 cups
• Cardamom powder 1tsp
• Fennel seeds (saunf)1tsp
• Baking powder 1/4th tsp
• CAshew nuts -crushed
• Ghee (clarified butter)- 1tsp

Procedure:

First mix the semolina (suji), ricedust, white flour, ghee & sugar with the full cream milk and make the batter. 

The consistency of the batter should not be very thin.

Cover it and keep it aside for an hour. Then add the saunf (fennel seeds), cashew nuts, cardamom dust and , baking soda

Whip it really well and make sure that you mix everything properly.

Take a non-stick frying pan.

Heat little oil and pour 1 big spoonful of batter on the pan and spread it evenly like a pancake.

Fry it on both the sides. After frying them, plate them up and pour sugar syrup on them.

It's done!

~ENJOY~

You can also make a soggy version by soaking them in sugar syrup or dipping them in syrup and removing them after some time.

In my house we prefer without sugar syrup .

Enjoy Janmashtami with yummy Malpua. ,🙏

Traditional Bengali Sweets

Hi friends! I thought it was getting a bit boring here with all the recipes...was it?  So dears I decided to treat you all with some sweets from Burdwan, a historical place near West Bengal. Recently  some colleague of mine sent these to me and I wanted to share with you these delicious treats with you all through my blog...

These unique sweets are so yummy that you always keep wanting to eat more once you taste them. They are called "SITA-BHOG" & "CHANDRAPULI ... The one that looks like basmati rice and kidney beans is SitaBhog and the half moon shaped sweet is chandrapuli made out of coconut. I had no idea why the name is related to Sita (Hindu goddess)....let's imagine may be when Ram,Sita & Lakshman were exiled for 14 yrs to the forest, plenty of coconut was available and Sita Mata prepared these sweets and Lord Rama and Lakhsman must have loved these..... By the way this is just my imagination. (hehehe) *^_^*

The actual thing...as seen in google:

• Sitabhog and Mihidana are two famous sweets of Burdwan, in the state of West Bengal (also called bardhaman) introduced first in honor of the Raj family. Shaktigarh's Langcha is another local specialty for Shaktigarh In Eastern Part of Burdwan City (courtesy +Wikipedia)
• It is also considered Goddess Sita's favorite food. Hence the name :-)
• Traditionally Chandrapuli was shaped like the moon and chandra in Bengali means the moon. However, these days they come in all shapes. You make it round or shape it like a half moon.  

This is how they look~ Enjoy~

                                    

If you all have patience to make these sweets I have given links to some blogs below: 

Sita Bhog-

http://www.riyatreat.blog spot.in/2009/08/sita-bhog.html

Chandrapuli-

http://www.colorandspices.com/2012/10/sindur-khelakolakulisubho-bijoyar.html