Health for life

Gulab jamuns are spongy balls,a quite famous North Indian sweets prepared usually with khoya and maida ,later they are fried in oil and soaked in sugar syrup. Usually we South Indians prepare this spongy juicy jamuns with store bought jamun mix, which makes the life easier. But after becoming a food blogger, i crossed many easy breezy preparation of this jamun with household ingredients especially with milk powder or else with homemade khoya. For our this months South VS North India challenge, an event by Divya, two of our group members challenged with two beautiful dishes.

For Southern India team, Pallavi Purani of Cook Eat Burrrp shared gulab jamun for this months challenge while Yasodha of Yasodhas Kitchen challenged Northern India team with Adhirasam. As am a part of Southern team, i have to prepare gulab jamun. When i received the challenge mail,immediately i went through the mail and i found that Pallavi shared an another interesting version of gulab jamun with milkpowder. Since i had all the ingredients in my hand, i prepared immediately this morning and served these super spongy jamuns to everyone after their lunch as dessert. Thanks Pallavi, this gulab jamun recipe is definitely a keeper and my jamuns turned out utlimately super spongy,pect and absolutely delicious.Since i rolled my jamuns as tiny balls, they gets soaked quickly when compared to the medium sized balls, i got almost 40numbers of jamuns with the measurements Pallavi have given.


1cup Milk powder
3tbsp Maida
1+1/2tbsp Rava
3tbsp Cream
4tbsp Melted ghee
1pinch Baking powder
1cup Sugar
1cup Water
1tsp Rose water (optional)
Few pistachio nuts (chopped)
Dessicated coconut flakes (as per need)
Oil or ghee for frying

Sieve together the milkpowder,maida,rava and baking powder in a bowl.

Gradually add the cream and melted ghee and knead everything smoothly to form a dough.

Keep aside the dough covered with a towel for half an hour.

Meanwhile heat the water and sugar together in medium flame,boil it until the sugar gets dissolves and put off the stove. Keep aside and let it cool.

Now make small balls from the prepared dough, roll it well and these balls should have any cracks.

Heat the oil or ghee for deepfrying in medium flame.

Drop gently the rolled balls and fry in medium low flame until they turns golden brown, strain the excess of oil with a paper towel.

Add these fried balls to the already prepared sugar syrup and let them sit for an hour.

Serve gulab jamuns topped with chopped pistachios and dessicated coconut flakes.

Enjoy!

First day of every month, i know most of us will check our mails just to know wat we guys have to cook for a fantabulous SNC challenge. I was super thrilled to check my mails this morning and i was surprised to see two beautiful dishes, for the Southern team Kirti challenged us with a droolworthy and irresistible channadal halwa while Swasthi challenged the opposite Northern team with flavourful Hyderabadi dum briyani.

I can talk for hours about this beautiful event started by Divya Pramil of You Too Can Cook. The motto of this event is to exchange an Indian recipe between two teams. One team is Southern team (bloggers  born and brought in South India) and the another one team is Northern team (food bloggers born and brought in North India). Every first of a month, a blogger from each team will challenge a recipe from their origin and the opposite team have to cook the recipe challenged by the other team.

I have tasted this channadal halwa long back at one of my friends potluck party and i still remember the taste of this smooth and droolworthy halwa. Am damn sure you cant stop urself just with few spoons of this halwa. Thanks Kriti, we just love it and am just enjoying this halwa loaded with beautiful flavours.Sending to my own event Cooking with Seeds-Dals.

Ghevar, an incredible Rajasthani delicacy served during Teej festival, a fasting festival for Hindu women,i have already heard about this high caloric sweets. But never had chance to tasted or prepared them at home.Coming to this months SNC challenge, an event Divya of You Too Ccan Cook, both Southern group members and Northern group members got their mail yesterday with their respective challenges.As am a part of Southern group, i have to make this famous Rajasthani ghevar for this months challenge. This challenge was suggested by Manjula Bharath of Desi Fiesta from Northern team,while Southern team challenged them with Vadacurry by Ramya krishnamurthy of LemonKurry, vadacurry is one of my favourite and seriously i felt like making them too.

When i went through Manjulas recipe, i thought this ghevar will be quite tricky. But for my surprise, this sweet is quite easy to make eventhough this incredible sweet goes for frying ghevar,sugar syrup and rabdi. The cooking process may sounds long but its truly worth to try this fantastic sweets.Ghevar goes for maida,sugar,ghee,saffrons,cardamom powder,few nuts,milk and condensed milk. If you have everything at home, this ghevar gets ready very much easily. Batter consistency plays an important role for making ghevar, batter should be thin without any lumps.

Honestly i have fallen in love with this fabulous sweet, even served with rabdi this ghevar have a mild crispy texture and we loved it very much. My lil one just relished this sweet delight and asked me again to make me some.But only disadvantage of this dish is its truly very highly caloric as the maida batter is fried in ghee or oil and served with hot sugar syrup, finally with highly sweetened rabdi. Once a while, we can enjoy this ghevar. Fried ghevar can stay for more than 15days in air tightened box. Thanks to Manjula for sharing this traditional sweet with us, we seriously loved it.


For Batter:
1+1/2cups Maida
2tbsp Ghee
Few saffron strands
1/4cup Milk (room temperature)
Warm Water (for making thin batter)
Oil for frying

Sugar Syrup:
1+1/2cup Sugar
1cup Water

Kesari Rabdi:
3cups Whole milk
1cup Sweetened condensed milk
1/2tsp Cardamom powder
Crushed pistachios,almonds
1tsp Saffron strands

Whip both milk and ghee together for few minutes.  

Add the maida and mix well, gradually add the water and mix it well to get a thin batter consistency.

Heat enough oil in a round,deep,flat bottomed vessel in high flame.Once the oil is hot, take the batter in a ladle and pour in the middle of the vessel in a thin stream from 1 foot height.

Once you pour the batter, the hot oil will start bubbling. After pouring a whole ladle of batter, stop of few seconds and start pouring small ladle of batter.

I went for two small ladle full of batter to make mine.Make a space in the center of the frying ghevar with a skewer once the batter gets settled.

Let the ghevar gets fried on medium flame until they turns golden brown.

Take the ghevar out of the oil caully with a skewer and keep over a paper towel to remove the excess of oil.

Make a one string consistency sugar syrup with the sugar and water and keep aside.

Meanwhile in an another vessel, boil the milk and cook in low flame until the milk gets reduced to half of the quantity,now add the saffron strands, cardamom powder and curshed nuts,mix it well.

Add finally the condensed milk and bring it to boil again and remove from the stove once the milk turns thick,keep aside.

While serving, spoon the sugar syrup over the crispy ghevar and tilt the plate to remove the sugar syrup. Top it with the rabdi and nuts and serve it immediately.