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What's Cooking? Indian recipes
P.S. Lakshmi Rao, a retired banker, has a passion for cooking. Her friends and family enjoy her culinary delights. Lakshmi is a long time Atlanta resident.

<<What's Cooking? Main


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Diwali Sweet Treats

Poornam Boorelu

Covering

1-cup urad dal washed and soaked for two hours 
2-cup rice flour
2 1/2 cups water
1/2-teaspoon salt

Blend urad dal with one-cup water. Mix rice flour, salt, remaining 1½ cups water and urad batter in a bowl. Transfer the batter in to the blender and blend until smooth. Transfer the batter back in to the bowl; keep it aside for couple of hours.

Filling

1 cup chana dal
1 cup water
1½ cups light brown sugar or jaggery (gud)
½ teaspoon fresh ground cardamom seeds
2 cups oil for frying

Wash chana dal and cook with 1-cup water in a pressure cooker container until you hear three whistles. Open the cooker when it is cool. Discard if there is any water left in the bottom of the chana dal. You can cook dal in a sauce pan if you do not have pressure cooker. You may need more water. Make sure dal is cooked. Mash dal with a spoon until smooth and cool it. It is O.K to have little dal here and there.
Mix brown sugar and mashed dal. Mixture gets little watery at this point. Put this mixture in to a non-stick pan and cook it in medium low heat mixing continuously for ten minutes. Add cardamom powder and mix. Remove dal mixture from heat and cool it to become hard. Make small lemon size balls. (about 20).

Heat oil in small frying pan in medium high heat. If you drop a small drop of batter in to the oil it should float immediately. Then the oil is ready for frying.

Dip chana dal ball in the urad flour batter gently and drop it into the oil carefully. Make sure batter sticks to the chana dal ball completely. Other wise the filling will ooze out and oil will be spoiled. Fry four or five at a time turning them to get brown on all sides. If the batter is too thin for some reason add little more rice flour to make it thick. Repeat with rest of the boorelu.

This sweet is a must for all the auspicious occasions like festivals, marriages, and baby- naming ceremonies etc. 

Note: You can substitute urad flour for urad dal. This can save some time.

Almond Barfi 

1 cup almonds with skin or without the skin
1/2 cup milk
1 cup sugar
2 tablespoons ghee (clarified butter)
½ teaspoon crushed cardamom seeds 
¼ teaspoon saffron threads soaked in teaspoon of milk (optional) 

Soak almonds in cold water for an hour.
Boil 2 cups water in small sauce pan and add almonds. Boil them for a minute. Remove almonds from hot water and put them in ice water. Take one almond at a time in between your thumb and index finger and squeeze it to remove the skin. Repeat with rest of the almonds. You can eliminate this process if you are using almonds without skin.

Blend almonds with milk in a blender until it becomes thick paste. Remove the almond paste from the blender in to a thick non-stick pan and mix with sugar. Place the pan on the stove in medium heat. Stir continuously with a heat proof spatula until the almond mixture becomes thick. Add little ghee in between until all the ghee is finished. Mix cardamom seeds powder and saffron (if using). Spread almond barfi in a greased plate. 
Cut in to desired shapes when barfi is cold.


Darbesh

BY PAROMITA SENGUPTA

Ingredients
2 ½ cups besan
1 ½ cups rice powder
I pinch baking soda
750 gms sugar
25 gms raisins
25 gm cashew nuts 
50 gms khowa kheer
Permitted food color
Vegetable Oil for frying
½ tsp crushed nutmeg

Make a batter with besan, rice powder, baking soda, water and a pinch of yellow food color having a semi-thickish consistency. Pour oil in the kadai and heat well.

Pour batter on a perforated spoon pressing with another spoon into the heated oil. In case boondis fail to appear round, then mix a little water to the batter. In the meantime, make a syrup with sugar and 3 cups of water and allow it to boil till it is of single-string consistency. Put the boondis after frying into the syrup. Keep aside for sometime till boondis are well soaked. Then place the boondi mixture on the fire. 

Stir it carefully and constantly till mixture does not stick to the kadai. Mix the crushed nutmeg, khowa, raisins and crushed cashew and allow it to cool. Then form laddoos and serve.

Patisapta

BY PAROMITA SENGUPTA

Ingredients
Rice powder –500 gm
Suji soaked in milk---100 gm

For Filling:
Milk ---1 litre
Sugar---2-3 tbsp

Boil the milk with 2-3 tbsp sugar and thicken iuto pancake consistency. Make a batter with rice powder and soaked suji(for 10-15 min) using sugar and milk. Wipe a non-stick pan with ghee/oil and make small pancakes with the prepared batter, putting the khowa filling inside. Then fold the pancake. A sweet coconut filling can also be used instead of the khowa filling. 


Labanga Latika

BY PAROMITA SENGUPTA

Ingredients
Maida—1 cup
Oil for frying
For filling
Milk—1 litre
Oil –2-3 tbsp
Sugar –1 cup
Water—1 cup
Cloves—few
Nutmeg powder

Make a dough with maida and 2-3 tbsp oil. Add water if needed. For the filling, boil milk with 2-3 tbsp sugar and thicken, stirring constantly. Take a small portion of the dough and roll it flat into a puri. Put a spoonful of filling in the middle and sprinkle with some nutmeg powder. Fold it lengthwise and then breadthwise and seal it with a clove at the centre. Likewise make the others and fry them in white oil. Keep aside. Prepare syrup with sugar and water. When sugar dissolves completely, put the folded sweets into it and allow them to soak. Serve on cooling.

Ricotta Cheese Barfi 

BY MINA KUMAR

Ingredients
16-ounce ricotta cheese 
½- stick unsalted butter
1-cup milk powder 
½-cup sugar 
½-teaspoon cardamom powder 
2- sheets of silver foil 

Mix ricotta cheese and butter in a microwavable container and cook in microwave for 3 minutes. After 3 minutes, stir and then cook for 3 more minutes. Then, add milk powder, cardamom powder and sugar to cheese and butter mixture. Cook for 5 minutes in the microwave. If the mix is not dry, then microwave a little longer. Once it is dry, take it out of the microwave and spread it onto a flat square plate and place silver foil on top. Finally, cut it into diamond shape.



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