traditional dessert

Kesari bath:

November 29, 2021

Kesari bath is made in many ways. Traditionally, it is made with Bansi Rava, and that is how my husband likes it. Since it is our Anniversary, presenting one of the much-cherished desserts and an integral part of our wedding menu.

Today, I am celebrating five years of blogging and 23 years of our togetherness with the much-loved sweet of my Husband, Kesari bath.

It is a simple sweet, with minimal ingredients like Bansi Rava, Sugar, Saffron and ghee, garnished with ghee fried cashews and raisins. Earlier I used to eyeball the measurements and prepare. The traditional measure and this foolproof recipe, which we cherish, is by my friend Madhu.

For measurements, use any tumbler of your choice.

Ingredients:

Bansi Rava- 1cup

Water-3cup

Sugar – 1 ½ to 2 cups ( Acc to your sweet level)

Salt – ¼ tsp

Cardamom powder – 1 tsp

Saffron – 10 to 12 strings (soak it in hot water or milk)

Ghee- ½ cup or a little more, as needed.

Cashews 10-15

Dry grapes- 15-20

Method:

-Take a small cup, add saffron, pour little hot milk or water, and allow soak.

-Keep water to boil in a saucepan.

-In a pan, add a tablespoon of ghee, fry cashew and dry grapes and keep aside.

-In the same pan, roast Bansi Rava till a pleasant aroma comes and turns grainy.

-Add salt and pour boiling water and allow to cook on a low flame.

– Once Rava is cooked, add sugar stir well to make sure there is no lump.

-While stirring, In every small interval, add ghee and proceed to stir.

– After 10 minutes of stirring, you can add saffron laced milk and mix well.

– Keep adding ghee little by little and mix well. Cook this mixture until ghee starts leaving from the sides. Finally, add cardamom powder, dry fruits mix well.

Serve hot.

NOTE:

If you wish to make square pieces out of it, when the Kesari bath is done, Spread the content on a ghee applied plate.

Allow to cool, mark the shape, get the perfectly shaped pieces, and store them in an air-tight container.

Broken wheat Huggi:

December 17, 2018

Huggi is a very popular, semi solid dessert of North Karnataka and each house has its own method. It is a sort of homely recipe and you would not find in any restaurant. Broken wheat is known as Godhi nucchu in Kannada language. I learnt Some of my favourite North Karnataka recipes from my previous neighbour aunty, who hails from Solapur near Gulbarga. I used to enjoy whatever she used to offer, starting from simple triangle chapati, obbattu, obbattu saru, chapparadavarekai palya, chavlikai palya and khara byale saru to Godhi nucchina Huggi, which she used to offer to God, every Friday evening and used to offer as a prasadam to us.

Aunty used to use hardly 3 ingredients and it used to taste divine. It is no coconut dessert and you can feel the texture of wheat as well as flavour. Preparation is very quick and simple and needs hardly any pre-preparation.

Recipe goes like this-

Ingredients:

Broken wheat – 1 cup

Jaggery – ¾ cup

Salt – ¼ tsp

Ghee – ¼ cup

Cardamom powder – 1 tsp

Cashew pieces – Roasted (Optional)

Method:

-Wash broken wheat twice. Cook with 3 cups of water and a pinch of salt for 2 to 3 whistles.

-Mean time, heat jaggery by adding ½ cup of water. Strain the liquid and remove the impurities.

-Add strained jaggery syrup to cooked wheat and cook further at a very low temperature.

-When raw smell of jaggery vanishes, add ghee and cook further by mixing in between.

-Lastly when mixture becomes like a mass, add cardamom powder, garnish with roasted cashew and serve.

Halasina Hannu Berati Payasa / Preserved jack fruit payasam:

September 2, 2018

First, I want to wish a very very happy “Krishna Janmashtami” to all my readers. On the eve of this festival I made our traditional payasam and enjoyed with my family.

“Berati” is nothing but preserved jackfruit pulp, which is cooked until it forms into thick mass and usually made during Jack fruit season and stored for future use.

How to preserve jackfruit / Berati is already shared in my blog and it is here .

In Coastal region we love jack in many forms. Berati Payasa is one of them.

Now we will see traditionally how it is made:

Ingredients:

Berati / jackfruit preserve – 1 bowl

Coconut – 1 (To extract milk)

-OR-

Thin coconut milk – 2cups

Thick coconut milk – ½ cup

Jaggery – to taste

Salt – ½ tsp

Cardamom powder – ½ tsp

For Seasoning:

Ghee – 1 tbl sp

Thin Coconut slices – 2 tbl sp

Cashew pieces – 2 tbl sp

Toasted black sesame – 1 table spoon

Fresh coconut slices – 1 to 2 table spoons

Method:

Take out Berati from your freezer and keep aside for some time to attain room temperature.
Slice coconut by using small knife, chop these sliced pieces into small bits.

Toast black sesame and keep aside.
Take little ghee and fry coconut bits and keep aside.

If you want to, you can add ghee roasted cashew bits as well.
Grate coconut (coconut should be fresh), put one cup of water and grind this in a mixer jar and extract milk by sieving this ground mixture.
This is thick coconut milk and you should keep this separately. We use this at the end stage of Payasa making.
Do this procedure a couple of times to get a thin extract and lastly discard coconut fibre.
If you are using readymade coconut milk, please skip this step.
Now take one thick bottomed vessel, put Berati, thin coconut milk and dissolve Berati and keep this on a gas stove to boil.

Usually while making Berati, we put little jaggery, so add required amount of jaggery and boil until raw smell of the jaggery vanishes.
Lastly add thick extract of coconut milk and give one boil. Don’t boil it much. Add Cardamom powder and mix.

Remove from fire and add fried coconut pieces, toasted black sesame or cashew brittles to prepared Payasa.
Serve with lunch thali or as a dessert.

NOTE:

Traditionally only toasted sesame and coconut bits are added.

Arrowroot Halwa:

September 26, 2017

Traditionally we call this Arrowroot halbayi. Which is easy to digest and considered as a very light food during fasting or illness. This should be consumed fresh and the shelf life of any halbayi is only 24 hours.

Arrowroot powder is extracted from the arrowroot plant, which is milky white in colour and powdery like corn starch. It has high nutritional content and is a very good substitute for bleached corn starch as a thickening agent in cooking. It is odourless and works well too.

Arrowroot powder’s “Easy to digest” quality is qualified to make infant food as well as to treat diarrhoea. It is usually consumed in a porridge form in our region. Usually, 1 tablespoon of powder is mixed with little water (according to the consistency) and cooked until it is shiny and glossy. Then with preferred seasonings like salt or jaggery.

Although it is a starch, it contains no gluten, so works well in gluten-free baking or cooking as well.

Ingredients:

Use a small tumbler to measure arrowroot, milk and jaggery or sugar.

Arrowroot powder – 1 cup

Coconut milk or milk – 1 cup

Jaggery or sugar – 1 cup (grated)

Ghee – 2 tablespoons

Water – 2 cups

Cashew bits – 2 tablespoons

Cardamom powder – 1 teaspoon

Method:

– Mix arrowroot powder in water and keep aside for one hour.

– After an hour, pour the top/soaked water. Add 2 cups of water, mix nicely and sieve this solution to remove any impurities.

– Make jaggery syrup by adding little water, boil and sieve the solution to remove any impurities.

– Grease one steel plate with little ghee and keep it aside. Roast cashew bits with a drop of ghee and keep aside.

– Mix sieved mixture, coconut milk, jaggery syrup in one thick Kadai and heat the mixture by stirring continuously on low fire.

– Add ghee in-between, when it is half done add cardamom powder, cashew and stir once.

– When the mixture leaves the sides of the vessel and becomes one mass and non-sticky, pour the mixture to a greased plate.

– Take one flat spoon/ladle, apply some ghee to the back of the ladle and press the mixture to give a uniformly smooth texture and even thickness.

– When it cools down a little, mark and cut this into the desired shape and serve.

– Please note, this halwa/ halbayi stands good only for one day. If you want to enjoy this dish over more days, you should store this in a refrigerator and reheat it before serving.

Beaten rice/Poha laddu:

August 12, 2017

Wish you all my lovely readers a very happy Krishna janmashtami. As beaten rice is one of the favourite things of lord Krishna. Beaten rice is also known as poha in Hindi and Avalakki in Kannada.

This ladoo is one of my twin daughter’s favourite things in this whole wide world. I learnt this addictive crunchy ladoo recipe from my sister’s Mother-In-Law. Now let’s get started with the recipe.

Ingredients:

Whole wheat flour-1 cup

Chickpea flour/Besan -1 cup

Thick beaten rice – 2 cups (thicker variety, which is used for deep frying in savoury making)

Sugar- 2 ½ cup

Clarified butter (ghee) – ½ to ¾ cup (as required)

Dry fruits – 1 cup (We like chopped almond and cashew)

Cardamom powder – 1tsp

Method:

1. Dry roast wheat flour and chickpea flour separately in a thick bottomed vessel and keep small flame in a gas stove, so that flour will not get burnt and fry uniformly.

2. Fry dry fruits with little ghee and keep aside.

3. Deep fry beaten rice and put it in a tissue.

4. Take all these things (roasted flour, dry fruits, fried beaten rice, and cardamom powder) in a large bowl, to this add powdered sugar and mix everything nicely.

5. To the above mixture add melted little hot clarified butter or ghee and mix it with clean hand.

6. Once you can make ladoo stop adding clarified butter and continue making ladoo.

7. After it cools down, store this in a clean, dry airtight container and enjoy whenever you feel like.

Badam Halwa / Almond Halwa :

July 5, 2017

Badam halwa, the name itself brings back so many fond memories of my two kiddos’ as well as of my late father in law. My memories go back to my delivery time. When my father in law heard about my twin daughter’s arrival, he celebrated his joy by preparing and distributing this sweet to our near and dear ones. While growing up, even my kids used to enjoy this sweet and used to refer to this as “Yellow sweet”. After so many years last weekend I prepared this to celebrate my hubby’s birthday and enjoyed every bit of the preparation by cherishing all these fond memories.

I Normally follow this age-old method-

Ingredients:

Almonds – 500 grams

Sugar – 750 grams

Milk – ½ to ¾ litre

Ghee – 1 to 1 ½ cup

Saffron – 1 tsp

Cardamom powder – ½ teaspoon

Method:

– Soak almond overnight.

– The next morning, peel the skin. Usually three fourth of the content will shed their skin, if you mash those swelled almonds inside the water, by using your palm.

– After removing the outer skin, put these in a mixer grinder jar, make paste by adding sufficient milk.