Mysore Pak

Mysore Pak is mostly made for Deepavali festival. Preparation process of this sweet is believed to be tougher.

Ingredients:
Besan - 1 cup
Sugar - 2 1/4 cups
water - 1/4 cup for every cup of sugar
Ghee - 2 to 2 1/2 cups

Preparation:
Take a tray and spread few drops of ghee on it. Keep this ready before you start preparing the sweet, so that hot content can be poured on it once done

Mix besan well with a spoon of ghee until you get rid of all lumps
Sieve besan and keep nice flour aside to use
Dissolve the sugar in water and boil it until single string consistency. In this stage, sugar water would have boiled well and slightly foamy
Heat ghee parallely in another burner
Add flour slowly to sugar water and stir continuously
when the mix bubbles out, start adding hot ghee laddle-by-laddle and continue stirring (Use help from another person for this step)
Mix will become frothy with addition of hot ghee. This will create perforation in mysore pak and indicates correct consistency
continue adding ghee and stirring until the frothy content blends well, starts to solidify and comes out of the pan without sticking
Now pour this content on tray. Don't level the content as it will remove perforation and crispy texture
After a minute, cut it out with knife. Just make lines but don't take out pieces yet
Leave it to cool down for 30 mins to 1 hr, as the ghee inside the mixture will be still hot and cooking it
Take out pieces. It should break easily. you will notice the centre layer of the sweet slightly turned brown in color. This is a sign of perfect Mysore pak !
Store it in air tight container for better shelf life

Servings:
20 Pieces

Coconut Barfi

This sweet is mostly made for Deepavali festival. Its simple and easy to make.

Ingredients:
Grated coconut (ground)- 1 cup
Sugar - 1 1/2 cup
water - 1/4 cup
cardamom powder - 1/4 spoon
Ghee - 4 spoons

Preparation:
Take a tray and spread few drops of ghee on it. Keep this ready before you start preparing Barfi, so that the hot content can be poured on it once done

Dissolve the sugar. Stir it well
When it boils and slightly become foamy, add coconut and stir well
Let it boil, add 2 spoons of ghee and stir well
Mixture will become foamy and slightly changes color. Add Cardamom powder at this stage
Add another 2 spoons of ghee, when the contents start to solidify
Stir well until the contents blend well and come out without sticking to the pan
Now pour this on tray. After a minute, cut it with knife. Just make lines but don't take out pieces yet
Leave Barfi to solidify well and cool down for min 30 mins and then take out pieces and store it in air tight container

Servings:
15 pieces

Nalla Karam Podi

This Podi (Powder) recipe is hot and spicy. This is from Andhra Cuisine. Powder might be light / dark in color depending on the Black dal, curry leaves addition.

Ingredients:
Black Gram dal - 2 1/2 spoons (heaped)
Coriander seeds - 1/2 cup
chenna dal - 1 1/2 spoons
red chillies - 10
cumin seeds - 1 spoon
tamarind - 1/4 teaspoon
salt - 1/2 spoon
Curry leaves dried - 5 twigs (optional - i didn't add it)

Preparation:
Dry fry all the ingredients except salt, in a pan
When they turn golden brown and aroma releases, stop frying
Allow it to cool for 10 mins and powder it with Salt.

Usage:
Serve it with Idli / Dosa / Hot steamed rice. Have it with Ghee or Gingelly oil, as it is very hot & spicy powder