KAJU KATHLI

KAJU KATHLI recipe

         
                    One of the Indian Diwali sweet made using cashew powder and sugar . My daughter loves this sweet very much. In chennai we used to bought this sweet from stores . But here in USA ..DOESN'T EVEN SMELL THE TASTE OF INDIAN ...Ofcourse here also we have indian stores and indian hotels ..but I'm not satisfied with the taste ..(but ,it's like used to). Also my hubby is a snack  lover so .. .

These conditions forced me to start my research ! In HOME MADE (of all kind of sweet and snack).for the last 1 1/2 years I've tried many sweets and snacks . In between I got some flops but overall  I got good results only .. 

I'll blog all my tried sweet and snacks recipes one by one later in this blog .. 

Here I'll give you kaju KATHLI recipe ..

                   

Ingredients:

Cashew.   - 2 cups (heaped)
 (I used broken cashew) 
Sugar.       - 1 cup (flat measure) ( you can reduce it to 3/4 cup  for less sweet)
Corn starch - 2 tbsp (optional )
Water.       - 1/2 cup
Butter /ghee for greasing

Method :

1. First grind cashew into fine powder using dry grinding jar of mixer / blender.

2. Powdered cashew may look like clusters  ,break all these using a fork.and keep it aside.

3 . Add sugar and water to a pan and keep it in medium flame ,bring it to boil and wait until you get one string consistency.you may get it in 10-12 minutes.

4 . Add cashew powder to the syrup (keep the flame low).stir continuously using a wooden spoon ( because it may form lumps and  stick to the bottom and chance of burn  ,so keep stiring ) for about  10 minutes . Now take a drop of that mixture and roll it between your fingers ,if it can be rolled with out sticking ,that's the stage .switch off and let it sit  for 5 minutes.

It'll become thick ..after it gets cooled. (After 5 minutes)If you  feeling the mixture is runny  or sticky ,don't worry just add  corn starch little by little and knead it like chapathi dough.

5. Finally roll this dough  into  1/4"  thickness using  rolling pin   and cut them into your desired shapes. Store  in a  air tight box for about 1 week or you can keep it in fridge for 2-3 weeks .

Before roll the dough just grease the rolling pin  and surface used for rolling  with little butter or ghee.

 Total process needs only 30 minutes

Time , it needs to be in stove for heating is only  15 - 18 .minutes ( sugar syrup 5 minutes , adding and stiring mixture 10 minutes ).It doesn't need much time for cooking .

GREENGRAM LADDU -பச்சை பயறு லட்டு-சிறுபயறு

GREEN GRAM LADDU 

Healthy and easy to make laddu.

My daughter's  favorite laddu,we can make this laddu for any special occasion, I made this laddu for Diwali . If it's rightly made and stored  in a clean and airtight container , it lasts long. 

We made this laddu only with jaggery or with karupatti(get from palm trees)-the Nature  gift for all of us . I'll give you the details of karupatti later( palm jaggery )

Let's do the preparation .

                              

Preparation time : 30 minutes

Ingredients:

Greengram/

moong dhal whole with husk - 2 cups headed

Peanut.                                         -3/4 cup 

Badam/almonds                        -1/4 cup

Jaggery.                                       -2 cup  grated 

Water.                                          -1/2 cup

Grated coconut.                         -1/2cup

Ghee.                                            -1 tsp

Making:

Step 1.

 Roast & Grind:

1. Dry roast green gram,peanuts,and badam separately and let them cool for a while.

2. Gently rub the peanuts with your hand  and Remove the peanut skin.

3. Heat a pan with one tsp ghee ,add grated coconut and fry until coconut turns golden brown

   color

4. Grind the above 3 into powder  ( just stop before it was finely powdered).

( grind greengram separately and peanut, badam together)

I

Green gram powder.                           Peanut badam powder

Mixing:

1. In a mixing bowl ,add the powders  , fried coconut and  mix well ,check-whether   everything evenly mixed.

                               

Step 2:

Jaggery syrup:

1. Heat jaggery with 1/2 cup water or upto the level of jaggery (fully immersed)

2. Switch off stove when jaggery reaches   two string consistency.

   ( syrup is nor too thick or liquid,it should be inbetween , like thickness of honey )

Step 3:

Laddu making :

1. Add  hot jaggery syrup to the  powder mixture in  the mixing bowl, little by little.

   Mix everything with fork , check for the consistency of  that mixture for making them into 

   laddus ,if you feel that you reached the laddu making consistency,stop adding jaggery     

   syrup,and make round shaped laddus by your hand .(as quick as possible,before if cools down)

2. Keep laddus in an air-tight container, it'll stay fresh for long period.

PORIKADALAI LADDU-ROASTED GRAM DAL LADDU -POTTUKADALAI LADDU

PORIKADALAI LADDU

 This snack is my hubby's favorite...Making of this laddu takes not more than 15 minutes, within 15 minutes you get 16-18 small sized laddus . 

 This one we call, திடீர் லட்டு (quick laddu)

Let's go to the preparation...

Ingredients:

Roasted gram dal(பொட்டுகடலை)  powder -  2 1/2 cups

Powdered sugar.                                                -1 1/4 cups

Cashew.                                                            - 2 tbsp ( chop into small pieces)

Ghee.                                                                  -4 tbsp

Making:

1.  Start the process by making powder,first make roasted gram dal powder by grind.                       

      2 1/2    cups       roasted gram dal in mixer( approximately 1 cup dal yields 1 1/4 cup 

      powder). Then grind sugar and make powder,if you have powdered sugar in home ,then no 

      problem, use it.

2. Actual proportion , for 1 cup dal powder :,1/2 cup powdered sugar

3. Pour 1/2 tbsp ghee in a pan ,roast cashew in low flame  and take out when it 

    slightly turns brown.

4. In a bowl add roasted gram dal powder ,powdered sugar and cashew ,mix well with 

     a fork ,check whether they are evenly mixed .

5. Again in the same pan pour the ramaining ghee ,put stove in low flame ,ghee starts melting in the pan and now before the smoking temperature ( before smoke comes) lift the pan and pour melted ghee into the bowl  ,if ghee is heated enough you can see bubbles like in the below picture ,quickly mix the powder with fork,now it looks like crumbs ,take some crumbs in your hand ,make round  shaped laddu  by giving  enough pressure to that crumbs ,hold them tightly,so that it won't break,

Note:

Make laddus as quickly as possible before it cools down ,I usually pour little by little ghee to portions of powder and make laddus ,at that time also we have to keep the ghee in low flame (during the whole process keep ghee heated ). 

We get  16 laddus out of this flour.

If ghee is not heated well ,then it  needs more ghee  ,I use 4 tbsp ghee for these laddus.

We can also mix vanaspathi/ dalda with ghee ,instead of using only ghee.

Chop cashews into small pieces ,or it's tough to make laddus.

 We can also make this laddu with moong dal ,same process,instead of using gram flour use moong dal roasted and make powder and follow the same method.

That's it, 

    Our delicious and easiest laddu is ready......