Holi– A colorful festival and a festival of colors indeed. A festival that marks the end of winter and ushers in Spring.
Happy Holi everyone!
Well it’s been ages since I played Holi. Perhaps the last time was when I was a teen.However we’ve just been invited to celebrate and play holi at a friend’s this year. Naturally I’m quite excited and hence was inspired to make something special as well.
Any celebration is not complete without a delectable “something sweet” I decided to go with a family favorite-“Gajar ka Halwa” or a Carrot pudding.
The recipe calls for grated carrots, milk and homemade mawa ( recipe included) to be cooked together. The carrots used for a halwa should be preferably the red variety most often found in the winter months. You could however use the orange ones if the red are un available.
This halwa could be served hot or cold. It is even more decadent when served with a dollop of vanilla ice-cream.
Go ahead and indulge a little.
INGREDIENTS:
- 500 grams Carrots (peeled and grated)
- 500 ml Milk (full fat)
- 100 grams Ghee
- 200 grams Sugar
- 8-10 Almonds ( blanched and slivered)
- Handful of cashew nuts (chopped roughly)
- Few raisins
- Pinch of saffron
- 1/2 teaspoon cardamom powder
- 60 grams mawa (crumbled)
DIRECTIONS:
- Heat the ghee in a heavy bottom pan.
- Add the grated carrots and sauté them for about 8-10 minutes.
- Next add in the milk and cook this mixture till the carrots softens and the mixture is dry. Keep stirring till milk is fully condensed.
- Then add in the sugar, it will seem quite wet again and hence keep cooking on a low flame till the halwa looks fairly dry.
- Now add in the cardamom powder and the saffron.
- Lastly stir in the crumbled mawa.
- Turn off the heat.
- Mix in the raisins and cashew nuts.
- Garnish with slivered almonds.
- Can be served hot or cold.
Mawa: Dried whole milk
Easy way to make up some mawa:
- 200 grams milk powder ( full fat)
- 40 ml Milk
- Muslin cloth
- Knead the milk powder with a little bit of milk at a time.
- Keep doing this till a soft dough has been formed.
- Tie the ball into a muslin cloth
- Add water into a pressure cooker. Place a trivet in it.
- Keep the muslin cloth in a small bowl over the trivet.
- Shut the cooker without using the weight and steam the dough for about 15-20 minutes.
- The mawa is now ready.
Cookingwithshy 