Ma Ladu (Payathama ladu)

Jayanthi Sundar

Preparation time less than 1 hour (if you keep all the ingredients handy !)

Makes about 12 even sized ladus

Ingredients:

  • 1 cup moong dal flour (shop bought)
  • 1 cup icing sugar (or powdered sugar, if your prefer)
  • ¼ cup melted ghee (excellent, if freshly ‘kaichiya nei’)
  • 12 cashews roasted evenly in ghee to a light golden colour
  • 4 cardamoms powdered

Preparation:

  • In a heavy bottomed kadai dry roast the flour for 15 minutes slowly and steadily until theraw smell of the flour disappears.
  • Move the flour pan away from the hot stove; when the flour is still warm and not too hot, add the icing sugar (or, powdered sugar) to the warm flour along with the cardamom. Mix them well.
  • Now add the melted ghee to the flour-sugar mixture and mix it evenly. Make this mixture into even sized ladus, with cashews placed on each ladu and gently pushed in. The cashew should be seen and not hidden within the ladu. The ghee must be melted – otherwise you cannot make ladus.

Tricks of the trade:

  • While roasting the flour, don’t allow it to burn – it will then taste awful (gritty, burnt and looking discoloured as well)
  • For the ladus to be firm (that don’t fall apart when you touch them), warm the flour sugar/ghee mixture slightly.

Horlicks Mysore Pak

Malini Srinivasan

Ingredients:

Gram Flour – 250 gms
Sugar – 500 gms
Ghee – 600 gms
Horlicks – 2 spoons
Water – ½ cup

Preparation:

  • Add a few spoons of hot ghee to the gram flour and mix well. Sieve it
  • Take sugar in thick bottomed saucer. Add water and let it boil to form sugar syrup, till it is soft ball stage.
  • Simultaneously, melt the ghee and the ghee should be boiling hot.
  • Now add the flour slowly to the sugar syrup and mix rapidly so that no lumps are formed.
  • Add the hot ghee to the mix; keep stirring continuously. Cook till the mixture becomes frothy and ghee separates
  • Add 2 spoons of Horlicks and mix well
  • Pour the mix on a ghee greased plate
  • Leave it to settle for 10 mins before you cut it in square or diamond shape
  • You can also sprinkle a spoon of sugar.

Peanut Mysore Pak

Lakshmi Rajagopal

Ingredients:

Pea nuts – 200 gms
Ghee – 200 gms
Sugar -- 300 gms
Coconut –- 50 gms

Preparation:

  • Soak the peanut for one hour without husk. Grind to smooth paste.
  • Take sugar in thick bottomed saucer. Add water and let it boil to form sugar syrup, till it is soft ball stage.
  • Simultaneously, melt the ghee and the ghee should be boiling hot.
  • Now add the ground peanut paste slowly to the sugar syrup and mix rapidly so that no lumps are formed.
  • Add the hot ghee to the mix; keep stirring continuously. Cook till the mixture becomes frothy and ghee separates
  • Add the coconut and mix well
  • Pour the mix on a ghee greased plate
  • Leave it to settle for 10 mins before you cut it in square or diamond shape
  • You can also sprinkle a spoon of sugar.

Thattai

Malini Srinivasan

Ingredients:

Oorad Dhal – 200 gms
Raw Rice -– 600 gms
Sesame – 1 table spoon
Gram – 2 table spoon
Peanut fried and husk removed – 100 gms
Ground Coconut -- 100 gms
Oil to fry
Salt to taste

Preparation:

  • Heat a thick kadai and roast the Oorad dhal until it turns brown in color; grind the roasted oorad dhal in to a powere; sieve it.
  • Soak sesame, gram and peanut in three different containers.
  • Soak the rice for about two hours and grind the rice to a paste.
  • Mix coconut, gram and sesame and grind it in to a paste.
  • Mix the oorad dhal powder, rice flour, paste made out of coconut, gram and sesame and peanut.
  • Add salt and mix it well like how we make it for Murukku.
  • Take small portions of the maavu and make them into round thattai.
  • Heat the oil and deep fry the thattais, until they become golden colour.
  • You can add curry leaves as well to the maavu and that will add to the taste.

Cashew Nut Murukku

Lakshmi Rajagopal

Ingredients:

Cashew paste (soaked and ground) – 1 cup
Rice flour – 2 cups
Ghee -- 4 table spoon
Sesame – 2 table spoon
Salt to taste
Oil to fry

Preparation:

  • Mix the rice flour, cashew paste, salt, ghee and sesame like murukku maavu.
  • Heat the oil in a thick kadai.
  • Use Mullu Murukku Die and squeeze to small murukkus directly in hot oil.
  • Deep fry the Murukku, until they become golden colour.

Badusha

Banu Chandrasekaran

Ingredients:

  • Maida 600 gram
  • Baking Powder Pinch
  • Bicarbonate of Soda ¼ tea spoon
  • Sugar 400 gram
  • Ghee/Unsalted Butter 250 gram
  • Saffron, Rose Water
  • Curd 2 karandi – small laddle

Sift maida with a pinch of soda and ¼ tea spoon of Baking Powder Melt butter/ghee and add to maida and crumble well so that butter is well Mixed with maida. Add curd and mix well. Knead the flour into a dough. Add water if required. Do not knead too much. It should be flaky. Leave it for 15 minutes.

Meanwhile heat oil or oil and ghee mixed together in a fry pan or vanali. Do not put oil in high flame. Take a little bit of dough and circle it between your palm to make a ball and press it down to form a circle (like vadai). Press with your finger to make a dent (kuzhi) in the centre.

Fry the balls in batches on medium flame and make sure the heat is maintained at the same temperature so as to cook the inside well. Cook until the balls turned into golden brown – outside it will be crispy and inside soft. You can see the balls are puffed up and doubled in size. When both sides are cooked drain on a kitchen towel to absorb the extra ghee/oil.

To make syrup

Melt sugar with water (3/4 cup) and cook until you get one string consistency. You can check by touching the syrup between your thumb and index finger. Don’t forget the syrup will be very hot. Add saffron strands (which is mixed with little bit of warm milk) and switch off the gas. Leave for 5 minutes and add rose essence/water.

Dip the cooked balls in the syrup and press down well to immerse in syrup. Leave them for 5 minutes to soak, remove and arrange them on a plate.

Syrup will get cold as you add more and more balls. In that case reheat the syrup in a low temperature. There will be some syrup left over but this can’t be avoided. You should be able to get 30 reasonable size badushas.

This is how I have been making Badushas for the past few years.