NAVANAKKI HOLIGE

Navanakki or foxtail millet is one of the oldest millets known. It is a staple in south India, especially Karnataka. Variety of dishes like payasam, upma, dosa are prepared with navanakki.

Navanakki holige is similar to puran poli from Maharashtra. It is a parantha made from whole wheat flour or all purpose flour, stuffed with navanakki and jaggery filling, rolled and baked on griddle (tava) or deep fried.

Traditionally this sweet is prepared on special occasions and festivals.

Recipe for Navanakki Holige

Ingredients for Navanakki Holige

• All pupose flour or maida
• Navanakki
• Jaggery
• Cardamom powder
• Clarified butter or ghee
• Oil
• Rice flour or any other flour for dusting
• salt

How to make

Take maida in a mixing bowl. Add salt, oil and  water to it.

Knead a soft dough. Cover and keep aside for an hour.

Dry roast navanakki for 2 to 3 minutes on medium heat. Keep aside to cool.

Grind navanakki to a fine powder and sieve it.

In a pan melt jaggery with 2 tablespoon of water. Bring it to boil.

Add sifted navanakki flour. Mix well.

Cook for 2 minutes and remove from heat.

As the mixture cools it will take form of a soft dough.

Add crushed cardomom. Mix well.

Divide the maida dough into small equal portions. Shape them into balls.

Take a dough ball, roll it into a circle of approximately 4 inches. Place a portion of filling at its center.

Gently bring together the edges and press them together to seal it.

Dust some flour on the rolling surface to prevent it from sticking.

Gently roll it flat into an oval shape. Take care while rolling so that there are no holes. 

Deep fry till golden in colour and crisp.

Top it with a spoonful of ghee and serve it.

GUR RASGULLA

Gur rasgulla are chenna (homemade cottage cheese balls) in jaggery syrup. It is a Bengali sweet prepared mainly in winters, during Makar sankranti. The amber coloured spongy balls in an ochre coloured syrup made from jaggery tastes delicious.

The first time when I was successful in making these rasgullas, I couldn’t stop myself from showing off the sponginess and the beautiful colour of my gur rasgullas (very unlike me). Once again I realised that only hardwork can yield you good results.

I tried different recipes which suggested adding suji or semolina, cornflour. I was never happy with those results.

There are a few things which should be kept in mind for a spongy rasgullas. Firstly always use the homemade, fresh chenna or cottage cheese. Secondly, the chenna or cottage cheese shouldn’t be too moist or too dry.

Rub the chenna till there are no cracks when shaped into balls. The process of mashing should be done with heels of your palm. This may take 10 minutes. This step is very important.

Cow’s milk is considered to be best for soft and spongy rasgullas.

Recipe for Gur Rasgulla

Ingredients for Gur Rasgulla

• 1 litre cow’s milk (yields 180 to 200gms chenna)
• 2 lemons/ 1 tbsp vinegar
• 1 ½ cups + 1 cup jaggery
• ¼ tsp cardamom powder (optional)

How to make

Bring milk to boil. Lower the heat. Add lemon juice or vinegar and give it a gentle stir.

If the milk doesn’t split add more lemon juice.

Remove from heat when you can see the curdled milk and clear whey separated.

Pass it through a sieve lined with muslin cloth. Wash the chenna under running water. This will cool down the chenna and also remove the traces of lemon juice.

Squeeze to get rid of the moisture. Remember too less or too much moisture is not good for rasgullas.

Rub the chenna with heels of your palm so that it becomes like soft dough.

Divide into 12 to 16 portions. Rub the portions between your palms and shape them into balls. If you find that the balls are having cracks, mash them again for some more time. Cover with moist cloth and keep aside.

Take 4 cups or 1 litre of water in a pressure cooker. Add 1 ½ cups of jaggery to it. Bring it to boil.

Drop the chenna balls in boiling syrup. Cover with lid and weight.

Cook on medium heat for 10 minutes. Remove from heat. Let the pressure come down.

Transfer the rasgullas to another bowl with a cup of syrup.

Add one more cup of jaggery to rest of the syrup. Bring it to boil. Add cardomom powder (optional). Simmer for 15 minutes or until the syrup is thick and shiny. Pass the syrup through a sieve. Transfer back the rasgullas to the thick ochre coloured syrup.

 Let it sit into the syrup for minimum 6 hours before serving.

DINKACHE LADOO / GOND LADDU

This is a time saving and low cal recipe of Dinkache ladoo, as it is called in marathi.

As a child I would love to have these laddus which were strictly rationed by my grandmother. The big aluminium container used to be a priced possession of her until all laddus were consumed.

The process of making these winter special laddus used to be an elaborate process, right from purchasing the ingredients to sun drying the ingredients to the actual making.

Dinkache ladoo or gond ke laddu made from edible gum and dry fruits is prepared in different parts of India. The preparation varies from region to region. This particular recipe is a Maharashtrian style preparation.

Dinkache ladoo is had mostly during winters. They are full of energy and nutrients . They are consumed by new mothers for good health.

Traditionally, most of the ingredients are fried in ghee or clarified butter. My variation of this recipe requires one fourth amount of the ghee.

Also in olden days all the ingredients used to be sun dried for 2 to 3 days to get rid of any moisture.

Recipe for Dinkache ladoo

Ingredients for Dinkache laddo

• 100gms edible gum
• 2 cups dry coconut
• 1/3 cup almonds (badam)
• ½ cup cashews (kaju)
• ½ cup ker beeja
• 1 cup dried dates (khareek)
• 1 tbsp poppy seeds (khuskhus)
• ½ tsp carom seeds (ajwain)
• 250gms jaggery (gur)
• 100ml water
• 4 tbsp clarified butter (ghee)

How to make

In a microwave safe dish microwave edible gum or dink for 5 minutes (without ghee). Remove the popped gum pieces. If any of gum pieces have not popped, microwave again for 2 minutes.

Dry roast grated coconut until golden in colour.

Dry roast poppy seeds and caraway seeds for couple of minutes.

Now microwave almonds, cashews and ker beeja for 4 to 5 minutes until pink in colour. As I forgot to add ker beeja to the same dish, it took me extra 5 minutes to do that. Skip the ker beeja if not available.

Roast the dry dates in one tablespoon of ghee for 3 to 4 minutes on low heat. Cool it. Make a coarse powder in mixer.

Melt jaggery with water in a pan. Bring it to a boil. Boil until the syrup coats the spoon.

Mix all the dry ingredients in a big mixing bowl. Add 4 tablespoon of clarified butter or ghee to it.

Pour jaggery syrup in the mixture. Mix well. Let it cool for 5 minutes.

Take some mixture between your palms and press gently to shape them into irregular balls. This mixture will yield you 16 laddus.

Clean your hand with water and dry them. Now reshape the irregular balls into round laddus. This procedure has to be done while the mixture is still warm.

Dinkache ladoo can be stored for a month or more but they usually get consumed much before the given shelf life.