Wednesday, January 13, 2016

Posted by Mala at 1:00:00 AM 1 comment
Tomorrow is Bhogi Festival.  Giving away the old things is customary in Bhogi, but we can never give up the old,  traditional cooking, the authentic family recipes, which were prepared  by all elders at home.
Bhogi is also the first  festival, which heralds the Pongal Festival.  At dawn, a bonfire is lit and all the discarded items are put in there (which ofcourse causes lot of pollution), and with Pongal, we all get ready to welcome new things in our lives.
 Actually what every individual should do is, to burn off all hatred, enmity and bitter feelings towards others, and bring in more and more love and peace. Probably, this is what our elders  actually meant, when they said, old things should be discarded.
This is a traditional, rich sweet / dessert, which, nowadays is not made in many households at all. The soft poli, just melts in your mouth, gets washed down by the rich, creamy milk , and is a real real delicacy. The creamy milk, made richer by the ground almonds, gives immense pleasure while eating this great dessert! Serve it chilled.....then you won't put a full stop to your eating!


Ingredients

For the dough
Maida /Refined flour - 1/2 cup
Sooji / Semolina - 1 tsp
Ghee - 1 tsp

For the milk
Milk - 4 cups
Saffron - few strands
Cardamom powder - 1/2 tsp
Sugar - 1/3 cup
Almonds - 8-9, soaked in water for 2 hours

Enough oil to fry the polis

Recipe Cuisine: South Indian; Category: Dessert
Prep time: 10 mts; Cooking time: 30 mts for the milk to condense; 10 mts for frying the polis

Yields 7 polis

Saffron strands soaked in 2-3 tsps milk, and almonds soaked in hot water


Maida, sooji and ghee


Kneaded into a firm dough and allowed to rest for 2 hours.


Small balls made


Skin removed from the soaked almonds and ground to a fine paste adding 2 tsps milk


Milk set for boiling


Saffron and cardamom powder added, kept on low flames and allowed to simmer


Condensing nicely


In the meantime, roll out thin rounds......


fold them into half


and keep them aside.


Now ...back to the milk again.....add the ground almond paste, and let it simmer for 5 minutes



      Add the measured sugar, allow to simmer for 5-7 minutes, and switch off. 

Heat cooking oil in a pan, when it becomes hot, gently drop the half folded rounds one by one...


dip it nicely into oil


take out, and straight away, drop into the hot milk.


Immerse it into the milk nicely.


Wait for 2 minutes, then gently take it out...and


line them up separately on a plate. Don't pile them on top of each other. They tend to get stuck.


And pour the remaining milk on top. Allow to cool down, then shove the vessel into refrigerator, serve after 2 hours, when they are perfectly chilled!



This post first appeared in www.malpatskitchen.com

Notes
*My mom used to make Paal polis just with sooji, and mother-in-law used to make, just with maida. I have combined both. Adding little bit sooji gives a nice texture to the polis, otherwise, they tend to sag a lot while getting soaked in the milk.
*You can fry the polis the previous day and store in air tight container too.
*Before dropping them into the hot milk, microwave them for just 10 seconds, they become soft, and take in milk easily.











1 comments:

  1. Who won,t lke this delicacy ,which is meant to slither down your throat after lapping up the essence of the softly folded crepe drenched in kesar laced frothy thickened RABDI? Wow! Just love it!

    ReplyDelete

Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.