Kobri Mithayee or Tenga Burfi - Coconut Sweet

Kobri Mithayee or Tenga Burfi - Coconut Sweet

This name brings back memories of the numerous “potti kadais” (“Box shops” when literally translated, to denote their tiny size!), selling betel leaves, scented nuts, ‘goli’ sodas, tobacco, snuff, beedies and cigarettes, which dotted every corner of our ancient city not so long ago. Ripe Nanjangood Rasa Bales - a special sweet variety of bananas, were hung in bunches from the ceiling of the ‘shops’. These shops were mere wooden boxes which sat conveniently on any and every corner of the compound walls which ran along the busy city streets. A garland of newspapers and magazines were strung across the 10’ x 10’ ‘shop’. The ‘bennae’ biscuits ( butter biscuits), ‘karada kadale’ (spiced up ground nuts), kodu balae (a crispy savory dough ring), lemon peppermints, the mint candies with zebra stripes , the mini sized ‘kadlekai undaes’ (a sweet made of ground nuts and jaggery ), and the ever adorable kobri mithayees were all lined up in shiny glass jars in the front row of the shop attracting school children who passed by.

Kobri mithayee has been the favourite among school children through many generations. The school where my children studied had a ‘tuck shop’ where they sold goodies to the children during tea breaks. My children often pestered me for two rupees before going to school, just to buy their favourite ‘tuck’. I wondered what this 'tuck' was all about until finally I found out that it was nothing but our old kobri mithayee in a new caramelized form.

Mother prepared the best of kobri mithayees , which looked like snow white crystals ,soft and chewy at the same time .We hung around while the sweet was being prepared enjoying the aroma to our heart’s content. The moment they were cut, the hot sweet squares melted into our eager mouths and disappeared without a trace. Somehow, I never got the same texture when I tried to prepare kobri mithayee. A friend of mine gave me a fool proof method to prepare this sweet. Though it can never match mother’s preparation,I think I have managed to get a satisfactory mithayee.

INGREDIENTS:

Requirements are 1 coconut, 1 tumbler milk and 2 tumblers of sugar. When I measured the gratings of one moderate sized coconut it measured up to 1 .5 tumblers. The measures are given accordingly below.

Fresh grated coconut - 1 and 1/2 portions
Sugar – 2 portions
Milk – 1 portion

METHOD:
1. Mix all the ingredients in a thick vessel and place it on flame.
2. Keep stirring till the sugar starts to melt.
3. Decrease flame to low, and go about your other chores.
4. Stir the liquid mass now and then.
5. When the whole mass thickens, it will gather into a big ball while stirring.
6. Pour this into a greased plate and flatten with a spatula.
7. When it cools and solidifies cut it into squares with a sharp knife
Store in a dry air tight jar, if anything is remaining after relishing your kobri mithayee!

Maladoo made healthy with jaggery

Kesari and maladoo were regulars in my kitchen. In my attempt to cut down on the calories, I have shifted to making sweets which uses jaggery for sweetener instead of white sugar. Jaggery based sweets will need very little or no ghee. And you get a healthy and tasty sweet. I chanced upon Anisheetu's recipe similar to maladoo and jaggery in the ingredient list caught my attention. I made a mental note of the ingredients and the method. Here is the recipe which I followed.

Ingredients
Pottukadali/pori kadala/roasted gram dal - 1 cup
Grated jaggery - 3/4 cup
Grated coconut - 2 tblsn
Ghee - 2 tblspn
Powdered cardamom - 1/2 tspn
Cashew/Raisins - few (optional)




Method
Lightly roast the pottukadalai. Powder it finely. Roast coconut till light brown. Alternatively you can MW the grated coconut for 1 minute or so.

Heat ghee in a pan, Roast cashews and raisins. Add powdered jaggery and melt it. No need to add water. Since the jaggery is grated, it melts easily in the ghee. When it starts bubbling, stir in powdered gram dal, roasted coconut and cardamom powder. Remove from fire. Mix well and make balls when warm. It tasted good and fits the bill for a low calorie, tasty sweet.



Time taken - 15 minutes
Yields - 14 medium sized ladoos.







I am sending this to Srivalli's Mithai Mela and Mahima's Under 15 minutes Cooking

Free Stainless Sinks May Not Be So Free

The quote below is an excerpt from a Kitchen & Bath Industry group discussion on LinkedIn.

I emailed the author, Steven Conneen, to ask his permission to quote him here (Thanks Steven).

Apparently, just as in times past when consumers are in a money-conserving mood, the market is being flooded with cheap products to meet demand - in this case poor quality stainless steel sinks.

Think twice about installing a no-brand stainless steel sink UNDER a granite, quartz or solid-surface countertop. The cost of removing it when it rusts or discolors will be FAR MORE than any savings you enjoy today. In fact, it may be impossible to remove it without destroying your beautiful tile backsplash.

Those of you that have grown up experiencing only high quality stainless sinks don't know how bad they can get.

Sinks that are to be undermounted should be ONLY high quality, "lifetime sinks", such as Elkay, Franke, etc. Corian, quartz and Siligranite sinks also can be termed "lifetime sinks".

In fact, you should question ANY free product offered as an enticement to get you to buy, unless the offer is from a manufacturer of the products (ie. Free Elkay Faucet with the purchase of an Elkay Sink, or Free GE Hood with the purchase of a GE range and dishwasher).

Peggy

As a manager of a high end plumbing showroom in the Northeast we have gone to great lengths to educate our plumbing/ contractor and retail customers and that's the key. It takes some work but you have to hit it from all angles. We work hard to educate the architects, designers, builders or anyone involved in the spec about quality and the opportunity to make more money.

It seems like such a waste to spend thousands of $ on beautiful stone counter tops to cheap out on the sink and faucet.

One of our biggest obstacles right now is actually with the granite companies. There has been huge influx of import (sub-quality) stainless steel sinks from Asia which these companies can buy for a fraction of the cost of the Elkay, Franke or KWC sinks. They'll even throw it in at no charge to hook the consumer on the granite purchase.

What the consumer doesn't realize is that these Asian sinks are not true 304 grade Stainless steel sinks with an 18/10 chromium/nickel content. Fortunately we've had some customers come in looking to replace their Asian sink because it is starting to show rust.

I now encourage all of my customers to bring refrigerator magnets with them to the counter places to test the chromium/nickel content in the sinks. The lower the content the higher the concentration of ferrous iron which will cause the magnet to stick to the sink.