Arisi Thengai Payasam - Rice Coconut Payasam with Jaggery

I have settled down well in my new place. Navarathri was the first festival after our move. I kept three steps of Bommai. I got only the small bommais here. Navarathri, here is very quiet since we don't have people visiting golus here. We did the poojas and made payasam in the morning and chundal in the evening. I could not transfer the pics from my camera, since I broke the battery recharger. Yet to buy a new one. There are loads of pics to be transferred and shared with you all. Meanwhile, I have quite a lot of pictures in the drafts, to feed my blog. I thought I will share a recipe of sweet with you all. I have already posted a payasam with coconut and rice, where sugar is the sweetener. This version is similar with jaggery as sweetener. I liked the jaggery version better.

You need

• Raw rice- 2 tblspn
• Grated coconut- 1/2 cup
• Grated jaggery - 3/4 cup
• Boiled milk - 1 cup
• Cardamom powder - 11/4 tspn
• Water - 2 cup

 

 Method

 

Soak rice in water for an hour. Drain and grind rice coarsely . Add coconut and pulse to form a coarse paste. No need to add water.

 

 

Boil 2 cups of water. When it starts to boil, stir in the ground paste. Take care not to form lumps. Cook till the rice is well cooked. By the time the rice cooked, it would have got a thick porridge consistency. 

 

Meanwhile liquidize jaggery in 1/2 cup of water. Add the jaggery syrup to the cooked rice+coconut mixture. Cook till the flavor of jaggery is well absorbed. Add hot milk and switch off the heat. Stir for a minute or so for the mik to be well incorporated into the cooked mixture. Sprinkle cardamom.Serve warm or chilled as desired.

 

Note : Milk tends to curdle when boiled along with jaggery. That's why boiled milk is added at last and no further cooking is done after the addition of milk to avoid curdling.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Pista Burfi - Pistachio Fudge

PISTA BURFI

My sister - in- law gave me a recipe for Badam Burfi and she said that the same could be adapted in the preparation of Pista burfi, peanut burfi and mixed nuts burfi. I tried out Pista Burfi and it turned out quite good. While most of the sweets prepared during Deepavali ooze with ghee, this burfi is minus that 'sin '!
No flavouring or colouring agent is required as it is awesome in its natural colour and flavour.

INGREDIENTS

Pista - 1 cup
Sugar - 3/4 cup

METHOD

1. Blanch the pista, remove the peels and spread out the nuts on a cloth.
2. Keep aside a few bright green ones for topping.
3. Dry grind the remaining pistas into a coarse powder. If a smooth burfi is prefered grind it to a smooth powder.
4. Heat sugar with 3/4 cup of water in a thick bottomed pan.
5. Grease a plate with little ghee and keep aside.
6. When the sugar syrup reaches a one thread consistancy decrease flame and add the powdered pista and blend well.
7. Keep stirring till the mass leaves the sides of the pan. You can see and feel the sugar crystalising on the sides of the pan.
8. Switch off flame and imediately pour the pista sugar mixture on the greased plate.
9. Quickly sprinkle the whole pistas on top and cover the plate with a greased plastic sheet or an alluminium foil.
10. Flatten the burfi mass by running a rolling pin on top of the foil so that the whole pistas get embedded on the levelled burfis.
11. Since this will harden very fast remove foil and immediately cut out diamond shaped burfis using a sharp knife.
12. Leave it to cool thoroughly before storing in an air tight container.

Share the joy and the flavoursome, colourful Pista Burfis with your near and dear ones on a Happy Deepavali day.

Sweet Tooty-Fruity-Nutty Rice Dessert

Arborio rice is Italian short-grain rice. It is named after the town of Arborio in the Po Valley, where it is grown. Cooked, the rounded grains are firm, creamy, and chewy, due to higher amylopectin starch content of this rice variety, thus they have a starchy taste of their own yet blend well with other flavors.

I wanted to try this rice dessert for satisfying my sweet tooth and rice cravings, but as I didn’t want to make the usual rice pudding/kheer. I made this dessert with my touch of creativity using different ingredients all throughout this recipe.

Ingredients:
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1 cup Arborio Rice

1 tbsp Butter (unsalted)

3 cups Water

¾ cup Sugar

¼ tsp Cardamom powder

2 tbsp Heavy Whipping cream

1 pinch of Saffron

¼ cup Semi Sweet Chocolate chips

For nut and fruit filling:

1 tbsp golden Raisins

1 tbsp chopped dates

1 tbsp sliced Almonds

1 tbsp chopped Walnuts

1 tbsp chopped Cashew nuts

2 tbsp fancy fruit cake mix

2 tbsp sweetened Condensed Milk

Method:
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Making Sweet Rice:
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1. In a sauté pan on medium heat add the butter and rice and sauté it for about 3 mins until the rice is bit 2. crispy or you can feel the rice is hot when you touch it.

3. Now pour the water and bring it to a boil keeping the flame to high.

4. After one boil, reduce the fame to low and cook it for about 10 mins or until the rice is cooked 3/4th.

5. Mix the saffron in 1tbsp of whipping cream to get a soft yellow color.

6. Add sugar, and whipping cream and mix well. Increase the flame to medium high and cook it until done or 5 mins more until it gets thick and there should be no water left.

7. Make sure that the rice is cooked through.

8. Split half of this rice to a separate bowl.

9. In another bowl add the chocolate chips with 1 tbsp of whipping cream and microwave it for about 30-60 secs or until the chocolate melts completely.

10. Now mix the second half cooked rice to the melted chocolates.

Fruit and nut filling:

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11. Mix all the ingredients and keep it aside in a bowl

Assembling:

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12. Of Sweet rice, Chocolate rice and Fruit filling.

13. You can assemble this two types of rice and fruit filling as you like, but I have shown two types of presentations.

14. You can choose any one of my presentations or you can get creative to make your own presentation.