Badam burfi and Moong dhal ladoo

Hope everyone had a wonderful Diwali. Thanks for the wishes!
Back home, I remember, Diwali sweets re planned well 2 months before. Oh yeah, one of the much waited festival of the year for us, we book in advance a sweet master (sweet wala). The list will contain at least 2 different sweets and snacks. They just come and make a huge batch in front of us 2 days before the festival. It is always fun to see how those people prepare 200 counts or more sweets in matter of minutes. Ah, those days, we are just allowed to taste only one from those big batches until Deepavali.
Now, I can make those sweets and snacks and didn’t get the same interest to eat :)
Next biggest thing for Deepavali is Firecrackers. It just scares me :( I hate that blasting sounds. So I didn’t miss those horrible war zone sounds here…
I share my sweets with my neighbor and friends, wear a new dress and celebrate in quiet manner here. Just to show my son and he should understand our tradition/culture. Well he is pretty much interested for the Trick Or Treat night!

Ok, coming to the badam recipe/almond fudge, other than stirring, stirring, stirring no other special skills are required!
The recipe, I learnt with my Dear Friend Hema. She was reputed to make some good Burfi in our group. If you fail to have a burfi consistency, you get a Badam halwa or if you succeed, you get the final result as Burfi!

Badam Burfi

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Ingredients:

Almond/Badam: 1 cup
Sugar: 1 cup But I used 3/4 C as we like mild sweet taste.
Ghee: 2 tbsp + 1/2 tsp to smear the cookie sheet
Milk: 1/4 cup or less.

Method
Soaking the badam/Almond: Take a microwave bowl, add enough water to cover the almonds.
Microwave on high for one or two min (Until the water turns hot -Not Boiling point)- let the badam soak for 20 min. It is more easy to peel or even more easy to grind. Peel the skin and rinse the badam/almond once again.
Now grind the almond adding as little milk as possible. The less milk you use, the less time it takes to cook. You can make it a fine paste, but I love little grainy my burfi !
Take a heavy bottom pan, preferably non-stick.Put the 2 tbsp ghee, once it starts to melt add the ground almond and sugar.
Now, keep stirring, stirring without rest! Until the mixture turns like dough! The mixture will start leaving the side.
Grease a cookie sheet with little ghee. Drop the mixture and spread the mixture , take a rolling pin roll slightly to get a smooth surface or icing knife to smooth it.
Let it cool completely. Make a desire shape , or diamond shape with greased knife.

Note: The burfi has little amount of ghee, so it tend to stick a lot at the end point. Try to be patience if not add more butter or ghee!

The burfi can be kept outside for a week without refrigeration.

The slide show might give an idea what is the burfi stage!

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Moong dhal Ladoo or Payitham parru urrunde

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Ingredients:

Moong dhal (dehusked): 1 cup or store bought Moong dhal flour!
Sugar: 1 cup but I used 3/4 (milder version)
Green Cardamom: 6 (remove the seed from the pod)
Cashew: 10 numbers broken into small pieces
Ghee: 1/4 cup + 2 tsp more for frying cashew and dhal


Method:
Add a teaspoon of ghee and roast the green gram dhal. Let it cool and grind into powder. Sieve to get a fine powder.
Grind the sugar and cardamom.
Fry the cashew with 1 tsp of ghee until golden brown.
Mix the green gram flour, sugar, carda and cashew together.
Heat the 1/4 cup of ghee , add one tbsp at the time in the mixture and make a ladoo. DO NOT POUR AT ONCE.
It could take less or more ghee... Try to make dry the ladoo- Less calories, if you add lots of ghee, it will be soft but take time to hard .

Yield: 8 medium size ladoos

Note: I used the store bought Moong dhal flour, fry for few minutes with little ghee and proceed the same way. It was much quicker and easier.

Sending this Deepavali post to Srivalli who is hosting JFI- Festival Treats. An event created by Mahanandi

The sweet treats are reaching Festive Food: Diwali celebration By Priti.