Colorful Holi

Gujiya - Indian Sweet

When you think of gujiya your think of HOLI (the colorful festival of India) or vice versa. I have fond memories helping my mom in the kitchen making gujiya and storing them in huge containers more for our consumption than distribution Ahh…those were the days!

With the festival of holi 2 days away, I requested my mom to share her recipe with me for this blog. Here it is…

For Dough

Ghee (clarified butter) – 2 Tbsp

All purpose flour (maida) – 150 gms

For Stuffing

Fried & Powdered semolins (rawa/suji) – 125 gms

Khoya (Dried thickened milk) – 125 gms (if you get to buy ready made Khoya; in a non stick pan heat 1 litre of milk on slow heat with constant stirring till it gets thickened)

Khus-Khus  (KusKus / Poppy seeds) – 1/2 – 3/4 tsp

Combination of nuts and powdered sugar – 125 gms (nuts: almonds, cashew nuts, raisin, pinch of nutmeg powder, cashew nut powder)

1. Combine maida and ghee and add little cold water and knead. The dough should be a little hard. Cover it with a piece of wet cloth and keep aside for 2-3 hours.
2. Combine all ingredients for stuffing and keep aside.
3. Knead the dough again and make small balls.
4. Roll out small rounds like we do for pooris and place it in the gujiya mould. Fill in the stuffing on one side and close the mould hard. What you will see is a semi circle filled in with filled stuffing and ready for frying.
5. If you do not have a mould. Follow the the process of rolling out a circle, filling the stuffing on one side and covering with the other half. Only in this case with your fingers gently apply mixture of water and maida on the inner side and then press it hard so that it stick together well.
6. Please note that the semi circle should be firm with no gaps else while you fry, it will tend to break open and all your lovely stuffing would be in the oil.
7. Take enough oil for frying and heat on high flame.
8. Immerse the prepared gujiyas into the hot oil and lower the flame immediately. This is to ensure that the cooking happens on both outer and inner sides of the gujiya.
9. When nice and brown take it out and place it on an absorbent paper.
10. Store in airtight containers.

* few people also like a coating of sugar syrup over their gujiya. All you need to do is to dip the fried gujiyas in sugar syrups for few seconds and decorating with silver foil and nuts before storing them. However, I love it just the way it is ..freshly fried and just about warm 

Here’s wishing all my readers a very happy holi!

Meet Jayalakshmi.. an excellent cook and an equally efficient homemaker

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image : Priya Q

Indians love their halwas, be it be carrot halwa, kesari / suji halwa or aate ka halwa (made from wholewheat flour). This one just melts in your mouth as your devour it. The best one I have ever had is at the Gurudwara (religious place for the Sikhs) where aate ka halwa is distributed to the devotees as khada prasad. No matter how many time I tried, I must admit I never even was close to the one we get at Gurudwaras! But, it is still doable…so do try it out

Whole wheat flour – 1 cup

Sugar – 1.5 to 2 cups (as sweet as you want!..i generally take 1.5 cups)

Water – 2 cups

Clarified butter / ghee – 1 tbsp

1. Heat ghee in a thick bottomed vessel and add the flour
2. Boil water alongwith sugar
3. Fry at low heat till the flour starts turning slight brown and you can smell its aroma
4. Carefully add the boiled water to above and stir. Please be careful of your hand since the flour starts jumping up!
5. Keep stirring till the cooked halwa leaves the sides of the vessel and almost become one mass. Keep adding teaspoons of ghee if required in between the stirring
6. Serve hot!

Till next time….happy cooking!