Neelam Ji ke Besan ke Laddoo and the Giveaway winner.

Sometime back i finally did my 100th post, where i announced a giveaway in all excitement. I was thrilled to have over 45 entries for the giveaway and morever everybody was more excited about the personalized hamper than the Nigella book, woah.. for once i was more popular than Nigella, so what it was on my blog alone :D. I took a while to declare the winner but am glad iam doing that now. And the winner of the giveaway is Charis Alfred Bhagianathan of Culinary Storm. Looking forward to sending you the stuff lady. And a hearty thanks to all the others who played along!


The reason why i couldn't announce the results any sooner, was i had guests at home. Very special guests. I had my best fren Prachi's parents halting at our place for 2 days in between their packed south trip. If some of you remember, Neelam ji  from the kaddu ki sabzi post, yes its the same Neelam ji... she is the same, full of energy, just a little extra white hairs here and there still calls me billi(naughty kid in local lingo), and even better sense of humor. 2 days of non stop laughter with her around was awesome. I had just come back from a cousins wedding, a typical big fat tam brahm wedding in trichy and then a reception in Hyd. We were dead tired but this was long due trip to be made by them and we thoroughly enjoyed it.

As usual aunty in all the time she had, wanted to prepare and feel me as many things as possible. My only condition / requirement from her was to bring me Jawe (a semiya like handmade thing generally found in UP areas) and some ajwain, have never found ajwain as fragrant as from their place. And had asked her to teach me, how to make besan ke laddoo. I have never had laddoos better than the ones she had once made us have when she stayed with us for 10 days in our college times. Since then i have never liked any other besan laddoos. And thanks to aunty both this and a lot more were fulfilled by her. I got my jawe, she even made some for me. We even made besan ke laddoo, and she also made papdi chat and dahi saunth ke wade (urad and moong daal wale dahi bhalle in short). It was a roll, she just didn't stop, and we had an awesome time.

I had to had to make a note of her besan laddoo recipe, i wish i had detailed pics here, but its one strenuous task to make these laddoos, maybe next time.

Neelam Ji ke Besan ke laddoo 

Ingredients

500 gms besan / gramflour

3 tbsp sooji / rava / semolina

1/2 tsp cardamom powder

250 gms finely powdered sugar

250 gms ghee / clarified butter 

2 tbsp finely chopped pista 

1 silver sheet / vark

Method

1. Heat a kadhai / wok a little before it starts fuming, switch off the heat, wait for a minute and add the gramflour and semolina to the kadhai. Switch on the heat to medium high and keep stirring for 4-5 minutes. 

2. You will see the besan getting lighter in the next 3-4 minutes, now add 4-5 tbsps of ghee to the flour mixture. Also add the cardomom powder. Keep stirring continuously till the ghee disappears. Keep stirring for 10 minutes, use two spatulas, so that the flour doesnt spill out, and also doesn't stick to the bottom. 

3. Slowly you will observe the color changing, a little darker, which is when you can add a little 10-15 more tbsps of ghee to the mixture, it will get thicker, and difficult to stir, but you have to keep doing so. 

4. In another 5-10 minutes, depending on your kadhai and heat, there will be a point when the mixture will release a distinctive fragrance of besan and ghee together, it indicates that the mixture is almost cooked. 

5. Keep stirring at this stage, using the 2 stapulas and maknig sure it doesnt burn at the bottom. At a ponit it will again release the same fragrance, a distinctive one once again. At this stage add the rest of the ghee to the mixture.

6. The mixture will suddenly become very thin, but dont worry, keep stirring it over the heat for another 15-20 minutes. At this stage the mixture will start releasing the ghee and will become all shiny. 

7. Switch off the heat and let the mixture rest until its completely cooled down. 

8. Now add the sugar 1/4th at a time and mix thoroughly, the sugar requirement will differ from person to person, so check after each addition if you would like to stop and the sweetness is appropriate to your taste. 

9. You may add the pista when adding the sugar, some like it without any dry fruits. 

10. Once you are satisfied with the mixture, take a leveled tbsp of the mixture and make perfect rounds using your palms. 

11. Garnish with some silver sheets and pistachios. 

12. Can be stored upto 2 weeks in air tight containers, and they will stay fresh. This will make up to 50 laddoos / 1 kg of the laddoos. 

Aunty also made some awesome papdi chaat and dahi saunth ke pakode. It was all so awesome. Will make a post on them some other time. 

A very congratulations again Charis. Will send you the goodies soon. And a hearty thanks to all the others who played along!