Thandai & Paneer Malpua With Instant Rabdi

Holi, a festival of Colors, love, joy, happiness and let's not forget to mention, festival for foodies especially those who have sweet tooth....grin emoticon grin emoticon
Every year at ours place we have a large family gatherings and bunch of friends but phew...this time we have no such huge gatherings..frown emoticon. No gatherings doesn't mean no sweets, it has to be made as no festival is complete without sweets....so thought to try Malpua with Rabdi, and it was dear Hubby's request. 
Malpuas are sweet pancakes that is made with whole wheat flour or with all purpose flour, its fried and later soaked in sugar syrup. Whereas Rabdi is made from milk, and it takes quiet a lot time to get its correct consistency, it needs to cook on low flame until milk turns thick and creamy...but i don't have that patience (may be next time), so have tried Instant one and believe me this too tastes equally yum..and was finished in a day...:D
Well there is no such compulsion of serving Malpuas with Rabdi. Malpuas can be served as it is with a drizzle of rose flavored sugar syrup and chopped nuts. Rabdi with Puas combo is much famous in North India and my family too loves the same way....!! So lets begin..!

Happy Holi to all and stay safe..:)

Ingredients:

For Malpua:

1 Cup Maida / All purpose flour
1 1/2 Cup Milk
50 Gms of finely crumbled Paneer (Cottage Cheese)
4-5 Tbsp Powdered Sugar
1/2 Tsp Cardamom Powder
1/4 Tsp Nutmeg Powder
1 Tsp Fennel Powder
2 Tbsp Thandai Mix powder (Optional, it enhances the flavor but if not available can skip this)
Pinch of Baking Soda
4-5 Strands of Saffron (Kesar)
Pinch of Salt

For Sugar Syrup:
1 Cup Sugar
1/2 Cup Water
2-3 Whole Cardamom for flavor
1 1/2 Tsp Pure Rose water

For Instant Rabdi:

Instant  Rabdi

2 cups Milk
1/4 cup Sweetened Condensed Milk
4-5 Tbsp of Sugar / (Or to taste, already we are using Sweetened Condensed milk, would be better to add to your taste)
150 Gms crumbled Paneer (Cottage Cheese)
Bread Crumbs of 4 Bread slices (Can use food processor)
4-5 Strands Of Saffron (Kesar)
1/2 Tsp Cardamom Powder
1 1/2 Tsp Pure Rose water (If using Rose Essence, 1/2 tsp)


For Garnishing Malpua & Rabdi:
10-12  Roughly sliced Pistachios
10-12 Roughly sliced Almonds


Method:

For Malpua:

• In a pan, boil milk and simmer until it comes to 1 1/2 cup qty. Allow it to cool to luke warm temperature.
• In a bowl, Add Maida / All purpose flour, Finely powdered sugar, Cardamom powder, Nutmeg powder, Thandai mix powder (optional), Rose water and Salt.
• Now slowly and little at time, pour milk in to it and whisk it into a smooth batter. 
• Grate Paneer / Cottage Cheese finely and add the same in to the batter. 
• Whisk well thoroughly, making sure the batter should be lump free and similar to the cake batter consistency...( should be bit runny)
• In another pan, heat ghee (clarified butter) on medium-low flame for about 4-5 minutes. 
• Meanwhile prepare sugar syrup.
• Once the ghee is heated, with the help of a ladle, pour the batter in to the middle of the pan in the heated ghee. No need to spread the batter, it will spread on its own.
• Allow it to fry on medium-low flame.
• Once the sides turns little brown, flip to the other side and again fry until both the sides turn light to dark brown.
• Once done bring out and immediately soak it into the sugar syrup for 5 minutes. 
• Follow the same procedure with remaining batter.
• Take out the Malpua from the syrup and layer in a plate.
• Garnish it with sliced pistachios and almonds. 

For Sugar Syrup:

• In a pan on a medium-high flame, Add sugar and water and cook until sugar dissolves.
• Turn the flame to high and bring it to boil.
• Turn of the flame, and add whole cardamom (slightly cracked) and rose water.
• Mix and keep it aside.

For Instant Rabdi:

• In a Pan, at the high flame, bring milk to boil. Turn the flame to low and add condensed milk, sugar and saffron. (Mix saffron strands in tbsp of milk and allow it to stand for about 15-20 minutes to get nice yellow color)
• Keep stirring and bring it to boil.
• Turn off the flame and add, crumbled Paneer (Cottage Cheese), Bread crumbs, cardamom powder and rose water.
• Mix well and allow to cool.
• Garnish it with sliced Pistachios and Almonds.
• Can serve luke warm or chilled, both tastes yumm..! 

Serving:

Just before serving, add a dollop of rabdi over malpua and garnish it with a little of a sugar syrup and chopped nuts.

Malpuas remains good for a week if refrigerated, and before serving microwave it for 30-40 seconds and you are ready to relish it..Enjoy

Coffee Custard Filled Buns

Since long i was planning to bake buns but always end up making loafs..But this time it was only buns in mind. Few time back my dear friend Priyanka Chakraborty, posted Custard filled buns on Facebook food forum group that i follow. I bookmarked her recipe link. And yesterday was a day when i was checking all those bookmarked links and came across her recipe. I quickly made up my mind and experimented it with small batch.
Her recipe has vanilla custard filling inside, but i wanted to bake something with coffee flavor so i added instant coffee powder and cocoa powder to the vanilla custard and filled the bun with it..

Check my coffee Custard Filled buns recipe below:

 Here is her Blog page with all wonderful goodies..Following her blog is truly inspirational..
Source: My Experiments with Food-Lusciously Soft and Creamy Custard Buns

Ingredients:

For Coffee Custard Filling
3 tbsp custard powder
500 ml milk
7 1/2 tbsp sugar
2 tbsp fresh cream
11/4 tsp instant coffee powder
2 tsp cocoa powder

For Buns
2 cups Maida / All purpose flour
1/4 cup powdered sugar
1 tsp Instant Dry yeast
1 beaten egg
100 ml warm milk and some extra for brushing buns
Olive oil / Butter for greasing bun dough
3 tbsp melted butter
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp sugar (For activating yeast)

Recipe:

For Coffee Custard Filling

Dissolve Custard powder, Instant coffee powder and cocoa powder in 2 tbsp milk and keep aside.
In a pan Pour milk, add sugar and cream and bring to boil. Turn the flame to medium and add the dissolved coffee custard mixture in a pan. Keep stirring until mixture thickens and very much similar to the cake batter consistency. Allow the mixture again to come to boil while you keep stirring and turn the flame off. Pour the filling in bowl and allow it cool completely. Later place the bowl in a refrigerator for 1-2 hours or until custard sets.
Meanwhile be ready with your bun dough..

For Bun Dough

• In a large bowl, Mix sifted Maida or all purpose flour with powdered sugar, melted butter, salt and mix all.
• Dissolve Instant dry yeast in warm milk with a tsp of sugar. Let the yeast mixture stand for 10-15 minutes until frothy.
• Now in a flour mixture bowl, make well in between and add beaten egg and mix.
• Add frothy yeast mixture in flour mixture and start gathering all to form a dough. Knead dough for 4-5 minutes until smooth, elastic and non sticky.
• Grease the dough in a bowl with butter or oil and cover the bowl with plastic cling film or tea towel and allow the dough to proof for 1-1/2 hour or until doubles in volume.
• Once the dough doubles in volume, punch back down and knead again for a minute. Prepare a baking sheet. 
• Divide dough in to 11-12 lemon size balls. 
• Take a lemon size dough ball, make indentation in between and spoon a tsp of set coffee custard filling in to it.
• Carefully fold the edges of the dough ball up and around the filling. You can't get any of the filling on the edges or it simply won't seal. Pinch all of the edges together and seal as well as possible (although be careful the coffee custard filling should not be too thin else it will be difficult to fill in dough balls, it should set in refrigerator before use). Same way fill all the dough balls with custard.
• Place the filled and sealed buns on lined baking sheet and let rest with a tea towel covered for another 30-35 minutes or until nearly doubled in size.
• Brush all the rised dough balls with milk and bake for 15 minutes in preheated oven at 180 degree Celsius.
• Once baked, bring the buns out and transfer on wire rack. Allow it to cool completely and here you are ready to enjoy your relish with cuppa of coffee or tea..:)

Note:  I have microwave convection and have baked it on convection mode for 15 minutes in preheated temperature at 180 degree Celsius, and later grilled it for 2 minutes to get nice golden crust on top (Use rack for baking)
If using Proper Electric oven, bake the buns on toast mode for 10-12 minutes in preheated oven at 180 degree Celsius or until crust is golden.



Yields: 10-12 Buns with this measurement.

Baked Aam Doi / Bhapa Aam Doi (Sweetned Mango Curd)

A very easy and a one pot quick dessert where there is no chance to go wrong..Its a No fuss, No mess, No hard work, No load, but yes, A healthy and a quick dessert..A baked Mishti Doi, a well known Bengali dessert which is made with curd. You can make a flavored Doi as i did. To bid adieu to mangoes of season, tried my hands with one more mango dessert which is super yummy and was easy too...Have a look below for the recipe....

 Ingredients:

1 can Condensed Milk

1/2 cup room temperature Milk  (Full fat or low fat, up to you)

1 cup Full Fat Curd / Yogurt Strained (Basically a hung curd or Greek yogurt, which is more creamier)

2 ripe mangoes

and some sliced Pistachios for Garnishing... 

Recipe:

• Strain the Curd in a Muslin cloth tied over tap for 30 minutes. Let the water part strained out of it.
• Meanwhile Wash, peel and roughly cut the ripe mangoes.
• Now Empty Condensed milk can, Milk, Full Fat Strained Yogurt and roughly cut mangoes in a mixer jar.
• Blend all until smooth and pour the mixture in to a baking Mould. 
• Preheat Oven at 140 degree Celsius.
• Bake the Mixture for 25-30 minutes in Preheated oven.
• Once done, bring the set curd out from oven and allow it to cool. 
• Garnish it with sliced Pistachios.
• Refrigerate for 2-3 hours and here you are ready to serve, A Chilled Aam Doi.

Wasn't it easy and quick? Do try today and you too will fall in love with it....

HomeMade Oats Ice-Cream (Eggless)

With left over rolled oats packet i made this. I was wondering to make muffins, later i thought no muffins, will make cake, will make cookies, will make bread loaf....so on and many thoughts came one by one. But do not wanted to bake this time. So thought for some chilled dessert out of it, and  ice cream with it was the best thought i guess. Heard very little? An oats ice cream? But believe me it was good,,, very creamy, thick and soft in texture. And with oats, it is healthy as always....:)

Mostly kids love ice creams but don't like oats and every mother wants their kid to eat oats, why not to give in form of ice creams than...fun for them and happy mommies.....
This can be garnished in different ways. Below i have shared some garnishing ideas, do have a look to it as well.......

This Ice cream can be made with different flavors using mango pulp, chocolate, strawberry or any other flavour..

Ingredients:
1 1/2 cup finely powdered rolled oats (Use mixer grinder)

2 cups low fat milk
1 cup water
1 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 cup powdered sugar
3 tbsp Raisins/sultanas
3 tbsp sliced Pistachios
3 tbsp sliced roasted almonds
4 tbsp Dark choco chips (can use semi sweet also)

Recipe:

• In a large bowl, Mix (Cold or room temperature) milk, powdered sugar and water. 
• Meanwhile in mixer grinder jar, grind rolled oats into very thin fine powder. (you'll see some oat chunks, so sieve it and use or can still use as it is)
• Add this grind oats slowly in milk mixture (Keep mixing continuously or else it will start forming lumps, you can even use hand blender to break lumps if any).
• Mixture should be, smooth and lump free. Now mix vanilla extract, Raisins/sultanas, sliced pistachios roasted sliced almonds and dark choco chips to it. Pour this mixture in freezer safe container cover and allowed it to freeze overnight without disturbing. After 2-3 hrs scrap in between (do this twice).
• Scoop and serve..

Garnishing Ideas:
1) Garnish it with toasted muesli and Dust cinnamon powder
2) Garnish it with with sliced pistachios, sliced almonds and with choco chips..
3) Or simply drizzle strawberry or chocolate syrup by adding dried fruits and choco chips...
4) Or scoop ice cream between two chocolate biscuits or any flavor of biscuits that you like and sandwich it. Serve the same with berries that you are have at home..

Note: For a perfect soft scoop add 1 tbsp of vodka to your ice cream mixture and Beat  for about a 2-3 minute. Than freeze your ice cream. This gives nice soft texture to ice cream and not the firm one. (But its optional and totally up to your choice)

Too much of alcohol in ice cream will not allow it to freeze so make sure you use little qty of it.

Luscious Jamun Frozen Yogurt (Java Plum)

Since childhood i am very much fond of yogurt and fruits. I remember, i always use to mix all available fruits at my place and mix in curd with little sugar and enjoy. Since than i have came across to flavored yogurts and than frozen yogurt. Take any favorite fruit of your choice and you can make frozen yogurt out of it. I initially thought to make it with mangoes but later when i checked it was not in a sufficient qty, but in one corner of my kitchen i saw jamun (Java Plum) in large qty, i jumped with joy and quickly pulled out and made this.
Check its recipe below. Lets beat this scorching heat with icey, creamy and luscious frozen yogurt.

Ingredients:
500 gms Jamun (Java Plum)
450 ml thick & creamy full fat yogurt
1/2 cup Honey (Can use powdered sugar, i used honey)
2 tsp fresh lime juice

Recipe:

• Wash Jamun (java plum)
• Remove its seeds (My jamuns were riped and so it was easy for me to pull out its seeds, if its not same with you than use knife)
• In mixer jar beat thick and creamy curd until slightly fluffy. Now add seedless jamuns, fresh lime juice and honey. Beat until smooth.
• Pour in a Freezer safe container. Cover it with plastic cling film. 
• After 1-2 hr bring out and scrap for a minute.(Do this twice).
• And than after freeze it thoroughly in freezer. (Mine was ready to serve in 5 hrs)
• Scoop and enjoy luscious Jamun frozen yogurt. :)