Halwai August 3, 2023

Ingredients:

• 2 cups – Rice flour
• 2.5 cups – water
• A pinch of salt
• For the filling:
• 1 cup – grated fresh Coconut
• 1 cup – Jaggery
• 2 tbsp – Raisins
• 2 tbsp – cashew nuts, chopped
• 1 tsp – cardamom, ground

Method:

  1. Preparation of the filling:
  2. Put 1 tbsp of ghee in a kadai and heat it. Fry the chopped cashewnut till it becomes golden brown. Drain and keep aside.
  3. Put the kadai on the gas stove again and put the grated coconut and jaggery into it.
  4. Mix well till the coconut becomes soft and till the jaggery melts, blend with the coconut.
  5. When the mixture is well cooked and becomes quite dry, take the kadai off the heat. Allow the mixture to cool.
  6. After cooling, add the raisins, fried cashewnut and cardamom powder to the coconut and jaggery mixture. Mix well. The filling is ready.
  7. For the modak:
  8. Heat 2 cups of water in a vessel.
  9. Add salt to the water.
  10. As the water starts boiling, add rice flour to the water. Lower the flame and mix well. Ensure lumps are not formed. It should be a smooth paste.
  11. If you find the mixture is too dry, add the remaining 1/2 cup of water.
  12. Keep the vessel on the gas stove till the rice flour is cooked.
  13. Take the cooked dough from the vessel and put on a wet cloth.
  14. Cover the dough with the cloth and mash it with any metal tumbler. This will make the dough softer.
  15. Rub a little ghee on you palms and take small portion of the hot dough. Make a ball out of it.
  16. Press the ball with your finger to make a depression into the ball. Then widen the depression to make a small round dent in the ball.
  17. Put 2 tsps of the filling in the small indentation.
  18. Merge all the sides of the vessel to make in the shape of a fresh fig.
  19. Take a colander and spread some ghee in it. Place the modak in it.
  20. Make 10-12 modaks from the remaining dough and place all in the colander.
  21. Place the modak in such a way that they don’t touch one another.
  22. Take a big vessel. Pour 4 glasses of water in it. Put the vessel on the heat.
  23. As the water starts boiling, cover the vessel with the colander full of modak.
  24. Now cover the colander with a tight lid so that the steam should not come out from anywhere.
  25. The modak should be steamed for 10 mins.
  26. Serve hot modak with a tsp of ghee on it.

Recipe courtesy of Sify Bawarchi