halva

Came across a basic recipe somewhere and added some other ingredients to my likes. We have tried this out for about 4 times. The taste and its stay-abouts have been improved ever since.  It was a little raw the first time and turned out much better yesterday. It is a Persian delicacy originally, and I customized it further with other ingredients. Best part is , the house keeps the aroma for a few days after making this delicacy, just like baking bread or a pizza.

Ingredients:

• Rice flour   – 3cups
• Sugar – 1.5 cups
• Rose water or/and fresh rose petals – 1 cup
• Saffron – about 20 strands
• Elaichi (cardamoms)  – 3 elaichis powdered
• Dry fruits – crushed almonds and cashews
• Butter – 1.5 cups
• Oil – half a cup
• Water – 1.5 cups

Utensils:

• Vessel for sugar syrup.
• A thick bottom larger vessel for flour.
• Wooden scoop

Preparation steps:

1. Make a sugar syrup – Pour water, sugar, rose water and saffron in bowl and boil till sugar melts
2. On another stove, Place a thicker vessel to melt butter, pour oil and let it heat up.
3. When the oil/butter is hot and melted, pour one half of crushed nuts, stir a bit, pour the rice flour and keep stirring for about 10-15 minutes till it turns into a thick paste. (“keep stirring”)
4. Now the interesting part – be careful and don’t hurt yourself at this step – “pour the hot sugar syrup into the flour and keep stirring. Pouring hot sugar syrup over flour makes the mix steam up. Just be careful and stay away from the steam as much as possible, and still keep stirring.
5. Keep stirring the mix for another 15-20 minutes while it turns from lighter color tending towards darker yellow or a brown tinge. (Color also depends on the color of the sugar as well, so watch out for lighter to darker color trend)
6. Prepare a plate with a layer of ghee or butter.
7. Pour the hot mix to this plate,tap flatten the content on the plate. Design/decorate with spoon as you desire. sprinkle the remaining crushed nuts over.
8. Let it cool down to the room temperature and serve.

It feels sooo good to take a bite and that melts into the throat. you will feel this to be tempting to keep eating it until you empty out the plate. Trust me, Try it out.