Homemade Indian sweets

Hello from glorious, hot, humid Kerala, where I'm reminiscing about my time up north while luxuriating under fans with cool drinks. (This is the life I'd like to lead if I were to live in India again, let me tell you.)

But back to blogging and getting caught up.

Another of the food items I wanted to learn on this whirlwind tour of India was how to make Gita-taiji's famous sweets. The Dehradun-based aunt has been sending sweets to Vivek and his brother, Mani, since they can remember.

So on a rainy Saturday afternoon, Gita-taiji set about teaching me how to make besan burfi, a sweet made of besan (chickpea flour), ghee (clarified butter), spices and almonds. It turned out to be a simpler process than I had expected, though rather time-consuming overall.

Gita-taiji takes over to demonstrate proper roasting technique.

While stirring, it's best to compress the besan against the bottom of the pan, which helps to keep the flour separated, rather than just stirring it. 

Simply stirring can cause the flour to clump into tiny, boondi-like forms (demonstrated by me).

Almond halves provide a nice contrast to the golden color of the roasted besan. 

The roasted besan is mixed with cardamom and sugar to create a dough.

To make greasing the pan easier, Gita-taiji uses the leftover heat from the stove burner where we roasted the besan.

When finished, the sweet will look something like this. All that's left is to separate and package the squares.

After this cooking lesson was over, I also watched Gita-taiji at work making bread -- Saturday night's rotis and Sunday morning's parathas. That Sunday sari brunch is getting more and more complete!

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Besan Burfi
from the kitchen of Gita Bhatnagar

1 c. besan (chickpea flour)
1/2 c. ghee (you might not need this much)
green cardamom powder (to taste)
sugar (to taste)
10-15 almonds (optional, for decoration)

Roast the besan and ghee together in a pan (a wok would work nicely if you have one) until the besan turns a dark golden color. (This is a simple step but a long one, so be patient. If the besan is not roasted enough, the texture of the sweet will be too chewy.) While stirring, mash the flour against the pan to compress it. Add ghee as needed.

Once the besan has been roasted, remove from heat to cool. While it's cooling, slice almonds in half.

When the besan is cool enough to touch, add the cardamom powder and sugar and mix into the dough with your hands. Line a metal pan with a bit of ghee and place dough onto pan, compressing and shaping the form to create a five- to six-inch square that's about three-quarters of an inch thick.

Slice the sweet into one-inch square pieces and place an almond half, skin-side down for contrast, on each piece. Sweets will be ready to package when they can be lifted from the pan without sticking.