Category Archives: sweets

Diwali Munchies: Hazelnut & Almond ‘Cake’

Its that time of the year again, Diwali, a.k.a the festival of lights.. The brain rewinds to memories from long ago of childhood, the aroma of Diwali savories deep frying in a variety of oils, Peanut oil for the ‘mixtures’ (as chivda is known down south) & ‘omappodi’ , coconut oil for the ‘murukku’ & ‘thenkozhal’ and lots and lots of ghee for the sweet stuff. Every family had (& still does) its traditional set of munchies. My favorite memories are that of waking up from my afternoon nap to the aroma of curry leaves being sauteed with asafetida to be added to the ‘Miccher’ (mixture). There would be a one foot high hill of various ingredients piled high on layers of newspaper to be mixed by hand before being ladled into the large stainless steel containers.(to be unopened, preferably, until Diwali Eve. Yeah, like that curfew was ever obeyed!!).

Fast forward to this century…Start the Car, drive to Edison, NJ , pick up boxes of stuff from Sukhadia…:-( Go ahead, replace the italicized words with your town & store of choice!

And yet, the heart yearns to recreate the marathon munchie making sessions of the previous generation and I usually like to at least make one sweet & one savory dish to celebrate the event. (in addition to the mandatory Lehiyam). Old traditions carried on, as in the Diwali Eve dinner of Onion & Coconut Sambhar with crispy roast potatoes and deep fried papad, (a tradition adopted from my husbands side of the family).
and some new creative liberties that I began taking last year with classics such as Okkarai (morphed into a health bar)

Thattai (Biscottified)

and a Lavender Badaam ‘Cake’.

Well, This year, its my mom’s recipe for ‘mullu thenkozhal’ for the salty part,

My li’l notebook of recipes dictated by ‘amma’ a week before she passed away.

and the introduction of a new member of the nut family into the South Indian ‘sweets’, Hazelnut.
Aside from flavored coffee, the first place one associates hazelnuts is Nutella and Ferrero Rocher chocolates. Since it was the first time I had worked with these in South Indian food, I combined it with some almonds but, in retrospect, I realize, the hazelnuts would have been great by themselves.

Hazelnut-Almond ‘Cake’ (Makes ~ 45-50 1 inch squares)

You need:
1 cup hazelnuts, with the outer skin removed
1/2 cup blanched and peeled almonds
1 1/2cup heavy cream
1 1/2 cups confectioners sugar (since this dissolves almost instantly)
1 1/2 cup milk (2 % will do since there’s plenty of fatty goodness from the heavy cream)
10-12 strands saffron (Disclaimer: I was rather generous with this, resulting in the darker color)
2 -3 tablespoons ghee.

On a low heat, lightly toast the peeled hazelnuts til they just barely start turning brown & emit a light aroma.

Dissolve saffron in 2 tablespoons of the milk.
In a food processor, combine the toasted hazelnuts and almond & process to a coarse grit. Keeping the machine running add the heavy cream and allow to grind to a coarse paste. Dilute with the milk and transfer contents of the food processor jar into a non stick pan.
Add the confectioners sugar, mix well and cook the mixture on a low medium heat (take care to avoid burning the mixture at the bottom of the pan).
Once the mixture begins to simmer, add the saffron infused milk along with the strands.
Stirring frequently, continue to heat the mixture till it begins leaving the sides of the pan. Add the ghee, & continue to heat the mix till it has the consistency of pizza dough and comes together as a ball. (for want of a better comparison!)
Line a small 6 x 8 inch sheet pan (or a small thali) with Parchment paper or Aluminum foil (brushed thoroughly with ghee).
Drop the mixture into the sheet pan and smooth over with an offset spatula.
Place in refrigerator and allow to set.
When completely cooled, cut into squares. Press halved toasted hazelnuts into the center and serve.

That is my 5 yr old piling on the nuts!

Wishing everyone of you a wonderful & happy Diwali.

Posted in dessert, Diwali, festival food, sweets

6 Comments

Fudging the basics… basic ricotta fudge and applications thereof!

Oct 12

Posted by panfusine

My initial idea was to call this post ‘Eating your mistakes’ but it turned out to be such a delicious deviation of intended results, I just did not have the heart to tag it as such.

It started out with the intention of making a beloved bengali dessert the ‘Sandesh’. My memory cells are pretty much swamped by gustatory inputs about classics like ‘Rosgolla’ & Cham Cham, that I do not have many memories about the third in the triumverate of Bengali sweets. So I turned to a classic bengali food blog, The Bong Moms cookbook and sure enough, came across this elegant recipe for bhappa sandesh. Scrolling down the list of ingredients, mentally ‘checking’ off the ones I had on hand…Ricotta, condensed milk (check & check… YAAY I was on a roll here) & I flew off to try this out, entirely forgetting the remaining list of ingredients which I did not have on hand, or a serious look at the simple technique described. That was the end of the Sandesh attempt.. and after that I took off on my ‘fudge’, winging it as I went along.
The end result was a delicious concoction with 3 different applications (possibly more to come) along the way.

Basic Milk Fudge:

1 lb. Whole milk Ricotta Cheese
1 can condensed milk
1 cup heavy cream
1/4 cup confectioners (icing) sugar
3-4 pods cardamom, crushed
10-12 strands saffron + 1 tablespoon milk to dissolve it in
1 tablespoon corn flour mixed in 1/4 cup of milk
1/4 tsp Pure orange extract (optional)

In a food processor jar, combine the ricotta cheese, condensed milk and the icing sugar.

Process to a thick & smooth consistency. Add the heavy cream to the mix while keeping the appliance running.

Pour the mixture into a large non stick pan. Keeping the heat on low, (this is crucial, at no point should the bottom of the pan heat up enough to caramelize the sugar in the mixture) keep stirring the mixture frequently with a wooden or bamboo spoon.
Dissolve the saffron strands in the milk and add to the mixture along with the powdered cardamom.
When the liquid has reduced to half the original volume, dissolve the cornflour in 1/4 cup of milk and add to the mixture.
In about 60-90 minutes the mixture should have thickened enough that a spoon run across the bottom reveals the bottom of the pan for a goo couple of seconds before the liquid covers it up again.

At this point, you may terminate the procedure and freeze the mix in small bowls or kulfi molds to make an awesome creamy & rich Kulfi (application # 1).

Disclaimer: these are miniature versions made with small amounts of the mix!

Should you want to go further, continue heating the mix further on the same (maddeningly!) low heat (add the orange extract at this point) till the mixture gives up all its moisture (you can see the butterfat sizzling from the edges at this point). At this point pour (more like dropping) the mix onto a greased plate, and cut into squares to serve as is when cold, or simply scoop a tablespoon of the mix when cold, shape it into little spheres and roll in some toasted pistachio. Place into tiny paper baking cups. (application # 2)

The final application that I used this fudge for were these gorgeous tiny ‘money bags’ (yea, I know, the French call them ‘beggars purses’ but I beg to differ!).

Ricotta ‘Money bags’

You need:
Milk fudge,
Phyllo pastry sheets
plenty of melted butter and a pastry brush for brushing it.

Preheat the oven to 300 F. Line a baking/cookie sheet with parchment paper.

Scoop about 1/2 – 1 tablespoon of the milk fudge and shape into little spheres as shown.

The specks result when the mixture is cooked on a higher heat.. It does not affect the taste as much as the eye candy value!

Thaw a packet of phyllo pastry dough as per instructions. Remove as many as you require (You’ll get about 6 purses from one single sheet of dough). Keeping them moist under a wet kitchen towel, Cut them into squares (~ 5-6 inches sides).

Lay a sheet of phyllo on a stone surface and liberally brush with the melted butter. Place a sphere of fudge at the edge of the phyllo sheet as shown.