Badam Pak / Badam Mysore Pak / Almond Fudge - Easy Diwali Sweet

My husband loves Mysore pak and we always get a kilo from Krishna Sweets during our trip to Chennai. However, I always keep thinking that there's nothing healthy in it but just loads of ghee and sugar and Besan (kadala maavu/ gram flour) which doesn't help much. Last week, when talking to my mami about Diwali preparations, she mentioned that ammamma used to make badam pak often and that everyone loves it. Immediately, I asked her if she has learnt the recipe and jotted it down and planned to try it this Diwali.

Badam Pak / Almond fudge

The ratio is the same as the traditional mysore pak, just that we omit besan (gram flour) completely and use badam (almonds) instead. 

What You Need - 

1 cup badam (almonds)
1 cup water
2 cups sugar
3 cups ghee

Method -

=> I used 1/2 cup badam, 1 cup sugar and 1.5 cups ghee and got around 15 pieces, as you see in the picture.  For your reference, the standard is 1 cup = 240 ml.

•  Powder almonds (badam) in your mixie. You might have to do it in batches as we need them to be finely powdered. There's no need to soak badam or peel the skin.
• Prepare a greased tray and keep it ready. I used my oven's tray and placed a baking sheet on it. 
• Mix all the ingredients in a wide pan and make sure there are no lumps. I used a whisk to do the job. 
• Put the pan on the gas stove (medium flame) and keep stirring in one direction. This is the painful part as you need to keep stirring continuously for about 12-15 minutes. 
• After about 8 minutes, you would realize that the mixture is getting thickened. Continue stirring.

• Around 13th minute, ghee would start leaving the sides of the pan and the mixture would have thickened even further.
• Now, you can pour the mixture on the tray. Don't level the surface, the best (ideal) result would be porous badam pak. If you had poured it on the plate earlier (before it's done) then the badam pak would be flat (not porous) yet soft.

• Wait for another 15 minutes for it to cool down and then cut into squares. 

• Store in an airtight container. This stays good at room temperature for 7-10 days. 
• Enjoy the rich badam sweet!! 

Badam Mysore Pak

Notes: 

• There was a lot of ghee  (about 8-10 spoons) that separated and I managed to collect them in a bottle, one spoon at a time, from the tray. The rest of the ghee that was on the tray, was used to roll out doodh pedas that I had made. 

• Also, I used the kitchen tissues (paper) to wipe/drain excess ghee from the pieces.

•  Timings would vary if you double or triple the quantities I used. You would have to wait and watch for the signs like, mixture thickening up and ghee separating. 

Butter Murukku without much butter - Crunchy on the outside, melts in your mouth

The secret is to use cooked moong dal. No roasting, no grinding - it's so quick and your mullu murukkus turn out to be crispy yet melt-in-your-mouth kind. 

Butter thenkuzhal

I Used -

• Rice flour -  1 and 1/4 cups
• Moong dhal - 1/2 cup (measured after cooking the dal)
• Butter - 1-2 tbsp
• Sesame seeds - 1 tsp
• Cumin Seeds - 2 tsp
• Salt - as required (start with 3/4 tsp and taste the dough and adjust)
• Hing - 1/2 tsp
• Red chilli powder - 1/2 tsp
• Black pepper powder - 1/2 tsp
• Hot oil - for frying

Method -

• Cook moong dal until mushy (Best to pressure-cook. I use 2 and 1/2 times water for 1 cup moong dal). 
• Mix with rice flour, add in the other ingredients like sesame seeds, cumin, red chilli powder, salt, pepper powder and a pinch of asafoetida and finally just 1-2 tbsp of butter. 
• Make a soft dough by adding a little water at a time. 
• Add hot oil to make the dough smooth so that it doesn't stick to your hands or the murukku mould. Just be careful not to hurt your fingers. 
• We're almost there, the rest of the process is mundane. Use the murukku press (you can use the Single star mould for making proper circles and 3 star one for making random shaped mullu murukku) and deep-fry murukkus into hot oil on medium flame until golden brown. 
• Drain on kitchen tissues to remove excess oil. 
• Store in air tight containers after 30 minutes and enjoy :-) 

Happy Deepavali 2014 everyone!