Holi sweets Archives | Sindhi Rasoi |Sindhi Recipes

Gheeyar~Sindhi Jalebi! A video Recipe

Alka Keswani — Sun, 06 Apr 2014 14:37:58 +0000

Dr Rajesh Khatwani, is a passionate cook and enthusiastic baker. Let me introduce Dr Khatwani, in his own words… “I am a practicing pediatrician in Ahmadabad. Wild life photography and cooking difficult dishes are two of my favorite hobbies. It started with cakes and kulfis—I learnt from my mother. I have tamed few of challenging dishes; Rasgullas, Sugar free Rasmalai ( Which won me 1st prize in male medicos cooking contest), Egg less Pineapple pastries (1st prize), Pizzas, Christmas cake and egg less baked caramel custard (on TV9 Gujarati ) and Khorak which was telecast on ETV Gujarati. ( I was first male viewer who was invited for cooking in their kitchen). My fresh orange cake and fresh Pineapple cake are always in demand by my family”. And here is what he shares with us, regarding Gheear/Gheeyar, a Sindhi delicacy… “Gheeyar is a Sindhi special Holi recipe. A well fermented maida batter is poured in hot oil with 5 fingers in a circulatory movements. Fried Gheeyar is then transferred to sugar syrup. It is commonly known as Sindhi Ghevar but it is quite different from Ghevar and Jalebi. After my Khorak show, I decided to try Gheeyar. It took lot of trials over months together before I could define a final fool proof recipe. I could present it on ETV Rasoi show on 16th March 2014. I am glad to mention that this ETV rasoi show video also will be the first video on Gheeyar available on net just like my Khorak show video. I am thankful to ETV Rasoi show for giving me chance to present such challenging Sindhi dishes and to Alka Keswani for inviting me to present it on SindhiRasoi.com” Print Gheeyar~Sindhi Jalebi! A video Recipe Rating 5.0 from 1 reviews Gheeyar is a Sindhi Sweet made during Holi festival, a huge crunchy jalebi , it is most sought after sweet during the festival of colours ! Ingredients For batter: Before Fermentation ½ kg All Purpose flour 1 cup Curd 1.5 cup Water (1 cup means 240ml) After Fermentation 4 tbsp All purpose flour 2 tbsp Gram flour (Besan ) Edible Food colour -1/4+1/8 tsp (Kesar Yellow) For Syrup 2.5 cups Sugar 1 cup Water 5 Green cardamoms ½ tsp Alum powder For Garnishing Pistachios Almonds, Silver varq Rose petals (Preferably Organic) Method Mix All purpose flour, curd and water and keep the mix at room temp for minimum 48 hrs and for 3 days in Winter. Stir it every 12 hours.You will see that the dough gets doubled in size within 12-24 hrs.This semisolid mix becomes the batter of thin pouring consistency after the fermentation for 48 hrs. This is very crucial step for Gheear making. Now add 4 tbs of Maida to make it of right consistency--little thicker and to reduce its sourness. Add 2 tbsp of besan to give crispiness to Gheeyar. Add color and the batter is ready. Meanwhile, make a sugar syrup by dissolving sugar in water and making ½ string syrup--i.e heat it to the level of 104 cg. Add cardamom and Alum powder to prevent recrystallization. In a pan,heat oil with ring mould in it and keep the flame to medium. Mix the batter with hand vigorously. Dip all fingers of your hand up to knuckles in the batter and make a net like design inside a ring mould by rotating all 5 fingers in circular fashion for 4-5 times and then bringing all 5 fingers together to make the thick border of Gheeyar.(Watch the video to understand the technique properly). Fry it till crispy, flip it and fry other side also. Dip it in Sugar syrup for a minute or so. Remove it in a plate. You can use a plain plastic bottle, instead---Make 5 holes of approx 6 mm diameter in the base of big Jalebi bottle. Fill the batter in bottle to half. Make Gheeyar in similar way with bottle and flip the bottle and make border with single main nozzle. Garnish Gheeyars with crushed Pistachios and Almonds. Decorate with Silver varq and rose petals. Serve with smile. 3.2.2265 Thank you Dr Khatwani, for honoring my blog by sharing this wonderful video recipe. I am sure this is going to help so many Sindhis, as well as Non Sindhis, who thought that Gheeyar could be only bought from sweet shops. Check the video of making of gheeyar ! Gheeyar from Dr Khatwani on Vimeo.

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Gheear~Sindhi style Jalebi

Alka Keswani — Thu, 13 Mar 2014 15:58:34 +0000

Holi, the spring festival of India, is around the corner.With just few days remaining in the festival of colours, many people asked for the recipe of traditional Holi sweet of Sindhis, Gheear or the jumbo jalebi. For sindhis, Holi means going crazy over sweets like Praghree, Gheear, Malpura etc. The recipe of typical Sindhi sweet, Praghree, the crispy layered pastry stuffed with Khoya, is already shared here, while that of malpura is here Last year I tried making gheear too but my attempts went into vain, when the under- fermented batter refused to turn into slim pearly droplets that bind together to make a circular mesh like sweet called gheear! All I got was the thick jalebi like sweet, that didn’t look even remotely related to gheear. This year things were better, yet far from perfect. Hopefully till next Holi, my gheear making skills will improve 😉 The batter is almost same as that of jalebi, but the way the batter is pipe out is different in gheear. Unlike concentric shaped jalebis, the gheear is made by squeezing out the batter through tiny hole of cloth or nozzle of bottle, in random directions. More details in the recipe that follows… Print Gheear~Sindhi style Jalebi Crisp and juicy jalebi like sweet, soaked in saffron mixed cardamom flavored syrup, enjoyed during Holi festival Ingredients For Gheear (Makes 7-8 pieces ) 1½ cups All purpose flour ¾th cup Yogurt (Yogurt is always half the quantity of the flour , 2:1 ratio) 2 tbsp cornflour Few drops of Jalebi colour (Red orange or yellow) Optional For Sugar Syrup 2 cups of sugar 1½ cups of water 3-4 green cardamons or ¼ tsp of cardamon powder ½ tsp of good quality saffron Unsalted pistachios and dried rose petals for garnish Method To make the batter, in a large bowl, mix 11/4 cup of maida (and save the remaining ¼ th cup), 2 tbsp of cornflour and ¾ th cup of beaten yogurt and mix well. Add little amount of water (Around ¼ to ½ cup, depending upon the consistency of yogurt), and mix vigorously to make a smooth, lump free batter. Keep whisking or mixing with your fingers for at least 15 minutes. Cover the bowl with a lid and let the batter ferment for 24 hours. The batter is generally made with just water and flour, but it might require around 32-48 hours to ferment well, depending upon the weather. Hence Yogurt is added to add the sourness and aid the process of fermentation. When the batter is fermented well, add the remaining ¼th cup flour and food colour (if using..I didn't used any!) and mix vigorously for around 10 minutes. Meanwhile in another pan, mix sugar, water, cardamom and saffron and make a syrup of one string consistency. Heat ghee or refined oil in flat bottomed pan. The diameter of pan should not exceed 12 cm. Or else use the shallow, 10 cm in diameter, metal cooking ring. Place it in the pan and pour the batter inside the ring. The aim is to make gheear that is around 8-10 cm in diameter or else it might break while turning in hot oil. Now pour the fermented batter into ziplock bag (and snip off one of the corner, making a tiny hole) , or muslin cloth (and make potli of it, then cut a small hole), or in a plastic squeeze bottle with small nozzle. Quickly pipe out the freely flowing batter in random directions to make a mesh like design. It needs patience and practice to make perfect design. For now, lets be contented with the taste of gheear rather than the look of it. Remove the ring, if using, and turn gheear gently, once or twice, frying it on medium to low flame, till light golden colour. Remove from oil, and soak for a minute or so, in warm syrup (neither hot nor cold). Drain and keep aside, un covered till the syrup coated gheear becomes more crisp. Repeat the procedure till all the batter is consumed. Store in airtight containers, only after thoroughly cooled. Shelf life is 2-5 days depending on the weather. 3.2.2265 Wishing you all a very happy, colourful and safe Holi !

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Praghree| Deep Fried Crunchy layered Puffs|Sindhi Sweet

Alka Keswani — Tue, 08 Jan 2013 08:55:04 +0000

Praghree (Praghri/Pragri), a deep fried crunchy, layered puff stuffed with Khoya/mawa, is a seasonal delicacy, made only during Holi Festival ( Indian Festival of colours). Rarely will you find these crunchy, sticky delights during rest of the year. Very high in calories but an addictive sweet, Praghree have many fans; specially from Sindhi Community. Almost every Sindhi sweet shop will stock this around Holi and generally there are two varieties of it. One is stuffed with Khoya and other with Chabu Halwo (cornflour pudding/Bombay Karachi halwa). This fascinating sweet could be made at home, but you need to have a heart to fry these in Dalda ghee (hydrogenated vegetable oil ) if you want the sweet to remain crunchy for long. As for me, I chickened out and fried it in sunflower oil. Well, there are many minute details that I need to share with you all, regarding this recipe, so stay focused here! Generally everyone around, buy Praghree from sweet shop, during the festive season. Seldom people make these at home.Hence not much of the reference was available online or in cookbooks. So let me first thank the people who helped me out to gather information and provide tips. I had the brief idea of making Praghree and the rough measurements of ingredients, thanks to Late ‘Baba’, an elderly person in my neighborhood. I have some of his recipes, on this blog of mine. So the base recipe is of ‘Baba’. But sadly he left us before I can get exact details of ‘folding’ and ‘rolling’ praghree, in traditional ways. After loads of research, I found that the texture and look of praghree resembles Spiral curry puffs, not exactly, but I think that the similar method of rolling might work. Before I could make up my mind to take a plunge, I came across the BLC’s ‘Flavors of Sind‘ book and I was happy to find a workable method of making Praghree. I went ahead with the method mentioned in the book and followed the recipe casually shared by Late ‘Baba’, and voila ! I got nice, crunchy, crisp golden Praghree. After all the efforts put in, I was happy to munch on a home made praghree, but then I realized that though it was crunchy and sweet, the sweetness lacked the depth of flavor. Also by next day, the leftover Praghree went soggy, unlike store brought ones, that stay crunchy even if stored for days. And then I did, what I always do, when I get stuck up with any Sindhi recipe; sending a distress call to Suresh Hinduja~The celebrity Chef of GourmetIndia !. As usual he enlightened me with some handy tips and of course I am going to share those with you all, at the end of the recipe Also my friend Kurush Dalal helped me a lot in my ‘research’, while I was trying to understand the origin and basics of this recipe. Thanks to him, I now know that even Parsi and Bohri cuisine have a sweet delicacy named Mawa Nu Khaja, which is made in somewhat similar way. The Parsi version also makes use of clotted cream apart from mawa/khoya. PLEASE NOTE: The recipe have loads of scope for hits-and- miss. So in case, you try out this recipe, please let me know whether it worked for you or not. Your inputs will help me and other readers of this blog, to fine tune this recipe further. Also I used ‘unsweetened mawa’ instead of sweetened one and added few spoons of powdered sugar to it (not a good decision !). Please try to grab some sweetened mawa for better flavor. I generally do not use any kind of essence (except vanilla essence for the bakes) and artificial colours in my food. This too backfired, and excluding out rose essence made the syrup very bland. So please use Rose and/or Kewra essence in the syrup…just few drops ! So now lets head towards the Recipe… Print Praghree| Deep Fried Crunchy layered Puffs|Sindhi Sweet Rating 4.7 from 6 reviews Prep time: 30 mins Cook time: 40 mins Total time: 1 hour 10 mins Serves: 7 Traditional SIndhi Sweet, deep fried crunchy puffs stuffed with Mawa and soaked in flavored sugar syrup Ingredients For the puff pastry: All Purpose flour (Maida) 2 and ¼ cups Dalda/Ghee ¼ cup Water to knead the dough For uncooked Roux (Paste) ¾ cup melted ghee 3 tsp All purpose flour For Sugar syrup: 11/4 cup sugar ¾th Cup water Few Saffron strands soaked in 1tbsp of water Few drops of Rose essence 3-4 green cardamom pods, crushed Other Ingredients: 300 gm mawa (sweetened) Dalda/ Ghee/ Oil for frying Dried rose petals for garnishing (optional) Varq (Varak, or thin, beaten silver foil) and/or unsalted pistachios for garnishing (Optional) Method For Sugar Syrup: In a pan, mix 1¼ cup sugar with 1 cup of water, add crushed cardamoms and soaked saffron (along with the water in which saffron was soaked) and boil the syrup for around 3-4 minutes, or till a thin syrup is made. Put off the flame and add 2-3 drops of rose essence.Mix and keep it covered with a lid. For the Crunchy crust : Mix the maida and Dalda/ghee and knead a stiff flour using some water. Let it rest for a while. The rested dough is now ready to roll. Divide the dough into 7 portions. Take one portion (let us call this portion as Portion A) out on the rolling board/clean surface and cover the rest of the dough so that it doesn't dry out! Now divide this Portion A, into 4 smaller portions, each being of the size smaller than a lemon/lime. Roll these four individual portions into small chapatis.Roll the dough Alternatively, you can a take a portion of dough and roll out a huge, thin disc, then using a steel bowl (katori), cut out small portions (the way cookies are cut using cookie cutters), put aside the cut discs and mix the remaining dough back to the kneaded dough. Make rest of the smaller discs in similar way...i.e rolling out a portion of dough, cutting out smaller disc using bowl..so on, so forth!) Prepare an uncooked roux/paste of melted ghee and maida. Smear each small chapati with this paste (Approx. 1-11/2 tsp for each chapati), by spreading the paste well. This roux or paste will work as binding agent between the layers. Now cut each chapati into 2 cm wide strips. Place the strips one on other . Repeat the same with rest of three chapatis and place all the strips on each other, to make a stack.Press this stack, gently! Now cut this stack into four portions (as shown in picture, below) and again stack each portion, one over top of other. Press it gently Here's how the tower of the strips look likes! Sprinkle some dry flour on rolling board/ clean surface and roll the prepared stack into more or less circle shape. Place a heaped tsp (or a bit more) of sweetened mawa in the centre of the rolled chapati.Now dip your fingers in water and gently tap your fingers around the mawa (be careful as not to press the edges ). Gently fold over the rolled dough, to make a half circled, filled chapati (Like Gujiya). Press the dough around the mawa stuffing (and not around the edges of the half circle). This will be our first Pragri (puff). Repeat this whole procedure with the remaining 6 portions. (Remember? We have divided the original dough into 7 portions and so far we were working on just portion A.Repeat this with Portion B, C,D...) (Phew!) Keep all the puffs covered with a cloth to avoid formation of any crusts. Now heat dalda/oil/ or mixture of dalda and oil, in a frying pan. Deep fry each puff, one at a time, on the lowest flame, turning intermittently, very gently, till golden brown. Frying on higher flame will leave the puffs undercooked from inside. Drain on kitchen towel/ tissue paper and fry the rest of the puffs, one at a time! COOL THE PUFFS COMPLETELY ! Once all the puffs have cool down completely, simply warm the syrup (just warm) and dip each puff in this syrup.Make sure that the puff is completely coated with the syrup.(You can hold each puff in syrup for few seconds) Place the syrup coated puff on a plate and garnish with petals/ varak/nuts. Cool and store in airtight containers.These stay good at room temperature for few days. Notes 1) You can add chopped nuts or crushed dried fruits to the sweetened mawa.2) You can stuff the puffs with Bombay karachi halwa (Place a piece of halwa in the centre of rolled chapati,instead of mawa.TIPS SHARED BY Mr. SURESH HINDUJA FOR CRUNCHY PRAGHREE !1) Adding 'Khasta' or ghee to the dough. (Shall make the pastry crisp)2) Using Dalda ghee to make roux (paste).3) Frying Praghree in Dalada ghee instead of oil (This will ensure that the pastry will stay crisp for long)4) Adding a bit of rose essence and saffron to the syrup (This will enhance the flavor of syrup)5) Keeping the syrup thin and not thick ( Thicker syrup will make the pastry soggy)6) As soon as the syrup is ready, cover it with a lid to trap the aroma.I am sure that if anyone making the Praghree at home, will be able to make it better than mine, since now you all have the handy hints by Suresh. Thank you Suresh, for the kind help and handy tips ! 3.5.3251

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