Rava Laddu

Rava Laddu is a simple and easy to make sweet and Iwanted to make something special for Sankranthi.  Most recipes,  called for equal amounts of the main ingredients. But I find equal amounts of rava, ghee and  sugar a bit too sweet for my taste. So I scaled down on the ghee and sugar.

Huh! I just noticed something. I used a different language to list each of the main ingredients. Rava is a Telugu word, Ghee is a Hindi word and Sugar ofcourse is English. Darn!!! After all these years I still tend to mix up all languages. Hmmm! I wonder what the output would be like, if I knew more languages. And… I just used the word output which hints at my programming background I suppose.

Will have to check my previous posts to see if I do tend to mix up languages  frequently. Lets proceed to the recipe of the Laddo’s for now.

Ingredients

• 2 cups  Farina Cereal ( Rava, Suji)
• 1 1/2 cup Clarified Butter ( Naiyya, Ghee)
• 1 cup Sugar (Panchadara, Chini)
• 1/4 tsp Cardamom powder

Method

• Heat a pan and dry roast the Farina cereal.
• Add the cardamom powder and mix well.
• Add the Clarified butter and cook on a medium heat unilt the  butter begins to ooze out from the cereal.
• Add the sugar and mix well.
• Remove from heat and cool until barely warm.
• Form laddu’s  the size of  golf balls with your hands.
• Allow the laddu’s to cool and harden a bit before serving.

Notes

• Farina cereal is a coarse form of rava or suji. I prefer it coarse as it gives the laddu’s a bit more texture. Many prefer the finer grained suji more. You can substitue it in the same proportion as the cereal.
• Sugar in India is more granular than that in the US. I would suggest grinding it a bit in the food processor/ mixie to break it down a bit.
• Many like to add raisins and cashew to the laddo’s. I kept them plain as both Aditiya and Ujwala are not too fond of nuts or raisins in their sweets.
• Because I reduced the quantity of the Ghee, observing the oozing out of the butter might be difficult. I mad a small indent with the edge of a spatula into the mixture and watched for the butter to bubble up and collect in the indent.
• If you try to form the laddo’s when the mixture is still hot, it will not hold together well.
• If you wait too long then it will harden up and shaping the laddo’s after that will be difficult.