SugarSyrup

I used to think all the while, that this is really difficult, but thanks to my sister-in-law she showed me once with jaggery.

Sugar - as per the requirement to make the sweet

Water - 1/2 cup (small one)

Water to be added just to ensure that sugar doesn't get burnt off before it starts melting

1. Mix Sugar and Water and heat them in a kadai
2. Stir them occasionally
3. Check as and when the syrup has become thick (when you touch the syrup in hand a sticky thread should be formed)
4. Can add cardamom powder for taste

Once the thread is obtained, the syrup is ready for the sweet to be made.

Note: Instead of Sugar if Jaggery is used then Jaggery Syrup would be ready.

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Gollbhai

For the first time I am paired with Sara's corner and created a recipe from my partner's blog.

Saraswathi is my cousin and is a housewife. She comes up with one or the other recipe every two days once, i selected one of her dish hallbhai and tweaked a little and prepared it on this saturday, Oct 24th 2009.

Ingredients:

• Rice - 1 cup
• Jaggery - 2 cups
• Cinnamon Powder (Elaichi) - 1/2 tspn
• Clove - 1
• Poppy Seeds - 2 tspn
• Fresh Grated Coconut - 1 1/2 cups
• Ghee - 1 tsp for greasing & 3 tsps for mixing
• Milk - 2 tbsp
• Cashew and Badam - 5 to 6 - (cut into small pieces)

Method:

• Soak the rice for 4 hours.
• Add cinnamon powder, clove, poppy seeds with rice and grind for 3 rounds.
• Add grated coconut to the grinded mixture and finely grind them.
• Add jaggery to the grinded mixture and grind again.
• Heat 1 tsp of ghee
• Fry the cashews and badam till golden brown separately in hot ghee. (Kindly note badam will take more time to get fried than cashews). Keep it aside.
• Pour the grinded mixture and keep stirring it continuously by adding the milk and ghee without allowing them to form loops in low flamed heat
• Put the fried cashews and badam
• Grease a plate with ghee
• Pour the mixture onto the plate and leave it for half an hour or till it gets cooled
• Cut the mixture into the desired shape.

I have cut into square and then rolled them into small balls so that it will be more in quantity and I can distribute to many.

Just for a change, I named this as gollbhai (sister of hallbhai). It is also called as "Amruth Palam" in Telugu.

Greatest thing of this dish is it could make my husband remember his childhood days and his grandmother. Infact, my mother-in-law could remember this sweet after 15 to 20 years.

Thanks to Saraswathi and her hallbhai which brought back the sweet memories.

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