This is one of the favourite Indian sweet of my daughter!
Gulab jamun is made using khoa or milk powder or a mix of cottage cheese and khoa!
Ingredients
Khoa-200 gms,
Maida or all purpose flour-1/3 cup,
Baking pwd-1/4 tsp.
Ingredients for sugar syrup or chasni-
Sugar-2 cups,
Water-1 and 1/2 cup,
Cardamom pwd-1/4 tsp
Note -khoa can be made at home or purchased from the market.
Home made is soft in texture because it is freshly made.
Market ones are slightly dry and hard,but can be grated to make a smooth dough.
Home made are a little time consuming as the slow boiling of the milk takes time.(40 minutes to an hour)
I have made khoa using 1 litre of full cream milk and left it on stove to reduce to a thick consistency using a ladle to stir the milk and to avoid spilling or sticking at the bottom.
Once the milk has thickened,keep stirring until the milk has no moisture.
Close gas and leave it to cool.
Once it is at room temperature,scrap the sides and bottom and form a ball.
Khoa is ready!
Method-
Grate store bought khoa to make it coarse in texture.
Take a bowl and mix all purpose flour or maida and baking pwd.
Add khoa and knead for 5 minutes to make a smooth dough.
You can sprinkle little water to smooth the dough if it is too dry.
Once the dough is made cover and let it rest for 5 minutes.
Chasni or sugar syrup-
Take a pan and mix 1 and 1/2 cup of water and 2 cups of sugar.
Put on high heat and stir until sugar dissolves.
Once the sugar dissolves do not stir and let it boil for 5 to 7 minutes or until you get 1 thread consistency.
You can check by pressing a drop of the syrup between the thumb and fore finger and it should be one thread.
Or once the sugar starts to coat the back of the spoon then the consistency is right.
Close gas and leave it aside.
Sprinkle cardamom pwd in the syrup to flavour the gulab jamuns.
Divide the khoa dough into 16 equal parts.
Make small round balls or oblong ones keeping in mind that the outer surface should be smooth.
Heat a kadhai or a deep pan to fry the gulab jamuns.
You can fry one gulab jamun to test to check the heat of the oil. It should not break.
You can use ghee or refined oil.
The gulab jamuns have to fried in low heat and in 2 batches.
Once the oil is slightly warm ,drop the balls in oil and do not stir.
The balls will sit at the bottom but as it starts to cook it will gradually come up and float on top.
Once it comes up stir the oil using a spatulla or wooden at the edges in circular motion.
This motion will make the gulab jamun move and fry evenly.
Once they evenly fried from all sides,take out and drop them in the chasni or sugar syrup.
The chasni should be warm and not to hot or cold.
If the oil is to hot for the next batch,then close gas for few minutes then fry the next batch on low heat.
Let the gulab jamun soak in the warm sugar syrup.
After half hour the gulab jamun will be fully soaked and it will expand in size too.
It is now ready to enjoy!
Makes 16 gulab jamuns!
