Indian sweets and desserts are well known world wide and are very tempting and mouth-watering. Be it the scorching summer heat or chilling winter, Indian desserts are too difficult to resist and are certainly not to be missed. There are a large variety of Indian desserts, ranging from the delicious ‘kheer’ and ‘laddoos’ to mouth-watering ‘gajar halwa’ and ‘barfi’.
Ras Malai is one of the most popular Indian desserts. This sweet dish was first invented in West Bengal, India, and is now quite popular with people in India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh. In India, it can be found in every sweet shop, especially in the states of West Bengal, Orissa, and Bihar. It is often pronounced as ‘Roshomalai’ in Bengali, the language of West Bengal.
Ras Malai comprises of sweet, cream to yellow-colored dumplings of cottage cheese or ricotta cheese (called ‘paneer’ in India) soaked well in clotted cream called ‘Malai’ in Hindi). This clotted cream is nothing but sweetened, thickened milk delicately flavored with cardamom, pistachios, rosewater, and saffron.
Following is an easy recipe for this appetizing, delicious Indian dessert:
Ingredients:
– Ricotta cheese: 2 lbs
– Sugar: ½ cup
– Half milk: 32 oz
– A pinch of saffron
– Crushed cardamom seeds: ¼ teaspoon
– Blanched almonds: ½ teaspoon
– Crushed green pistachios: 2 teaspoons
Recipe:
o Mix the cheese with sugar with little cardamom powder, and spread out the mixture on a baking tray.
o Bake the mixture at 350 degrees for 35 minutes or until it sets. However, make sure it does not get brown.
o Remove the tray from the oven, cool it at room temperature, and then cut the set mixture into 2″ small squares.
o Place these squares in a dessert bowl.
o Mix the other ingredients, baring the pistachios, well in a separate dish, and pour this liquid over the squares.
o The dessert is ready. Decorate it with pistachios, chill for 2-3 hours before serving.
So, next time you feel like preparing a special dessert for your family, do try this recipe at home and let your family experience the flavor of Indian cooking.