Rava Laddoo and Khoya Peda for Diwali

Diwali was always the funnest festival – new clothes, tons of sweets and even more fire crackers – those days were fun!! Its now the second diwali that im celebrating away from family. But it is special in its own way as AJ and i get to celebrate this together and we have our friends with us, who have become our family now This time we had a small diwali celebration with sweets and dinner at our place on Saturday and also got to go to two more Diwali parties where we met lots of people, wished each other and had even lots more sweets. I was literally on a sugar high that night!

I started the sweet making process a couple of days ahead and this year, i managed to make a few more sweets than last year. On the menu was – Rava Laddoo, Mysore Pak, Khoya Peda, Coconut Burfi, Spicy Diamond Cuts ( Namak Para ) and Dahi Vada. For dinner we had Puris with Spicy Aloo Bhaji, Paneer Koftas in gravy and rice.

Rava Laddoo

Heat a kadhai on moderate heat and roast the semolina till it gets a very pale golden brown colour and the aroma of roasted semolina comes. Dont let it burn or blacken. Keep stirring to avoid that from happening. Grind it along with the sugar, till the sugar is just about powdered. That way the semolina is not all that finely ground.

Heat a few tsp of ghee in the kadhai and fry the cashews and raisins. Keep them aside. Heat the remaining ghee in the kadhai on medium heat till it gets hot but not smoking. Remove from heat and mix in the semolina-sugar mix, cardamom powder and the fried nuts and raisins. Mix well. When it comes down to a temperature cool enough to handle it, make lime sized balls out of it, pressing it firmly while you do it. This should be done before the mixture cools completely.

This quantity of ingredients will yield about 25-30 laddoos.

Khoya Peda

I had read about making Khoya Pedas this way from somewhere. I didnt remember the exact proportions, but since this is not a burfi or something that needs to set and then cut out into pieces, i roughly used some proportions and it worked out well. This is probably the easiest version of any peda recipes.

The khoya that you get in Indian grocery stores is generally a block, like a block of paneer, so you will need to grate it so that it evens out and is easier to mix with the sugar and cook. Grate the khoya, mix it well with the sugar and heat it in a non-stick kadhai on medium heat. Keep stirring, or else the sugar will tend to brown when it remains in contact with the heated bottom of the kadhai. Let all the sugar melt and let the mixture loosen up a little bit and get thickened again. You will know it as the difficulty level of stirring changes. As the mixture begins to leave the sides of the kadhai, add the cardamom, give it a quick mix and remove from heat. When it is cool enough to handle, make small balls out of the mix and flatten it a little between your palm. Press in some ground pistachios for garnish and enjoy!

I just added some food colour for the different coloured pedas, you can also add saffron to get that colour.