Rasmalai is a Bengali delicacy that is very popular among the Indian Sweet Lovers. Ras malai – Ras literally translates to “juice” and malai to “cream”. Rasmalai is classic Indian festive dessert made with milk, an acidic ingredient, sugar and saffron.
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Preparation Time: 10 minutes
- Cooking Time:15-25 minutes
Ingredients :
- Whole milk 500 ml
- Lemon Juice/vinegar 2 tablespoon
- Corn starch 1 teaspoon
- Sugar 1 cup
- Water 4 cups
- Ice cubes 1 cup
Ingredients For Syrup:
- Milk 300 ml
- Sugar to taste
- Saffron stands few
- Yellow food color little bit
- Pistachios finely chopped
- Cardamom (Ilaichi) powder 1/2 teaspoon
Instructions:
- Add milk to a large pan and bring it to boil.
- Once the milk start boiling turn off the gas and add lemon juice and mix it well.
- Give everything a stir, and the milk should start curdling immediately. Let the curds sit in the pot like this for about 5 to 10 minutes.
- Next you need to strain the curds through a cheesecloth and rinse the curds with cold water. This really helps to cool the cheese and it helps wash away the lemon juice or vinegar.
- Then, gather up the corners of the cloth and squeeze out the excess liquid from the cheesecloth.
- Now tie a knot on the cheesecloth and hang the chena on your faucet to let more water drain for about 1-2 hour.
- After convenient time take the chena in large wide plate.
- Add cornflour and start mashing the chena till it’s smooth.
- Set the clock to 10 minutes and mash constantly for 10 minutes using your palm. Once it’s smooth, make small balls out of it and set side.
- The balls when dipped in sugar syrup double in size so make the balls accordingly. Usually you will get 8-10 balls from 500 ml of milk.
- In a wide pan add 1 cup of sugar and 4 cups of water and bring it to boil. The water to sugar ratio is 4:1. So for every 1 cup of sugar we add 4 cups of water. This ratio is important to get the right syrup consistency. Drop the balls in the syrup only when it comes to a full boil and the heat should be set to maximum throughout the duration of 15-20 minutes till the balls are cooking.
- Drop the balls in boiling sugar syrup and cook for 15-20 minutes. The balls will double in size by then.
- In the meantime add ice cubes to a bowl and then add some of sugar syrup to it and set aside.
- Take out the balls from the syrup and drop them in cold sugar syrup set aside for 10 minutes.
- While the balls are cooling down make lets make thickened milk.
- In a heavy bottom pan, boil 300 ml of milk. Soak few strands of saffron in a tablespoon of warm milk and set aside.
- Once the milk comes to a boil, lower the flame and continue to stir the milk at regular intervals.
- Add sugar and yellow food color mix.
- After 15 minutes the milk will thicken to desired consistency, add soaked saffron, crushed cardamom and finely chopped pistachios , bring the mixture to boil and turn off the gas and set aside for 10-15 minutes.
- Take out the cooled down rasmalai balls from the cold sugar syrup bowl. Squeeze and flatten lightly using your hands and put in sugar syrup(thickened milk).
- Refrigerate the rasmalai overnight or for 5-6 hours.
- Serve chilled by garnishing with some sliced pistachios and some saffron strands.
- Enjoy.
