I am going to do this piece as a write up for a change instead of writing it as a recipe. Reason for it is, it had and has been a long and tedious process of making mistakes and learning from it when I made these.
I rather have a very interesting story of being nailing it down on my first attempt and then forgetting of how to do it. Failing on all my further attempts of achieving the success I tasted for the first time. It was a long journey, but I never lost hope and keep trying whenever I get chance to do it. And my poor hubby has to pay for all the failures, as he is the one who did all the tasting :D :P.
Anyways, after so many failures, I came across a post in my facebook foodie group by Garima Sarolia Narera (her blog link for rasgullas: https://cafegarima.wordpress.com/2014/06/15/rasgulla/). Thought let my try few variations which she suggested. After trying, it turned out good. But I think I might have missed few things or probably did it wrong that is why was not perfect.
But finally, in this attempt I almost nailed it. It was a moment of bliss which made me recall my first successful attempt and let me forget all my failures in between. Although Garima has perfectly written her blog post mentioned above on how to make these beauties, I thought of writing this again to help myself not to forget the steps I had to go through to reach this point.
Without further ado, presenting to you detailed step by step process of making these beauties called "Rasgullas".
Ingredients:
1/2 litre full fat milk
3 cups sugar
5 cups water
1/2 cup curd
1 tsp cardamom powder
pinch of saffron strands
2 tsp pistachios - cut into thin silvers
1 large bowl filled with room temperature water
5 lt pressure cooker or any large bowl.
muslin cloth - I know not an ingredient but can't do without it :P
Recipe:
0. Line a strainer with muslin cloth. Put this over a large enough bowl which can fit your strainer on top of it and set it aside.
1. Take 1 litre of whole milk.
Note: Avoid taking any other type of milk, be it skimmed/2%/1% or anything else. First of all, you wont get same amount of chenna out of them and taste won't be very great.
2. Boil the milk over high - medium heat. Keep stirring it, else it might stick at bottom of the pan.
Note: If possible use a thick bottomed non-stick pan.
3. Once milk starts boiling, start adding 1 tbsp yogurt at a time and stirring the milk in between additions of yogurt. Keep adding until chenna starts to separate out. At this point, stop adding yogurt and switch off the gas. Strain it using strainer lined with muslin cloth.
Note: Now to separate chenna, I used to use lemon juice. And that works perfectly fine. But I used to get a little bit of lemon flavor in my rasgullas, even though I used to wash the chenna properly. So as Garima suggested, I started using curd/yogurt, and it worked wonders.
Advantages:
a. No more lemon taste in my rasgullas now.
b. No extra step of washing my chenna after straining it :)
4. Let it cool for 5 minutes, so that it won't be as hot when you touch it. Close the muslin cloth and tie the knot on top tightly. Hang this over the tap or cabinet handle for around 20-25 minutes.
Note: Do not let it hang for more than that. Because if you do, it will start to dry up more than you want it to and will start turning into paneer.
5. Once cooled and dried a little after 20-25 minutes, take it out of muslin cloth on a flat surface. I used normal large plate/thali. Texture should be a little crumbly but still wet enough so that it doesn't feel dry or dehydrated.
6. Now its time to do the labor. Start pressing it with heels of your palm and slide it on the plate with small smooth motions. Keep doing this until chenna comes together in a dough like structure. It took me around 12 minutes to reach that stage.
7. Once done, make small balls out of the dough. Keep in mind, they will be double in size, so shape them accordingly. On the other hand, take a 5lt pressure cooker or similar size utensil. Add 5 cups water,1 cup sugar and 1 tsp cardamom powder to it. Heat it over medium heat and let it come to a rolling boil. Do stir it in between until sugar gets dissolved, else it might stick at bottom and caramelize.
8. Once water starts to boil, add rasgullas in it and cover it with a heavy and large enough lid (Do not use cooker lid). Let them boil for 12-15 minutes. Check once in between at half way mark around 6 - 8 minutes.
Note: In order to check if they are done or not, at 12 minute mark, take out one rasgulla and put it in a glass of room temperature water. If it sinks down, that means it is cooked perfectly.
9. Once cooked, carefully and gently take the rasgulla's out in a big bowl of room temperature water.
10. Add 2 cups sugar in remaining sugar-water syrup and let it come to boil again. Let it boil for a minute. After a minute, close the heat. Let it cool for about 2-3 minutes. Add saffron strands to it then.
Note: Do not add saffron strands when it is boiling. Saffron tends to leave a bitter taste when added in boiling liquids.
11. Take ragullas out of water, squeeze them gently to take extra water out of them and add these to sugar syrup. Let them cool to room temperature. After that put it in refrigerator for atleast 4-5 hours.
Note: Please do not eat rasgulla's when they are hot. I know you will be tempted to eat them as soon as they come to room temperature. But trust me, I am speaking from personal experience, they taste precious after 4-5 hours of refrigeration time. So control yourself for this one time and let them "Chill Off" by themselves for some time :D.
12. Server them cold. Garnish them with pistachios on top.
I rather have a very interesting story of being nailing it down on my first attempt and then forgetting of how to do it. Failing on all my further attempts of achieving the success I tasted for the first time. It was a long journey, but I never lost hope and keep trying whenever I get chance to do it. And my poor hubby has to pay for all the failures, as he is the one who did all the tasting :D :P.
Anyways, after so many failures, I came across a post in my facebook foodie group by Garima Sarolia Narera (her blog link for rasgullas: https://cafegarima.wordpress.com/2014/06/15/rasgulla/). Thought let my try few variations which she suggested. After trying, it turned out good. But I think I might have missed few things or probably did it wrong that is why was not perfect.
Without further ado, presenting to you detailed step by step process of making these beauties called "Rasgullas".
1/2 litre full fat milk
3 cups sugar
5 cups water
1/2 cup curd
1 tsp cardamom powder
pinch of saffron strands
2 tsp pistachios - cut into thin silvers
1 large bowl filled with room temperature water
5 lt pressure cooker or any large bowl.
muslin cloth - I know not an ingredient but can't do without it :P
Recipe:
0. Line a strainer with muslin cloth. Put this over a large enough bowl which can fit your strainer on top of it and set it aside.
1. Take 1 litre of whole milk.
Note: Avoid taking any other type of milk, be it skimmed/2%/1% or anything else. First of all, you wont get same amount of chenna out of them and taste won't be very great.
2. Boil the milk over high - medium heat. Keep stirring it, else it might stick at bottom of the pan.
Note: If possible use a thick bottomed non-stick pan.
3. Once milk starts boiling, start adding 1 tbsp yogurt at a time and stirring the milk in between additions of yogurt. Keep adding until chenna starts to separate out. At this point, stop adding yogurt and switch off the gas. Strain it using strainer lined with muslin cloth.
Note: Now to separate chenna, I used to use lemon juice. And that works perfectly fine. But I used to get a little bit of lemon flavor in my rasgullas, even though I used to wash the chenna properly. So as Garima suggested, I started using curd/yogurt, and it worked wonders.
Advantages:
a. No more lemon taste in my rasgullas now.
b. No extra step of washing my chenna after straining it :)
4. Let it cool for 5 minutes, so that it won't be as hot when you touch it. Close the muslin cloth and tie the knot on top tightly. Hang this over the tap or cabinet handle for around 20-25 minutes.
Note: Do not let it hang for more than that. Because if you do, it will start to dry up more than you want it to and will start turning into paneer.
6. Now its time to do the labor. Start pressing it with heels of your palm and slide it on the plate with small smooth motions. Keep doing this until chenna comes together in a dough like structure. It took me around 12 minutes to reach that stage.
8. Once water starts to boil, add rasgullas in it and cover it with a heavy and large enough lid (Do not use cooker lid). Let them boil for 12-15 minutes. Check once in between at half way mark around 6 - 8 minutes.
Note: In order to check if they are done or not, at 12 minute mark, take out one rasgulla and put it in a glass of room temperature water. If it sinks down, that means it is cooked perfectly.
10. Add 2 cups sugar in remaining sugar-water syrup and let it come to boil again. Let it boil for a minute. After a minute, close the heat. Let it cool for about 2-3 minutes. Add saffron strands to it then.
Note: Do not add saffron strands when it is boiling. Saffron tends to leave a bitter taste when added in boiling liquids.
11. Take ragullas out of water, squeeze them gently to take extra water out of them and add these to sugar syrup. Let them cool to room temperature. After that put it in refrigerator for atleast 4-5 hours.
Note: Please do not eat rasgulla's when they are hot. I know you will be tempted to eat them as soon as they come to room temperature. But trust me, I am speaking from personal experience, they taste precious after 4-5 hours of refrigeration time. So control yourself for this one time and let them "Chill Off" by themselves for some time :D.
12. Server them cold. Garnish them with pistachios on top.
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