Saturday, April 09, 2005

Happy New Year!

No, I am not out of my mind. I am well aware that it is the middle of April. Different cultures follow different calendars, and according to the Hindu calendar, this is the first month of the year!

In my home state of Maharastra, today is New Year's Day, also called Gudi Padwa. In India, every celebration and festival calls for a special dessert and I decided to make the easiest of them all: kheer.

Kheer is essentially a dessert made from some carb (rice or noodles) cooked in milk and sugar, flavored with some cardamom and saffron. The kheer most commonly made at my parents' home was sevayachi kheer. Seviyan is vermicelli, a very thin pasta.

Ingredients: vermicelli, raisins and bits of cashews. 
Vermicelli

Kheer is also made from rice, wheat kernels and makhana or puffed lotus seeds, an exotic ingredient if ever you saw one! Coconut milk can be used instead of dairy milk for some types of kheer.

Kheer is eaten hot with rotis or puris, or chilled and enjoyed just by itself. Here is my easy easy recipe which serves 5-6 regular people or 3-4 starving grad students.

Kheer

Ingredients
1 tbsp. ghee (clarified butter)
1 pint whole milk
3-4 tbsp. vermicelli (depending on how thick you want the kheer)
1 tbsp. broken cashews
1 tbsp. raisins
1/2 cup sugar
1 tsp. ground cardamom
2 pinches saffron

Method
  • Heat the ghee and fry the vermicelli, cashews and raisins till golden brown (watch out, it turns color quite suddenly). 
  • Add milk, sugar, cardamom and saffron. 
  • Bring to boil and simmer till it reduces a bit. The vermicelli will thicken it further. 
Is that easy or is it easy? Have a sweet and yummy new year!

11 comments:

  1. hey was wondering where you disappeared! didnt see any posts for some time..
    Wish u a belated Happy Gudi Padva
    Hope u enjoyed the semiya kheer :)

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  2. Hey... I miss your kheer! My poor white-man's replicate didn't do it justice. Thanks for the recipe and Happy New Year!

    Ian

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  3. Looks totally yumm!! I made Kesar Kulfi to mark the occassion.

    Love....

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  4. Hi Nupur! New to blogging and great to see a food blog with Indian recipes. Happy new year to you all. Do visit my fledgling blog at http://greenjackfruit.blogspot.com/

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  5. Hi Nupur,

    I'm so glad I found your site! It's great to have an Indian-themed site to turn to for inspiration. I'm an admitted Indian food nut, and I've been collecting recipes from all over India for years. I can't wait to see more of your recipes - I'll be back regularly!

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  6. Hey Anu, was taking a break in Canada but I'm back to blogging now :)
    Ian, come on over anytime you feel like having some kheer. Hope to see you guys and the babies soon.
    Tan, wow, Keras kulfi...yummm...I enjoy your blog BTW.
    Mika, I'm a newbie blogger myself...isn't it fun?
    Emily, I think of so many recipes to use cardamom and saffron...I make chai-spiced oatmeal with these (will blog about it soon), and savoury dishes like "biryani"..they are such versatile spices while being so exotic.
    Melissa, I'm so glad you like Indian food. I hope to introduce more home-style Indian recipes so stay tuned!

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  7. http://www.indian-recipe.net

    Theres a cool site i found...its all free indian recipes n they seem to updated it every day...even tho it says "updated weekly"...o well...enjoy!

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  8. Hey Nupur,
    Just made this kheer and it turned out yummmyyyyyyy..Thanks for the lovely recipe.
    Affly,
    Swapna

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  9. Just wondering if you posted your recipe on this site....

    http://www.theholidayspot.com/gudi_padwa/recipes.html

    Just curious....

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  10. Hi,
    I have never written a blog, but had to write to thank you for the outstanding pav bhaji recipe you gave-i mean its true my kitchen smelt like Sukh Sagar and Shiv Sagar combined.
    Just wanted to say a big thank you and now we have prayers this Thursday so I am going to try your Kheer recipe .
    Thanks again,
    Kanchan Idnani, St. Thomas-U.S.Virgin Islands.

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  11. Hey have tried doing this way,but the result was that the semaiya remained hard inspote of nicely stir frying in ghee..Wat cud be the reason??

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