Besan ke laddoo 2.0

It's been about 6 months since I last witnessed the making of my mom's delectable Besan ke laddoo. The one reason I remember the last time so clearly was because it took great effort on my part to stir the ghee+chick-pea flour(besan) in the wok(kadhai) to get them to their characteristic light brown color, an indication of the laddoo reaching the correct amount of cooking/heating. In the process, I got sore arms for the next two days, and hence, I had an excuse for not doing pull-ups for a while. So, if you want to get big arms, try getting employed as a helper under a halvaee(the dude who makes sweets/halva).

It's almost become customary for my mom to make besan ke laddoo every time I come home, or more so, just before I am leaving home for college. Okay, stating this openly might get me into a bit of trouble with my college folks, but nevertheless. 

So here's my TAKE-2 on Besan ke laddoo.

For some reason , my mom had discussed the recipe for besan laddoo with her sister. She  comes from a family with a legacy of sorts in cooking. Nothing professional, but my grandmother was this really good cook. And that trait remains dominant in my mom, and all my maternal side aunts(Mausi, for convenience). 

So this time around, after getting a few tips from my mausi, my mom had a few new tricks up her sleeve. This was a good thing. Here's the tip my mausi gave...

If you mix in a small amount of ghee and milk into the laddoos before you work with them on the wok, it significantly improves the texture of the laddoo mixture, and quite obviously hence, it's taste!

Now you see, If you don't happen to be popular, you don't have to bother about losing your family's trade secret for some special recipe. Specially so if you are convinced that not many people will take great pains trying what you did.

But that definitely doesn't mean that you wouldn't like to be popular, does it? Moving on.

Now it was onto the wok. All of the pre-worked besan, and ghee(clarified butter), which turned out to be in about a 4:1 ratio was tossed into a wok, and fired up on high flame. Now it was a matter of time, and a lot of mixing, before they turned to that perfect-brown hue.

Then it was in with the powdered sugar and elaichi(cardamom), and more stirring, and tasting the mixture from time to time. 

Here's one thing. Do not add sugar while heating the besan-ghee mixture in th very beginning. The sugar tends to become brown early on, giving the impression that the besan is well cooked, in which case, what one would end up with is 

a) A lot of uncooked and wasted besan

b) Stomach ache, in case one miraculously managed to shape the mixture into balls, and more importantly, eat them!

All said and done, actually pretty well done, it was time to taste the final mixture. It was all fine. We just overshot the sugar. Usually, the ideal sugar:besan shouldn't exceed 1:2, until you are really desperately low on blood sugar. Our mixture clearly felt a tad bit sweet.

So it was back to the wok. With just a bit of besan, ghee and a bit of time, mom saved the day, as usual! And it was only a matter of time before I could gobble a few laddoos. But NO! Who wants to wait? I just scooped a bit of the laddoo mixture into a bowl and stuffed it into my mouth. HEAVVVENNNNN!!!!!

You see, shape is immaterial. As often quoted, 'Beauty lies within...' Someone mischievously rubbed off a few words. The original phrase must have been 'Beauty lies within the laddoo'. So why trouble mom to make balls out of the whole thing, when it tastes good without that last bit of effort? But the good soul that my mom is, she shaped all of the mixture into nice, cute looking things, which would eventually be devoured by desperately hungry and watering mouths!

I just feel happy for having sat next to her in mom's own little kitchen-endeavors, right since the age of 4, as early as my memory takes me. Each of my memories remind me of the exponential learning curve I went through. I hope it all adds up sometime in the times to come.