Yummy Recipes 4 All

Rasmalai, also known as Rossomalai, is a dessert originating from the Bengal region in the eastern part of the Indian subcontinent. The name ras-malāi is the Hindi cognate which comes from two words in Bengali: rōś, meaning "juice", and mālāi, meaning "cream". It has been described as "a rich cheesecake without a crust". The sweet is of Bengali origin; according to K.C. Das Grandsons, it was invented by K.C. Das.

Ras malai or rasmalai consists of white, cream, or yellow coloured flattened balls of chenna soaked in malai (clotted cream) flavoured with cardamom. The balls are cooked in sugar syrup and milk with saffron, pistachios and kheer as stuffing.

Homemade ras malai is usually made from powdered milk, all-purpose flour, baking powder and oil, which are kneaded to form a dough, moulded into balls, and dropped into simmering milk cream.

Rasmalai is usually served chilled. It is one of my favourite Indian sweets. Rasmalai taste best when it is chilled overnight. As the balls soak the milk and all flavour get intermixed well in 8-10 hours. So to serve the next day, make them a day in advance.

To make rasmalai balls the milk is first boiled and then curdled by adding lemon juice or vinegar. After draining the water from the curdled milk, the thing that is left behind is called the chenna or the paneer. This chenna/paneer is then mashed until it becomes smooth. Then small balls are made from that chenna and dropped into the boiling sugar syrup till it gets cooked.

To make the thickened milk or the ras into which the rasmalai balls are finally dipped and chilled before serving, full fat milk is boiled till it thickens slightly. It is then flavoured with saffron and cardamom.

My husband and I have sweet tooth, we love Indian sweets a lot. Here we are not getting every Indian sweet, so we thought to try this at home and it came out super delicious on our first try to make rasmalai. Now we can make them whenever we want to, we just need to have the ingredients.

Rasmalai is an easy to make sweet dish and also requires very few ingredients.

Ingredients

Preparation

For Rasmalai Balls

• Add full fat milk in a heavy bottom container and let it boil.

• Stir the milk occasionally so that it won't burn or stick to the bottom of the container.

• Once the milk starts to a boil, turn off the flame and add 1/2 cup of water to the boiling milk to bring down its temperature.

• Then add lemon juice into it and stir till milk curdles completely.

• Pass the curdled milk through a muslin cloth.

• Rinse it well. Proper washing of this chenna will remove the tang from the curdled milk.

• Drain the curdled milk through a muslin cloth and squeeze off the excess water.

• Gather the muslin cloth from all the sides to squeeze the chenna well. Chenna ­should  be well dried.

• Hang the cloth for about 30 minutes to remove the excess water.

• Once done, knead the chenna/paneer for about 10 minutes.

• Then make the small balls (either round shape or disc shape) out of it.

For Sugar Syrup

• Take a container and add sugar and water into it. Bring it to boil. Stir until the sugar gets completely dissolved.

• Boil the sugar syrup for about 10 minutes.

• Then already prepared paneer/chenna balls into the boiling sugar syrup.

• Cover it and cook it for about 10-12 minutes on a medium flame. The chenna/paneer balls will be double in its size by then.

• Let it cool completely.

For Making Rabri/Ras

• Heat full fat milk in a pan and let it boil.

• Add 1 tbsp of hot milk to the saffron and stir well.

• Once the milk comes to a boil, lower the flame and continue to stir the milk at regular intervals.

• Add this saffron mixture to the milk and boil it till it gets reduced to half. Keep stirring it occasionally.

• Add sugar and mix well.

• Now add cardamom powder, rose water (optional) and chopped nuts and boil it for another 5 minutes.

• Then turn off the flame and let it cool completely.

For Assembling Rasmalai

• Refrigerate ras/rabri for 2-3 hours if you want to serve chilled.

• Remove chenna/paneer balls from sugar syrup and press gently between your palm or between the spatulas to remove excess sugar syrup.

• Transfer it to a dessert plate or to a bowl, and then add in rabri on the top of it.

• Refrigerate for 2-3 hours or overnight.

• Garnish the rasmalai with sliced/chopped nuts (pistachios, almonds and/or cashew nuts) before serving.

• Serve the chilled rasmalai and enjoy yummy rasmalai with your loved ones.