Okkarai is a famous traditional South Indian sweet dish that is made on the auspicious day of Diwali. I still remember my older days where in my mom prepares only Okkarai and Vadai for Diwali. Probably we weren't afford to make other sweets and snacks during those days. Still in now a days in many brahmin families Okkarai is one of the mandatory sweet which is prepared on the auspicious day of diwali. This simple dish Okkarai needs only less expensive ingredients and readily available materials in any house. Lets see how to prepare this yummy sweet dish now...
Preparation and Yield:
Ingredients:
Method:
Preparation and Yield:
| Preparation time | 10 mins |
| Cooking Time | 1 hour |
| Yield | 250gms |
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| Okkarai (Diwali Okkarai) |
Ingredients:
| Channa Dal/Kadalai Paruppu | 1 Cup |
| Grated Jaggery | 1 Cup |
| Grated Coconut | 2 tablespoon |
| Cardamom powder | 1/4 Teaspoon |
| Cashew Nuts | Few |
| Ghee | 2 tablespoon |
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| Okkarai Ingredients |
Method:
- Dry fry the Channa Dal (KadalaiParuppu) in a pan till it turns into golden brown color. Take the dry roasted Dal into the vessel and add water and pressure cook it allowing 2-3 whistles.
- Once the dal is cooked, drain the excess water using a striner and spread the cooked and strained channa dal in a clean white towel for 5 minutes just to ensure the dampness is absorbed by the towel
- Take the dried, cooked channa dal to the mixer and grind it to a nice powder. Take the ground channadal powder along with the grated coconut and keep it ready. Lets start with our jaggery suryp now.
- Take the grated jaggery in a vessel and add 1/4 cup of water and keep it in flame. Let the jaggery gets dissolved in water completely. Remove the vessel from flame and strain the jaggery juice to a pan to get rid of all sand or dust particles in jaggery
- Keep the pan in flame and bring the jaggery suryp to boil. When the syrup starts to thicken, if you take a drop of syrup and rub between your fingers, it should stick. This consistency is enough. We don't need string or stone consistency for okkarai. To the syrup, add the grated coconut and mix well. Then add the ground channa dal powder and give a good stir. Slowly the channadal mixture starts to cumble and becomes soft like puttu.
- Add 1 tablespoon of ghee and keep the flame very low and occasionally mix the okkarai. Heat another pan, add a teaspoon of ghee and roast the broken cashews till they turn golden brown color. Add the roasted cashews and cardamom and mix well.The okkarai breaks down into smaller pieces and it should be soft. When we take the small pieces in hand and make into ball then this is the right stage to remove the okkarai out off the flame.
- The delicious Okkarai is ready to serve
- The delicious Diwali Okkarai is now ready. Get set ready to Welcome Diwali!
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| Okkarai (Diwali Okkarai) |