Mohanthal – Popular Gujarati Dessert
A popular Gujarati Indian dessert made on Diwali.
Ingredients:
- 500 grams gram flour.
- 300 grams ghee
- Half a cup of milk.
- 250 grams unsweetened mava or khoya.
- 350 grams of sugar.
- 2 tablespoons, coarsely grounded cardamom seeds.
- half teaspoon essence of saffron.
- 25 grams each of finely sliced almonds and pistachio nuts.
Method:
1. Add 50 grams of ghee to the flour and mix nicely with a fork.
2. Add the milk, mix thoroughly using a fork.
3. Sieve this mixture through a large holed sieve. The larger grains which are sieved through help to give the Mohanthal a lovely grainy texture.
4. Heat the remaining ghee and stir in the flour. Keep stirring and cooking the mixture until the flour looks golden brown. Please take your time with cooking the mixture – rushing it will burn the flour and give the Mohanthal a dark color and bitter taste.
5. Add khoya, cardamons, and nuts and cook till the mixture turns smooth and khoya turns a nice brown color. (Once you get this color, wait for the sugar syrup to reach its consistency).
6. Mix 2 cups water in the sugar and heat this mixture gently until it forms a syrup. The syrup should be of one-thread consistency. To check this – take a drop of the syrup and rub it between your thumb and first finger. When you separate the thumb and finger, the syrup should be thick enough to form a thin string.
7. Add syrup to the cooked flour and mava and keep on stirring till the mixture turns thick. Add a couple of drops of saffron essence. Keep stirring for a couple of minutes.
8. Pour the mixture into a greased dish similar to a flan dish (thali) and level the surface using a flat spoon. Sprinkle more sliced nuts to decorate the Mohanthal.
9. Let this cooldown. This could take several hours to cover the thali and leave it in a cool place. Then cut the Mohanthal into a small rectangle or diamond shape and store it in an air-tight container.
Suggested Read: Famous Food Of Indian States
