Safna's Cook Book

Festivals bring colours to your lives and  and festive season begins from August till December in India .  Starting with Ganesh Chaturthi on the cards, lined up with Navarathri & Deepavali.Sweet delights play a main role in these celebrations.Traditional steamed Modak's are something we all loved to eat during our childhood days.These Modaks are offered as naivedya to Lord Ganesha during the ten day celebration of the Ganesha festival which starts coming week. Its often referred to as "Indian Sweet Dumpling" because of the same method of cooking like dumplings.  In Kerala, we call this as Kozhukatta which is made in the same way like Modak with sweet stuffing made with coconut, jaggery, ghee & cardamom. Modak is the most popular delicacy made in Maharashtra during Ganesh Chaturthi and here it is called as Ukadiche Modak. Every year we can see different variants to this sweet in the market like Mango Modak, chocolate Modak, Motichoor Modak etc. I am here with the...

Mishti Doi is a traditional Bengali dessert made with milk, sugar and curd. Mishti in Bengali means sweet and Doi means dahi, so its also called sweet Dahi. It is prepared by thickening milk by boiling until it is reduced to half in quantity.We can set this in two ways: First is to ferment the milk overnight and second one is to steam the mixture. Earthenware is preferred as a container to make mishti doi as it contains porous walls to thicken the yoghurt and provides right temperature for the growth of the culture. We can add cardamom flavour or kesar flavour for a fragrance.Sugar can be replaced with date molasses or jaggery.Do try this delicate sweetened curd that makes a great dessert. Ingredients 1.Milk - 1 litre 2.Sugar - 3/4 cup 3.Curd - 1/4 cup Preparation 1.Boil 1 litre milk in a deep Kadai. 2.When it starts to boil, add 3/4 cup sugar to it. 3.Simmer the flame and reduce the milk to half.Let it rest for 8 minutes. 4.Caramelise 2 tbsp sugar with 1/2 cup water an...