Carrot Fudge/ Carrot Barfi

I know these days I'm a bit irregular in posting new recipes. The reason behind is that we moved from USA to India. So, there's lot of things happening at our end. The major thing is shifting to our new home. Hope I'll be regular once we get everything settled at our end. Amen!!

One of few things which we used to miss in USA is our family and the way festivals are celebrated here in India. The real essence of Indian festivals can be enjoyed being in India itself and so did we this time in Holi. This was my first Holi with my in-laws after my marriage. So, I was quite excited and made lot of sweets and savory items. One of them was "Carrot Fudge". 

Carrots marks Indian winters and they are incomplete without them. There are lot of dessert delicacies made with carrots. One of them is "Gajar Ka Halwa". I already posted the recipe here. You can have a look here:

http://flavorsofmyplate.blogspot.in/2015/01/gajar-ka-halwaa-quintessential-dessert.html

As this festivals marks the ending of Indian winters so I thought of enjoying these last few days of winter by having carrots in the form of dessert. So instead of making the usual "Gajar Ka Halwa" (Carrot Pudding) I decided to go for "Carrot Fudge" (Carrot Barfi). This is a very easy recipe and takes very less time to make.

My family enjoyed it having with the various other sweet and savory items. Hope you'll enjoy it as we did.  So, let's get started:

Ingredients:

1. Carrots: 1 kg

2. Milk: 2 cups
3. Khoa (Solidified milk): 1 cup

3. Sugar: 2 cups (as per requirement)

4. Ghee (clarified butter): 2 tbsp + 1 tbsp

5. Green Cardamoms (crushed): 1 tbsp

6. Chopped Dry fruits(as per your choice): 1/2 cup

Method:

1. Wash the carrots thoroughly and peel off the skin. Now grate them with the help of a vegetable grater.

2. In a heavy bottom pan pour milk and let it boil on medium heat. Reduce the milk to half. Stir continuously as milk tends to stick at the bottom of the pan.

3. Take another pan add 2 tbsp of ghee and add grated carrots. Let the carrot cook on medium heat until all the carrot juice gets evaporated. 

4. Now add sugar to the carrot mixture and mix until sugar gets well combined with the mixture.

5. Once the carrot is well cooked and no juice is left it's time to add this mixture to the reduced milk. Cook the carrot in this milk until everything gets dry.

6. Now add the khoa, crushed cardamoms and chopped dry fruits to the fudge mixture and mix well. Let it cool down.

7. Take a plate and grease it with 1 tbsp of ghee and spread the fudge mixture on this plate. Sprinkle finely chopped dry fruits on the fudge mixture and press it well so that it gets stick to the mixture.

8. Cut the fudge into desired shape. 

9. Enjoy!!

Note:

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Gajar Ka Halwa.......A quintessential dessert of Indian Winters

A very Happy New Year to all my readers. May this new year flourish with new discoveries, wonderful inspirations and happiness to fulfill all your desires. Hope you all had a wonderful holiday season and enjoyed with your near and dear ones.

I know last week I was bit irregular in posting since there was so many things going on at my end. It was my husband's birthday so we hosted a small party at our home followed by a Christmas potluck, a dinner invitation at our friend's place, prepping for the new year celebrations and finally welcoming the new year.

There are few food items which are specially prepared in winters and without which the winters are incomplete; "Gajar Ka Halwa" is one of them. Back in India, marriages and parties during winter are incomplete without it. Such is the influence of this delectable dessert.

There are many variations of this recipe like microwave version, pressure cooker version, sugar free version blah...blah...blah but this tastes best when it's made in a traditional way, where grated carrot is slow cooked in milk and then a generous amount of ghee, khoa and dry fruits are added to it. This makes the recipe very rich in calories. I need to confess here that I'm not that much calorie conscious but yes, I do care about my waistline.

During winters those red, sweet and long carrots can be found copiously and my mind starts drifting shall I have them in salads or make some Gajar Ka Halwa out of those. After having a prolonged dilemma I manage to convince myself to indulge into this sinful bowl of Halwa. Whenever I have a bowl it makes me feel guilty :( So, I tried to keep this recipe low in calories as much as I can. 

So, let's relish this bowl of bliss:

Ingredients:

1. Carrots: 1 kg

2. Low fat Milk: 2 cups

3. Ghee (clarified butter): 2 tbsp

4. Green Cardamoms (crushed): 3-4 

5. Sweetened Condensed Milk: 1 and 1/2 cup

6. Dry fruits (Cashews, Raisins, Almonds): as required

Method:

1. Wash the carrots thoroughly and peel off the skin. Now grate them with the help of a vegatable grater.

2. Take the milk in a heavy bottomed pan. As the milk starts boiling add the grated carrots and stir it continuously on low-medium heat.

3. Once all the milk is absorbed by the carrots add the sweetened condensed milk (since I have used sweetened condensed milk so there's no need of extra sugar. But you can adjust it according to your taste buds) Let it cook for 10-12 mins or until is mixture is completely dry. Stir the halwa continuously to assure that it doesn't stick to the bottom.

4. In a separate pan add ghee and fry the dry fruits. Now add them to the halwa along with the ghee. 

5. Now sprinkle the crushed cardamoms and give it a nice mix.

6. Enjoy it hot or cold. 

Note:

For regular updates just click the "Like" button on my Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Flavors-Of-My-Plate/737185573034586?ref=hl

You can also follow me on:

Instagram: http://instagram.com/ananyabhowmick

Twitter: https://twitter.com/flavorsofmyplat

If you want the recipe in Bengali, Gujarati, Hindi, Tamil, Telugu, Urdu (or any other language) click on the Google Translate button on the left side.