Shobana's Cooking Journal!: Doodh Peda

These days, whenever I visit anyone, friends or relatives, I make it a point to make something nice, mostly a sweet dish and take it for them, instead of randomly picking up something on the go from a sweet shop. The whole cycle of thinking about what to make - depending on the distance of the visitees (is there a word like this?? I know consignor and consignee exists), buying necessary ingredients, putting in my effort preparing it, spending some anxious moments thinking how it would turn out and say a silent prayer that the people for whom it is made enjoy it..... all this give me a greater sense of satisfaction than buying a packaged box of assorted sweets from any renowned sweet shop.

On one such occasion, I made Doodh pedas for K’s aunt. The recipe is absolutely followed from http://showmethecurry.com/2007/11/05/peda-indian-sweet/ It yielded about 18 fairly large sized pedas. Also, it took me seven minutes in my M/W, but for Hetal and Anuja, it took only three mins. That was the only difference. Else, their recipe is absolutely untweaked.

Ingredients

Butter - 1/2 cup or 113 gms
Milk powder (Nestle Everyday) - 150 gms
Condensed milk (Nestle Milkmaid) - 1 tin of 400 gms)
Elaichi powder - 1 tsp
Saffron - one pinch or few strands
Raisins / badam / pistas - to decorate
Oil - 1 tbsp - to grease your hands while making pedas

Method

Take a fairly deep Microwave safe bowl
Add butter in it and just melt the butter. No need to bring it to a boil
Once this is done, add the condensed milk and milk powder
Mix very very well.
Now M/W for one minute
Stop and mix again
M/W for another minute and mix again
After two minutes or so, mix the cardamom powder and the saffron into this mixture
M/W again for one minute
Keep M/W-ing till the custardy-mixture reaches a slightly soft chapati dough consistency
Once this is reached, mix well and allow the mixture to cool for ten minutes. This is what the cooled mixture looks like.