The best memories of my Diwali are the ones spent at home, the Ghar Wali Diwali.
Nostalgic Diwali! There are so many nostalgic memories of my Diwali celebration that stays quite close to my heart. Some memories bring smile to my face and some bring tears craving for those wonderful moments again. The reminiscences of the mood that is created in my home a week before Diwali celebration were beautiful with the smell of sweet savouries rising from the kitchen and the liveliness of the surrounding with family and relatives, coming and going is nostalgic.
Around a month before the Diwali starts, my mom and my granny used to make some important savoury snacks in the kitchen and chatting stories. My siblings and I would discuss the type of fireworks we should buy for the Diwali, enjoying the unique fragrance coming from the kitchen and even indulging in some hot savouries handled by our mom. Apart from homemade fresh and hot laddus and murukkus, we will also be tasting different kind of sweets gifted by our relatives and neighbours. In turn, we had a duty to carry the sweet boxes to gift it to the neighbours next door. Ah! it is such a delight when I look back at those days being treated like a royal guest when we enter our neighbours home with a big bag of full of sweets in our hands.
Diwali, is the only festival in India wherein a numerous amount of sweets is made and shared, a festival expressed through sweet foods. The tradition of making Diwali sweets is to celebrate the killing of Narakasura, a demon by Lord Krishna. They are also celebrated for the return of Lord Rama to his kingdom Ayodhya after killing the Demon King Ravana. To celebrate the victory of good over evil, Hindus make and distribute lots of sweets to family, friends and relatives.
And when I say sweets, it is not one or two but plenty of them. My favourite sweet is the Adirsam (அதிரசம்) and I am assured to eat a lot of them even the last bit that will be saved for me by my mom. How I love to eat them!
This Diwali, I tried my best to make a similar Adhirasam recipe taught to me by my mom for my kids who are unable to enjoy the festive mood of Diwali back home along with other savoury dishes like Laddu, Somasu, Murukku and Kara Sev. For my little ones, it is my duty to bring in at least half of what I enjoyed eating during the Diwali.
Ingredients
Rice Flour - 1 kg
Jaggery – about 3/4 kg
Cardamom -3 to 4 (remove the pods)
Oil for deep frying
Method of Preparation
Time has changed a lot now and making the sweet dishes all by myself is a cumbersome job mainly because most of the time, it is just me and the kitchen. That is the lifestyle of living in a foreign land. The below video #GharWaliDiwali by Pepsi and Kurkure can be related to many Desi women staying far from home, a very emotional one to watch. How I wished to have wings! Yes, I do miss the real spirit of Diwali celebration back in India. Do you miss your Diwali celebration too?
Nostalgic Diwali! There are so many nostalgic memories of my Diwali celebration that stays quite close to my heart. Some memories bring smile to my face and some bring tears craving for those wonderful moments again. The reminiscences of the mood that is created in my home a week before Diwali celebration were beautiful with the smell of sweet savouries rising from the kitchen and the liveliness of the surrounding with family and relatives, coming and going is nostalgic.
Around a month before the Diwali starts, my mom and my granny used to make some important savoury snacks in the kitchen and chatting stories. My siblings and I would discuss the type of fireworks we should buy for the Diwali, enjoying the unique fragrance coming from the kitchen and even indulging in some hot savouries handled by our mom. Apart from homemade fresh and hot laddus and murukkus, we will also be tasting different kind of sweets gifted by our relatives and neighbours. In turn, we had a duty to carry the sweet boxes to gift it to the neighbours next door. Ah! it is such a delight when I look back at those days being treated like a royal guest when we enter our neighbours home with a big bag of full of sweets in our hands.
Diwali, is the only festival in India wherein a numerous amount of sweets is made and shared, a festival expressed through sweet foods. The tradition of making Diwali sweets is to celebrate the killing of Narakasura, a demon by Lord Krishna. They are also celebrated for the return of Lord Rama to his kingdom Ayodhya after killing the Demon King Ravana. To celebrate the victory of good over evil, Hindus make and distribute lots of sweets to family, friends and relatives.
And when I say sweets, it is not one or two but plenty of them. My favourite sweet is the Adirsam (அதிரசம்) and I am assured to eat a lot of them even the last bit that will be saved for me by my mom. How I love to eat them!
This Diwali, I tried my best to make a similar Adhirasam recipe taught to me by my mom for my kids who are unable to enjoy the festive mood of Diwali back home along with other savoury dishes like Laddu, Somasu, Murukku and Kara Sev. For my little ones, it is my duty to bring in at least half of what I enjoyed eating during the Diwali.
Recipe for Adhirasam
Source: Wikipedia |
Rice Flour - 1 kg
Jaggery – about 3/4 kg
Cardamom -3 to 4 (remove the pods)
Oil for deep frying
Method of Preparation
- In a saucepan, boil the jaggery in water until all the jaggery is dissolved in the water.
- Place the rice flour in a large plate or pan and spread it evenly.
- Slowly pour the hot jaggery into the rice flour and as you pour, mix the contents with a large spoon or ladle to make a dough little by little.
- After making a dough, cover it with a lid and keep it aside for about a day or so at the room temperature. In between, you can knead it now and then.
- After a day, take and knead the dough again to make small balls out of it.
- Using a chappathi roll, slightly roll the dough into a circular shape just like you do for rolling chappathi and deep fry in oil until cooked light brown on both sides.
- Remove the adhirasam after filtering the excess oil by pressing it in between two slotted ladles or between the ladle and the pan.
- Finally, place it in a clean white cloth or paper towel to absorb the rest of the oil from the adhirasam.
- Store in an airtight container and eat wherever you want but within two to three weeks ( if it remains ;) ).
Happy Deepavali to you and your family. For the first time in many years, we are spending deepavali in Chennai and loving every minute of it. Adhirasam photo looks nice and thanks for the recipe. I am hungry now.
ReplyDeleteAdhirasam is one jaggery delicacy I like best besides manoharam.Adirasam tastes better after a couple of days.Happy Deepavali to you.
ReplyDeleteYou've brought back childhood memories of Diwali when Mom would make sweets on the eve till late night and when I woke up wouldn't be allowed to savor till Laxmi Puja is not done. Cute:)
ReplyDeleteOhh! Atirasa! Drooling! Yes, festivals are to be celebrated with family... We celebrate Deepavali differently. The childhood memories of Tualsi Pooje, Gopooje, Angadipooje all will be missed here in Pune.
ReplyDeleteTC! Keep smiling :)