If you have known me for a long time, you would know that i have very less affection for cooking, but I love new tastes, particularly if they are sweet. I will do anything to keep the meetha in my life. Even if I have to cook it, when no one is around to make it for me.
When I was getting married, I got a basket full of dried fruits and nuts. I ate almost all of them except for this huge bag of walnuts. I tried eating them, but I am not hugely fond of them. What I am fond of is something called "habshi halwa" - which is a mithai made of walnuts. [we siblings used to call us "qeemay wali mithai" - mince mithai :D] Therefore, I called my mother and asked her if I could make something out of the walnuts that have been sitting in my fridge for two months now and she suggested that I make "Walnut Halwa" and she whatsapped the recipe, and here begins the fiasco that was my akhrot ka halwa because of the badly written recipe. [Remember that I am not an active cook and need clearly written recipes to cook]
After I gathered the ingredients in many iterations [because I just set up house and had no idea how many maslas should be stocked in the kitchen] I set about to make akhrot ka halwa one fine Sunday evening.
So here are the ingredients:
Step 2: Now add, walnuts, semolina, sugar, milk and cook well for 4-5 minutes.
Here is where my problem started... I added the walnuts to the oil WITHOUT grinding them. That is what was missing from the details of the ingredients for a total novice cook like me. Second thing that was missing was how long am I supposed to fry the walnuts? Am I supposed to add all the ingredients at the same time? What?
So I fried the walnuts, and then they were not getting any softer and I started panicking. SO I decided to add the suji (semolina) and sugar and to my horror I realized that the walnuts are not going to get soft themselves. I need to do something and by then I was dealing with this:
So I turned off the fire and started pounding on the walnut, semolina and sugar mixture in my frying pan to break them into smaller pieces. and I pounded and pounded and till I was sure that the pieces are small enough to make the halwa soft enough to call halwa! And then I added milk and boo the milk quantity that was written was not enough to get the consistency that was show in the video, so I increased the quantity by half.
Step 3: Afterward, add butter, Khoya and dry nuts.
After I have saved the halwa from being a total disaster, I added the last ingredients and voila I was done. and here is the picture of my halwa that I enjoyed along with Ahsan and our landlord!
So, in conclusion if you are a novice cook, please make sure that you have gone through the recipe and video tutorial multiple times to notice everything. Ask plenty of questions from anyone who knows about cooking. So if you are making this akhrot ka halwa please make sure that you grind your akhrot coarsely in the beginning and save yourselves from the panicky twenty minutes of your life!
Sugandh
When I was getting married, I got a basket full of dried fruits and nuts. I ate almost all of them except for this huge bag of walnuts. I tried eating them, but I am not hugely fond of them. What I am fond of is something called "habshi halwa" - which is a mithai made of walnuts. [we siblings used to call us "qeemay wali mithai" - mince mithai :D] Therefore, I called my mother and asked her if I could make something out of the walnuts that have been sitting in my fridge for two months now and she suggested that I make "Walnut Halwa" and she whatsapped the recipe, and here begins the fiasco that was my akhrot ka halwa because of the badly written recipe. [Remember that I am not an active cook and need clearly written recipes to cook]
After I gathered the ingredients in many iterations [because I just set up house and had no idea how many maslas should be stocked in the kitchen] I set about to make akhrot ka halwa one fine Sunday evening.
So here are the ingredients:
- Walnuts 500 g [didn't have any weighing scales, so my saint of a sister told me that 500 g are approximately 4 cups]
- Semolina ½ cup
- Desi Ghee ½ cup
- Green Cardamom Seeds 8-10 seeds
- Sugar 1 cup
- Milk 1 cup
- Khoya 100 g [Amma told me that if I don't have any khoya I can use milk powder so I used olpers milk powder. They come in convenient sachets]
- Butter 100 g
- Dry Nuts 50 g
The cooking seemed fairly easy.
Step 1: In a pot, add Desi ghee, green cardamom seeds and sauté it.
Hmmm look easy. Since I grew up among wonderful cooks, I remember the term "choti ilaichi ko ghee mein karkaraein," that's practically a sound that will come from the pan when you saute the green cardamom sees.
Here is where my problem started... I added the walnuts to the oil WITHOUT grinding them. That is what was missing from the details of the ingredients for a total novice cook like me. Second thing that was missing was how long am I supposed to fry the walnuts? Am I supposed to add all the ingredients at the same time? What?
So I fried the walnuts, and then they were not getting any softer and I started panicking. SO I decided to add the suji (semolina) and sugar and to my horror I realized that the walnuts are not going to get soft themselves. I need to do something and by then I was dealing with this:
So I turned off the fire and started pounding on the walnut, semolina and sugar mixture in my frying pan to break them into smaller pieces. and I pounded and pounded and till I was sure that the pieces are small enough to make the halwa soft enough to call halwa! And then I added milk and boo the milk quantity that was written was not enough to get the consistency that was show in the video, so I increased the quantity by half.
Step 3: Afterward, add butter, Khoya and dry nuts.
After I have saved the halwa from being a total disaster, I added the last ingredients and voila I was done. and here is the picture of my halwa that I enjoyed along with Ahsan and our landlord!
Sugandh
