Diwali Recipe- Gujarati Style Mohanthal

Mohanthal is a traditional Gujarati sweet prepared from besan, ghee, sugar and flavoured with saffron, cardamom and nutmeg. Usually, people get confused between mohanthal, besan ladoo and magas ladoo since all the recipes use the same ingredients.

Ingredients

To be mixed (it is called Dhrabo in gujarati)

2 cups besan/chickpea flour/gram flour
1 tablespoon milk room temperature
1 tablespoon melted ghee warm

For the sugar syrup

¾ cup sugar
½ cup water

Other Ingredients

¾ cup minus 1 tablespoon ghee in total we have used ¾ cup ghee, out of which 1 tablespoon we have mixed with besan for dhrabo
2 tablespoon milk powder
8 to 10 saffron strands
1 teaspoon cardamom/elaichi powder
¼ teaspoon nutmeg/jaiphal powder or grated jaiphal

For the garnish

1 teaspoon poppy seeds/khus khus
8-10 pistachios/pista chopped

Method

Step 1 – Dhrabo – Mix besan, ghee and milk

- Sift besan once through a fine sieve and take in a wide bowl. Make a well/hole in the center and add milk and melted warm ghee.

- Mix well, first with a spoon, and then rub with your fingers or between your palms to get a crumbly texture. It will resemble breadcrumb-like texture.

- Once you notice it has a crumbly texture, press it with your hands or the back of a spoon. Cover and keep this aside for half an hour. This process is called Dhrabo Devo in Gujarati. We are doing this process to get the grainy texture of the mohanthal.

Step 2 – Roasting Dhrabo mixture

- After half an hour, sift this mixture through a medium-hole sieve. You can crumble the mixture between your palms to break the lumps, so passing the mixture through the sieve becomes easy.

- Heat ¾ cup minus 1 tablespoon ghee in a pan on medium flame. In total, we have used ¾ cup ghee, out of which 1 tablespoon we have mixed with besan for dhrabo.

- Once ghee starts melting or becomes little warm, add besan mixture to it. Do not let the ghee become too hot, otherwise, there will be a typical smell in your mohanthal.

- Immediately start stirring and keep mixing. Cook on low-medium flame for 10-12 minutes and keep stirring continuously. Cook this mixture on a low flame till it becomes brown in colour and fragrant. It will also become light and airy, which you will notice while stirring. Keep stirring continuously till it is done.

- Switch off the flame and add 2 tablespoons of milk powder and keep stirring and mixing for about 1-2 minutes.

- For elaichi powder, dry roast 10-12 elaichi/cardamom for 2 minutes on low flame. Keep stirring. Remove from flame, let it cool. Once cool, you can peel them easily to remove their seeds. Crush using a mortar and pestle.

Step 3 – For the sugar syrup

- In a pan, combine sugar and water, and let it cook on a medium flame.

- Once the sugar syrup becomes hot, take out a spoonful syrup in a bowl and add kesar to it. Let it sit for some time.

- Once the syrup comes to a boil, reduce the flame to low and allow to simmer until you get a 1.5 string (thread) consistency. Once you notice that the syrup has thickened, switch off the flame and take out little quantity on a plate. Once it cools check the consistency.

- To check, place a drop of syrup between your finger and thumb and draw them apart, you should observe one firm string and one breaking in between. That is one and a half strings.

- Switch off the flame and add cardamom powder, nutmeg powder, and kesar soaked in syrup. Mix. Do not switch on the flame and cook the syrup after achieving the desired string consistency. Otherwise, syrup will become thicker.

Step 4 – Preparing Mohanthal

- Immediaely add sugar syrup to the besan mixture gradually. When you add sugar syrup, besan mixture should be hot/warm, it should not be cold/room temperature. Sugar syrup should be boiling hot. Mix. Do not switch on the flame while doing this process.

- Pour this mixture into a greased plate/tin, sprinkle chopped pista and khus khus. Let it cool down for 10 minutes. Once it sets a bit, cut it into square pieces. We just have to make square markings so that it becomes easy to remove the pieces once it is cooled.

- Do not remove the pieces at this stage. Now let it set.

- Once it is set, again run the knife through the markings and cut it into square pieces. Remove the pieces and store them in an air-tight container.