Recipe- Mouthwatering Mysore Pak

Mysore Pak is a traditional sweet prepared for Diwali with besan flour, sugar, and ghee. Mysore Pak is said to have originated from the kitchen of Mysore Palace to delight the kings and their families. As the authentic Mysore Pak involves a lot of ghee this sweet is considered as Royal sweet.

Ingredients

1 cup besan flour
1 ¼ cups of sugar
¾ cup water
½ cup ghee + ½ cup oil

Method

* Sieve gram flour and keep it ready.

* If you are using homemade gram flour sieve it twice.

* If you are making a large batch then keep the besan flour in a cup with a small ladle to add into sugar syrup gradually.

* Measure 1.25 cups of sugar and keep it ready. You can reduce a quarter cup of sugar and use only one cup of sugar if you are concerned about sweetness but I believe the perfect texture comes only with the extra quarter cup of sugar.

* Keep a half cup of ghee and half cup of oil ready in a pan. If you are new in making Mysore Pak, you can take a tablespoon of ghee and a tablespoon of oil extra at the beginning itself in the same pan. Ideally, for one cup of Besan flour, one cup of ghee and one cup of oil is enough. But some kind of Besan flour may need extra tbsp or two of ghee.

* As we will be doing the final process very quickly you may not have time to take and heat extra ghee or oil to keep everything ready before making Mysore Pak.

* We need two stove burners at a time to make this sweet. Never forget that the oil + ghee should be kept very hot all the while during the preparation.

* First of all, grease a pan or plate with ghee and keep it ready.

* Measure a half cup of ghee and a half cup of oil and start heating in a separate pan (choose a pan with handle, so that you can pour quickly & keep it back on the stove to heat). If the liquid is hot enough, then reduce the flame to medium.

* Now in another heavy bottom pan, which is easy to scrap and mix, take the sugar with a cup of water and boil it.

* Let the sugar syrup boil for 5 minutes until you get the bubbly texture.

* Now check the one string consistency as shown in the figure. Try always to be available near the stove, because you may miss this stage and sugar syrup goes to the next stage, which is not useful for Mysore Pak.

* When you get the one string consistency, immediately start adding Besan flour gradually in batches. Use a ladle or small cup to add slowly.

* Quickly mix the syrup so that the besan flour incorporates well within the sugar syrup.

* Before adding the next batch of Besan flour make sure to mix the first batch completely.

* Add all the besan flour batch by batch and mix thoroughly.

* You have to do the whole process by mixing and scrapping quickly.

* This is relatively a quick sweet to make but all you need is your arm strength for continuous mixing.

* Mix all besan flour with the sugar syrup completely without any lumps as shown. The mixture starts bubbling, now quickly add the very hot Ghee+ oil on top of it as shown. Mix quickly. All the oil will be absorbed. Keep the ghee pan back on the stove to maintain the heat.

* Continue adding hot liquid, mixing and scraping.

* Every time when you add hot oil, it will be completely absorbed by the besan.

* Quickly in 10 to 15 minutes, it reaches the final stage, so please be ready to act fast.

* At one stage the mixture transfers from liquid paste texture to grainy texture as shown. The ghee added at this stage will be oozing out. If you continue cooking beyond this stage, your Mysore Pak will become powder or very hard.

* When you see this crumbly texture, quickly transfer the contents into the greased pan and quickly tap and shape the extra crumbs.

* Keep aside until it becomes warm.

* When the Mysore Pak becomes little hard and warm, make shapes.

* Serve or store after it completely cools down.