With Rakshabandhan, Janmashtami, Durgapuja, Diwali, all approaching, we all are gearing up for preparing home made sweets. Our festive season starts with Rakshabandhan and ends with Holi, I think. In fact, the festive season never ends for us Indians, There are so many throughout the year.... regional, cultural, social, religious. Almost, in all regions of India, homemade sweets are made with so much love and care for these occasions, of so many varieties.
Coconut.... I would say, is an integral ingredient in our home made sweets. We consider coconut as very auspicious. These round, brown fruits belong to the palm family. We, perhaps use every part of it, from its water to shell. This is also true with any island city or country. Wherever it grows in abundance, there is maximum use of it.
Remembering the bygone days, we have grown up eating a number of sweets made of coconut. They were quite time consuming and off course mouthwatering. The other day I had some shredded coconut and was thinking can we prepare some sweets with it without the cooking part. That is when the idea of preparing INSTANT RAW COCONUT BARFI popped up. It was so fun, easy and relaxing to prepare them. Only that we have to refrigerate them and always serve chilled. Let us see how we do it.
INGREDIENTS :
Shredded Coconut : 2cups
Sugar : 1/2cup
Powdered Milk : 2tbsp
Refined Flour : 1tbsp
Cardamom Powder : 1/4tsp
METHOD :
Blend together the shredded coconut and sugar for 2-3 minutes with intervals.
Transfer to a wide-mouthed bowl. Add the refined flour, powdered milk and cardamom powder.
Rub them well for about 10 minutes.
Transfer to a plate, flatten and refrigerate.
Take out after 1 hour, cut into desired shapes.
Transfer into a clean container and refrigerate again.
Serve chilled always, otherwise they tend to get soft and break as we are not cooking it.... hence they will not get sticky and tighten. There is no compromise with taste though.
