My 320th recipe, "Coconut Ladoo", a quick, easy and delicious Indian Sweet. Coconut cooked in milk and sugar until reduced to a delicious consistency and then flavored with cardamom and ghee.
Yeah I know today is not a special occasion or any festive day for making an Indian Sweet. But frankly who needs a reason to enjoy a delicious Indian Sweet. Even though I make Western desserts like Pies, Cinnamon rolls, etc. on a regular basic, my heart is always with a well made Indian Sweet. The one which is loaded with lots of sweetness, flavor, richness and love.
These days, RK has made it a habit to ask for dessert soon after he finishes lunch. Since we have a big sweet tooth, I tend to always stock up my pantry or refrigerator with candies and chocolates. Most of the times RK will be just be fine munching on one or two of those. However there are days where he asks me to make a more wholesome dessert for him, preferably an Indian Sweet.
This Coconut Ladoo recipe was born on one such day when he was pestering me for a dessert. I was already tried after making an elaborate meal for lunch. Also, since it was Friday I was almost out of my weekly rations and did not have a lot of ingredients to work with. I wanted to make something with is easy to make and with basic ingredient. I quickly saw the left over half a shell of coconut and decided to make an easy dessert out of it.
Usually, when I have left over coconut, I make a delicious Coconut burfi with it. However, that burfi is not one of RK's favorite. So I decided to twist that recipe a bit and make it even more rich and delicious. Instead of adding coconut to a sugar syrup, I decided to cook it with dairy. I was confident that adding milk will give this dessert a newer taste profile and would excite RK better than the simple coconut burfi. And it indeed turned out to be a grand success.
Today being a Friday again, I decided make another batch of the coconut ladoo for dessert. Unlike the burfi, the addition of milk in this coconut ladoo, gives it a softer texture. All you have to do is drop a ladoo into your mouth. And then it is effortlessly disintegrates and melts in your mouth. Also, the ghee and cardamom flavors the ladoo aptly so that you would want to return quickly to grab a second ladoo. And the final touch comes from the coating of the coconut on top of the ladoos. It elevates the simple coconut ladoo into something much more elegant 🙂
Coconut Ladoo
Coconut Ladoo
Youtube Video
Ingredients
- 1 ⅓ Cups Desiccated Coconut (extra for coating)
- ¾ Cup Milk
- ⅓ Cup Sugar
- 2 tsp Ghee
- ⅛ tsp Cardamom powder
Instructions
- First take a large pan and saute the coconut until it is slightly warm to touch. This basically removes excess moisture from the coconut. But take care to not change the color of the coconut.
- Now add the milk and sugar and mix well. Stir at regular intervals and Continue to cook in medium low flame until the mixture becomes dry.
- Now add the ghee and give a quick mix. Add the cardamom powder and mix well. Cook until the mixture turns slightly sticky starts to bind with itself.
- Turn off the flame and let it cool down until it is cold enough to touch. Grease your palm with more ghee and roll out the coconut mixture into balls. Roll the coconut ladoos into some more desiccated coconut. Leave it to cool completely to room temperature.
- Enjoy.
Pallavi says
You told you had half a shell of coconut but in the ingredients you have mentioned desiccated coconut. Which coconut did you use to saute (fresh coconut or desiccated)?
revifood says
Either of them should work for the recipe. Half a shell was when I did it for the first time.
Mary sen says
It is is very tasty but if you would fill it with nuts or something else it would be even tastier
But overall It's a very good dish
Chef
Mary