Bandaru Ladoo

Blogging Marathon-Edition 9 starts from today. There were so many themes to choose from. As Diwali is fast approaching, I selected Festival Foods of India with step by step instructions. I usually love to do step by step post. So I am so happy to select this theme for this week. Blogging marathon gives me an oppurtunity to explore various cuisines. So for this week, I am going to try out the sweets from other states, which are unknown to me.
For the first day, I chose Bandaru Ladoo. This is the first time I am hearing this name, and I was interested when I read about the method of preparation. This ladoo is from Andhra. Besan is the main ingredient. I searched the net and came across many recipes. The sugar syrup was the only confusing point. Each recipe gave a different syrup consistency. I settled for single thread consistency. I prepared these ladoos yesterday night. My daughter helped me in the preparation. She was so eager, she did some small works and was so happy. She also wanted to roll the ladoo herself, but as the dough was so hot, I had a real tough time to keep her away from touching it. The rolling part was very tough. My palm started burning because of the hot mixture. As for the syrup, I was wrong. I should have settled with a sticky syrup, because the ladoos were not very soft. They were slightly on the harder side yet delicious. Next time I will go for the sticky syrup. I will take this as an experience. The problem with new recipe is, you really don't know how it looks like in each stage. It involves a lot of guess work. Any how, I really enjoyed preparing this sweet. If any one know the exact consistency, please leave me a comment..

Ingredients:
Besan-250gm
Sugar-250gm
Ghee-1tbs+2tsp
Oil-To deep fry
Cardamom Powder-1tsp
Broken Cashew-50gm

Procedure:
1. Heat 2tsp ghee and add it to sifted besan.
2. Mix well. Add water to make a soft dough.
3. Heat oil in a heavy bottomed pan.
4. Take the dough in a murukku press and press out murukku into hot oil.
5. Remove from oil when the murukku is brown.
6. Repeat with the remaining dough.
7. Break the murukku into small pieces and grind them into a fine powder in a mixer grinder.
8. Add cardamom powder.
9. Fry broken cashew in 1tbs ghee until golden and add it to the besan murukku powder.
10. Add 1cup of water to sugar in a heavy bottomed pan.
11. Bring it to one thread consistency.
12. Add the prepared powder and switch off flame.
13. Mix it well and pour the mixture on a plate for easy handling.
14. Apply ghee in palms.
15. take out portions of the mix and roll into a rough ball. Finish off with the remaining mix.
16. Apply more ghee n the palm and rol each ball into a firm and neat ladoo. This has to be done quickly, because at this stage, the mix will start drying.
17. Allow it to cool completely and store in air tight box.
18. Share with friends and relatives and Enjoy..