Mohanthaal is a traditional Rajasthani and Gujarati sweet dish prepared with (besan) gram flour and clarified butter (ghee). It is a kind of besan ki barfi but mohanthaal has very fine granules of roasted gram flour. If you love gram flour sweets then definitely you should try this recipe. When you just gulp one piece of fine granules of besan roasted in desi ghee along with cardamom flavour settled down with sugar syrup, I bet you can’t stop with one piece only!!
My love for mohanthaal goes back to my childhood. This is one consistent mithai my mother used to prepare every year for Holi and Deepawali festivals. It is a sugar syrup based sweet dish and some people find difficult to prepare the right consistency of syrup. So my mom used to be in high demand during festival time in the neighborhood to help with the last step of mohanthaal when sugar syrup is getting ready! I was amused when my mom told that this year also during Deepawali that was called by next-door house aunt saying that mohanthaal has not come well, please do something…
Don’t worry, it is not really that difficult to prepare. Actually, mohanthaal is prepared in two different ways. One method is lengthier than other. My mom follows the first method, and I, being my mother’s daughter, am also used to the slightly longer process. I will post the short method too sometime in future.
A few points to remember :
- While frying besan mathri, keep the heat somewhere between sim and medium as besan gets fried faster . Don’t worry much if Mathris remain slightly raw from inside. While roasting, we will take care of this.
- Oil can be used in the whole process, but ghee gives wonderful taste. So decide as per your preference. I have used oil only for frying mathris .
- Two thread sugar syrup (do taar ki chashni) is the right consistency for this sweet dish. But if you add roasted gram flour slightly early in sugar syrup and mohanthaal is not set firmly even after a few hours, don’t worry. Once again, add the gram flour in kadhai, stir it for 5-7 minutes on medium heat till the batter is thick and that will make it set nicely.
- Mohanthaal will be very dry and brittle if sugar syrup becomes thicker than two-thread consistency. Again, don’t panic, collect dry mohanthaal, grind it in coarse powder, heat 1/2 or 1 cup milk in a wok/ kadhai and add powdered besan. Stir the batter continuously till it becomes thick and leaves the sides of wok/kadhai and then set it.
- Reduce or increase sugar quantity as per your taste.
- Ready gram-flour batter will be very hot when we shift to the greased plate for it to settle down. Because of heat, while cooling down, mohanthaal will change its colour and become bit more dark. But this will not affect the wonderful taste!
- If gram flour is roasted nicely, you don’t need to keep mohanthaal in the fridge for a week.
- Sweets of besan are usually very delicious and pure ghee will make mohanthaal irresistible. So, be aware of calories! Do some exercise and relish this homemade traditional Indian sweet to satisfy your sweet cravings this winter.
I have a few more posts on Indian sweets in the blog. If interested, you can take a look…
Naariyal ki burfi (coconut burfi)
Naariyal Ke Laddoo
Rabdi / Rabri
Ingredients :
For muthiya/mathri
Gram flour (besan) 250 grams
Ghee/oil 6 tbsp
Water 1/4 cup
oil for frying
35 to 40 gms muthiya 10
For roasting
Ghee/oil (melted)1/3 cup
For sugar syrup
Sugar 300 grams
Water 1 +1/2 cups
Milk 2 tbsp
Cardamom powder and some chopped dry nuts of your choice
Ghee to grease the plate
Process :
Thoroughly grease a plate having edges with desi ghee and keep it separate.
In a broad vessel, mix besan and desi ghee together. Then slowly add water and prepare tight dough.
Divide this dough in equal parts and prepare these flat rolls as shown in the picture. We call these flat rolls Mathri or Muthiya.
In a wok/kadhai heat oil or ghee and fry these mathris.
When mathris are fried break them into pieces and grind them till you get coarse powder. Sieve this powder in a slightly medium-sized-holed sieve.
Add ghee and coarsely grinded powdered besan in a wok/kadhai. Roast it on medium heat till you get a nice aroma of gram flour. Shift this roasted gram flour to a separate vessel.
Heat water and sugar in the wok/kadhai to prepare sugar syrup .
Add milk the moment sugar gets dissolved completely. All the impurities of sugar will float on sides of the wok. Discard them with the help of a spatula. Let the syrup boil on high to medium heat till it reaches two-thread consistency. Add powdered cardamom in sugar syrup.
The moment syrup is ready, add roasted gram flour. Be quick here…mix it thoroughly in sugar syrup and shift this batter to the greased plate and spread it evenly. Sprinkle cardamom powder.
Spread finely chopped nuts and press them slightly with the back of a spoon so that the nuts settle down.
After one hour, when mohanthaal is still little warm, cut it in desired shape and size. Let it cool and settle down completely.
Very difficult to hold our temptations, right!! Till then satisfy your craving with the scrapes of mohanthaal from wok/ kadhai😋
Because of hot batter, besan gets roasted even while cooling down and turns slightly darker in colour and this enhances the taste a lot 😋😋😋
