Home Made Bengali Sweet : Malpoa

Bengalis call their desserts course as mishti. It was many years ago that every household made its own sweet dishes. The principles of economy and the skilled required for the popular preparations led to families specializing in confectionery – making, where expertise was handed down from father to son. The community, known as Moiras, has developed sweet-making into a fine art and specialities like rosogulla and sandesh are made. The sweet shops of Bengal known as "Mistannan Bhandar" (Sweet House). But, to one’s belief, Bengali sweets are not only Sandesh,  Rosogulla or Misti Doi. There are even lots more varieties to Bengali Desserts, which might not be available, commercially in the market, nor in the sweet shops, but typically home made, like different "Pithas"(which are basically rice-wheat-coconut based sweets, some are stuffed , some not, some are stuffed and dipped in thickened milk and so on), Rasbara( made from pasted Urad dal, whipped till frothy, then fried in round balls and finally soaked in syrup), Narkel Naru(coconut laddoo) and Malpoa to name some of them..

 
I'll share this home made delicacy with you today, which is made during festival time,too. I always make this on my husband's birthday, as he just loves this. Being a bengali, he has less sweet tooth than me, he'll prefer this over any cake. So I made them on last weekend for his birthday. 

Malpoa : It is made with all purpose flour(maida) and semolina/suji, made into a thick batter. The batter is then drop into hot oil in a form a small round pancakes which are deep fried and then dipped into hot sugar syrup. You can add also crushed fruits in the batter, like banana, mango or pineapple for different taste. But my family just love the natural flavour of fennel seeds and coconut. This is the basic recipe of malpoa.



Ingredients :  

Flour - 1 cup

Sooji (Semolina) - 1/4 cup

Fennel (Mouri/Saunf) seeds- 1/2 tsp

Milk - 1 and 1/4 cups ( as needed)

Coconut - 2 tbsp, grated or finely chopped

Oil - 2 cups (for deep frying)

For Syrup:

Sugar - 2 cups

Water - 2 cups

Green Cardamom - 3(crushed)

Method : 

• In a bowl, mix together all the ingredients except oil. Using your hands, make a smooth batter free of lumps. use milk as needed to make a semi-thick batter,little thicker than pakora batter.
  

• Meantime, in a wide pan, prepare sugar syrup, adding cups sugar in 2 cups of water and let come to boil. Add crushed green cardamoms and Simmer for 8-10 minutes. Note : remember syrup thickens when cooled so do not boil to a thick consistency.
• Heat the oil to smoking in a wide pan/kadhai. Turn the flame down to medium. Using a ladle, pour in a full measure of the batter in a form of small circle of 3" diameter into the oil.  
• Fry for approximately 3-4 minutes until deep brown on medium heat, so the batter can cook through. Flip over and fry other side to deep brown.

• Remove and add directly to the hot sugar syrup, boil them for 3-4 minutes in syrup and then take them out. Meantime, fry another batch of malpoas and dip in sugar syrup. 
• Tips : If your syrup dries a bit during process, add some more water and sugar if required. But don't let syrup thicken much.
  

• Serve in room temperature. you can store the rest in refrigerator and can keep them for 7-10 days but before eating, warm them up a little. 

I would like to share this festive sweet with Sudeshna who is

hosting an event " Durga puja Food Festival" @ her place Cook Like A Bong....
And to EC of Simple Indian Food for her Festive treat Event
And to Shanthi Krishnakumar's event Dusshera, Dhanteras and Deepavali

In another note : Recently, Some of my blogger friends has passed me a loads of awards to me, which I couldn't acknowledge before for lack of time. My heartfelt thanks to Pinky of Esho-bosho-aahare showered me with so many awards that I just totally drenched with excitement and enthusiasm, Thanks dear for your support and love....

 

I am supposed to share these awards with 7 bloggers and I would love to share my awards with these lovely ladies of blogger world..........But I love you all

Home Cooked Oriya Food, Kitchen Flavour, Tulip, Babli, Sowmya, Nithya and Renu

Lissie of Salt and Spice has shared her awards with me.....My heartfelt thanks to Lissie

 

 

I would Like to share these awards with Shanthi, Chitra, Pallavi, Aysha, Ann, Meera and Radhika