How to make Jalebis at home

Jalebis are an orange-red sugary-syrupy sweet dish and a favourite of street food vendors in India. It is deep fried and admittedly calorie dense.

But who makes jalebis at home without the use of artificial orange-red colours? And can someone reduce its sweetness too?

PLEASE…..

My mom experimented with making jalebis at home and the picture above is what turned up. The orange colour comes from saffron.

Watching it being made in front of your eyes was as fascinating as the spiral shape it comes in.

Personally I don’t like jalebis much. I think they taste way too sweet but this one had just the right level of sweetness and “deliciousness,” if I may use that term.

Want to know how?

Then just read on.

Serves 3-4

Ingredients

White flour (Maida)-1 cup

Rice Flour- ¼ cup

Dry Yeast- ¼ teaspoon

Yoghurt- 1 tablespoon

Saffron- 10-20 strands dissolved in warm water

Luke warm water- ½ cup

Clarified butter (Ghee) – enough to deep fry (quantity depends on the size of your frying pan)

For the syrup

Sugar-1 cup

Water- 1 cup

Green Cardomom-2 crushed

Method

Make the Jalebi Batter

In a deep bowl, mix together the wheat flour, rice flour, dry yeast, yoghurt, dissolved saffron, and 1/2 cup lukewarm water.

Mix well.

Let it set for at least 1 hour.

Now make your sugar syrup

Place a deep pan on your heat source and add the sugar and water.

Bring to a boil.

Reduce heat and let the mixture boil for five minutes more.

Add cardamom.

Keep aside.

Fry the jalebis

In a fry pan (preferably non-stick), add the clarified butter and put it on your heat source.

Put the jalebi batter in an icing bag with a small opening.

As soon as the clarified butter heats up, squeeze out a tablespoon of the jalebi batter in the shape of a circle or figure of eight.

If there be space, you can add a tablespoon more of the jalebi batter.

Reduce the heat and gently flip the jalebis over with a slotted spoon to ensure that they acquire a golden-brown colour on both sides.

Do please ensure that you don’t burn the jalebis!

As soon as the jalebis are fried, take them out and put them in to the pan with the sugar syrup for a minute or two.

Take out the jalebis from the sugar syrup on to a serving dish.

Repeat till all the batter is used up.

That’s all. Your Jalebis are ready.

Serve hot. With Rabri (thickened milk) if you don’t mind the additional calories!

Prep time: 5 minutes (excluding 60 minutes for the batter to set)

Cooking time: 25 minutes

Total time: 30 minutes

[For more such Indian dessert recipes, feel free to refer to my book “The Ultimate Guide to Cooking Desserts the Indian Way which is available on all e-book platforms including Amazon, Kobo, Barnes & Nobles, Google Play, etc.]

 

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