Rashogolla / Rasgulla is a speciality of Bengal. It is nothing but cottage cheese balls which turns spongy after boiling in light sugar syrup. Being a Bong I can’t afford to loose the chance of posting it’s recipe as my first blog post. The recipe needs just a few ingredients and surprisingly will not demand much of your time. Do not bother if you can’t make it perfect at your first attempt. I also needed 2-3 attempts to reach the required level. Now you can also surprise your near and dear ones by making it at home. Good luck .

If you want to enjoy Rasgullas other than traditional one then look into this recipes : Kamolabhog (Orange flavoured Rasgulla) , Rasgulla “2 in 1” , Gurher Rashogolla (Rasgulla in Date Palm Syrup) .

Ingredients for 12 pieces :

1. Milk (with 3% fat) – 1 lit. (approx. 4 cups)
2. Lemon juice – 2-3 tbspoon / Vinegar – 4 tbspoon
3. Fine semolina – 1 teaspoon
4. Sugar – 1½ cups
5. Water – 4½ cups

Procedure :

The first step of making “Rasgulla” is to prepare “chena” or Indian cottage cheese. For its recipe look into the page entitled Chena/Indian cottage cheese.

Now in order to squeeze out the excess water from chena/cheese hang the cheese cloth containing the cheese for at least 30 minutes (I prefer to hang it overnight).

Then knead the chena with your palm for 6 -7 minutes until the dough becomes very smooth. At the middle of kneading process add the semolina.

After that start making equal size, crack-free, small balls out of this dough.

I have finished with 14 balls. You can increase or decrease this number according to your desired size of Rasgullas. Don’t make these balls too large as they will be double in size after getting into the sugar syrup.

Now it’s time to make the sugar syrup. Be careful while making the sugar syrup. It should not be very dense otherwise it will not be absorbed properly by chena. Take a pressure cooker, pour 4½ cups of water and 1½ cups of sugar into it. Put it on the stove on medium flame and let the sugar dissolve completely. After boiling the syrup for 2-3 minutes add the cheese balls into it. Put the lid of the cooker and let it cook for 5-7 minutes on medium-low flame or until you get the first whistle. Put the gas off. Please don’t unlid the cooker immediately, let it come to the room temperature and then open it. Otherwise the rasgullas will shrink and you will never get the desired sponginess.

Now you are ready to serve the delicious ‘rasgullas’.

Note :

1. Don’t add lemon juice in very hot milk. The result would be a hard cheese which is not desirable for this recipe.
2. For best result make the “chena” or cottage cheese the night before your day of preparation. Hang the cheese cloth containing cheese overnight in order to remove the excess water.
3. The amount of water to make “Rasgulla” sugar syrup should be more than that of “Rasmalai” syrup. For the fact that here the cheese balls should not interact with the surface of the vessel to maintain its round shape.(Ref. Rasmalai recipe)
4. Don’t overcrowd the vessel/pressure cooker with cheese balls. There should be enough space for cheese balls to turn double in size inside the vessel. So if you have quite a large number of cheese balls then divide them into batches before putting them into the pressure cooker.
5. If you don’t have a pressure cooker then make the rasgullas in a large pan with a lid intact.