“Rasmalai” is another popular Indian sweet dish made from milk, and one of my favourites too. The only way out not to stay deprived from these dear dishes, here far away from India, is to prepare them at my own kitchen. So, here comes the recipe of Rasmalai for you which you can try with ease. If you liked the recipe of Rasgulla, you will like Rasmalai for sure. Enjoy !!!!!!!!

Ingredients for 12 – 14 Rasmalai :

1. Full fat milk – 2 lit.
2. Lemon juice – 2 – 3 tbspoon
3. Granulated Sugar – 300 gm.
4. Semolina  – ½ teaspoon
5. Powdered sugar – 1 tbspoon
6. Green cardamom – 2 – 3
7. Sliced pistachio – ½ tbspoon
8. Almond – 3 – 4
9. Few strand of saffron

Procedure :

Making of “Rasmalai” consists of two major steps. First step is to make “Ras” which is nothing but a “flat Rasgulla” and the second one is to prepare “Malai”, which is a concentrated milk flavoured with saffron, cardamom, pistachio and almond in which the “Ras” is immersed.

Step 1 : Making of “Ras”

At first you have to prepare “chena”or Indian cottage cheese with 1 lit. of the milk and lemon juice. For this recipe look into the page entitled Chena/Indian cottage cheese under the “Useful Supplementary” tab in my blog.

In order to squeeze out the excess water from the cheese either hang the cheese cloth containing the cheese for at least 30 minutes or keep it under heavy pressure for approx. 10 – 15 minutes. You can use any heavy material even a heavy book as I often do.

Now place the cheese on a clean flat surface and knead with your palm for 7 minutes. Then add semolina and powdered sugar and again knead for another 7 minutes or until you get a smooth dough. Leave the cheese dough for 1o minutes so that semolina can absorb the water from the cheese and mingle well with it.

Now make 12 – 14 smooth cheese balls from this dough. Flatten them a bit pressing by hand to get the shape of Rasmalai.

Now take 80 gm. of granulated sugar and 1 cup of water in a pressure cooker to make the sugar syrup for flat rasgullas. Put the pressure cooker on medium flame and let the sugar dissolve. As the mixture starts to boil put the flat cheese balls into it and cover with the lid. Cook for 5 – 7 minutes over low flame or until you get the first whistle. Don’t uncover it immediately, let it come to the room temperature, otherwise the cheese balls will shrink and you will not get the desired sponginess. In the meanwhile let’s make the “Malai”.

Step 2 : Making of “Malai”

Take the remaining 1 lit. of milk in a heavy bottomed pan. Boil the milk over medium heat till it reduces to half of its volume, stir occasionally so that it does not get burnt from the bottom. This process takes a long time so have patience. In the meantime slice the almonds and grind few of it and few of sliced pistachios. Also grind the green cardamoms. Add remaining sugar, cardamom, saffron strands, grounded almond and pistachio into the reduced milk. Boil the milk for few more minutes until the sugar get completely dissolved into it. Now let it also come into the room temperature.

Assembling of “Ras” & “Malai” :

Squeeze the sugar syrup from the “flat rasgullas” or “ras” and immerse them into the “malai”. Garnish with sliced almon and pistachio.

Leave it like this for at least 30 minutes before serving so that the “malai” can well be absorbed by “Ras”.

 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 “Rasmalai” sugar syrup should be less than that of “Rasgulla” syrup. For the fact that here the cheese balls should interact with the surface of the vessel to maintain its flat shape. (Ref. Rasgulla recipe).
4. Don’t overcrowd the vessel/pressure cooker with cheese balls. There should be enough space left in the vessel for cheese balls to turn double in size. So if you have quite a large number of cheese balls then divide them into batches before putting them into the pressure cooker.