Apple stuffed sondesh

I am so bogged down with work 😦 along with a beauty of a throat infection 😛 so i have started croaking and giving competition to the frogs 😉

That brings me to a situation where i have not cooked or created anything in the kitchen lately (a week). My regular cook is jubilant 😉 because she feels threatened if she sees me to cook 😀

But i do have lots and lots of creation archived and will be updating here as time permits. 🙂

Sondesh is synonymous with Bengali. Visiting the sweet shops in Kolkata are not only a visual treat but also has an over- powering effect on our senses. Sondesh has limitless varieties be it shape, color, size or flavorings. 🙂 I have happy memories of sondesh making at my maternal grandma’s place. My eldest aunt (mamima) used to be the team leader. The final products were mouth -watering!!!!

I always love ‘twist -in -the -tale’ in everything that i cook. This is a technique i am in love with 😉 Imagine how dull life would be without some ‘twists’ 😉

It was the tail- end of the ‘apple season’ in Delhi, so made something different to bid adieu till the next season.

Here’s what i did …………

INGREDIENTS

200 gms – cottage cheese

1 tbsp – lime juice

1 apple ( I used red apple)

½ tsp – cinnamon powder

2 pinch – cardamom powder

2 tbsp – sugar

½ cup – powdered sugar

Few strands – saffron soaked in milk(optional)

Pistachio or raisin for garnish

METHOD

Knead the cottage cheese until smooth. Kneading it well is the tricky part.

Peel the apple (optional). Grate it. In a pan put the grated apple, 2 tbsp sugar and lime juice and cook it on low flame till the moisture dries up and apple looks like jam. Take it off fire and cool.

Add cinnamon and cardamom powder to the cottage cheese, powdered sugar and knead again.

Make balls of the kneaded cottage cheese, flatten the centre, add the apple stuffing and carefully cover the sides and make it into a ball again. One may keep it flattened like a ‘peda’/cookie.

Carefully drizzle the saffron milk a little on each sondesh. Garnish it with pistachios or raisins

Note : one may bring variation to the cottage cheese by cooking it for few mins on low flame. What we call in bangla ‘kora – paak’ sondesh.

One can make this with palm- jaggery, which is healthier than using sugar, but the taste will be altered.

I love ‘gur- sondesh’, or sondesh made with jaggery, but that is something of an acquired taste 🙂

 

Happy cooking !!! 🙂

Cheers !!! 😀