Pal poli – A recipe for Ganesh Chaturti

Ingredients

• Semolina (1 cup)
• ghee (4 tbsp)
• All purpose flour/Maida (1 cup)
• Milk (2 cups)
• Saffron (a pinch)
• Condensed milk (2 tbsp)
• Oil to deep fry
• Almonds (few chopped, for garnish)

Method

1. In a mixing bowl, add semolina, ghee(2 tbsp) and mix well.
2. Add refined flour or maida and mix it well.
3. After mixing it well, add little by little water and make a stiff dough. Knead it and allow it to rest for 15 minutes.
4. While our dough is resting, let us get our saffron milk ready.
5. For that heat a pan, add milk & bring it to a boil.
6. In a separate small bowl, add a pinch of saffron, add 1 tsp of water and soak it for 5 minutes. This will make the saffron soft.
7. Once the milk comes to a boil, reduce the flame and stir it for 5 minutes so as to get a creamy texture.
8. Add the soaked saffron into the milk and continue cooking in slow flame. The milk will change its color and the delicious aroma of saffron will spread.
9. After 1 minute, add the condensed milk and continue stirring.
10. In case you do not have condensed milk, you can substitute it with sugar.
11. Continue stirring for another 2 minutes or till the creamy consistency of the saffron milk is reached.
12. Switch off the flame and keep it aside.
13. Take the dough that is being resting for 15 minutes, and make small balls out of it.
14. Place a ball on a flat surface, with the help of a rolling pin, flatten it and roll it thin.
15. Once flattened, take few drops of ghee and spread it evenly on the surface.
16. Now fold the poli into half, press gently and apply few drops of ghee on the upper surface.
17. Now fold it from the other side. It will have a triangular shape.
18. Now with the help of a rolling pin, roll it once again, flatten it and make it thin poli. Now the poli has
19. got beautiful layer as it is stuffed with ghee.
20. Prick the polis with a fork or knife so that it doesn’t rise.
21. Heat oil to deep fry.
22. Once the oil become hot, add the polis into it and deep fry till it turns light golden brown in color.
23. Take the polis off the flame into a tissue paper to drain away the excess oil.
24. Place the polis into a dish, pour the saffron milk all over the polis and allow it to soak into the creamy milk.
25. Allow the polis to turn soggy in the milk.
26. Now in a serving dish, take the soaked polis leaving the milk behind.
27. Take few chopped almonds and garnish it on the paal poli.

Delicious Paal poli or milk poli is ready to be served. Enjoy!