Cracked wheat Payasam

Its my husband's birthday! I am planning on making a black forest cake in the evening.His mom , as a sentiment , prepares milk payasam (kheer) on his birthday ,every year. Since we are away from India, I planned on preparing milk payasam. But instead of using the traditional way of boiling rice or semiya with milk, I found a new recipe which uses cracked wheat. What more , you have got a dessert and a healthy choice too. This recipe is so simple that you would love it and you can prepare it on any day within 15 min.

Cracked Wheat Payasam

Cracked wheat- 1/2 cup
Water - 2 1/2 cups
Milk - 2 cups
Jaggery or Brown sugar-  3/4 cup or more for a sweet tooth
Cardomom - powdered

Optional for topping
Roasted Raisins- 1 spoon
Roasted Cashew nuts- 1 spoon

1. There are two varieties of cracked wheat, i. fine granulated and ii. coarse. Pressure cook the cracked wheat along with 2 cups water for 3 whistles, if its coarse variety. Else 1 whistle is sufficient. Switch off.

2. Wait till the pressure settles.Add the jaggery or sugar to the boiled wheat and blend.

3. Add 2 cups of milk and boil in medium for 5 min. Keep stirring and switch off when its well blended.

4. Add the cardomom powder and toppings and serve.

Serves 4 people.

Halloween Potluck luncheon

Halloween is here !We have planned a Halloween potluck luncheon in our office, the entrees where to be catered and the rest is to be brought in by employees. That leaves mainly the appetizers and dessert. I have decided to make a dessert. At first I thought of making curried egg puffs, an appetizer. But then the puffs have to be fresh, and cannot be refrigerated. I don’t have the time in the morning, when I am just too busy getting ready to office, preparing breakfast and lunch. So the next best option was to prepare a chocolate cake, which I can prepare the previous day evening and refrigerate. It seemed like I have come upon a good idea. As I was speaking to my friend, she told Halloween potluck lunch has been arranged in her office too. She told me she was going to make gulab jamuns. Now I started thinking, gulab jamuns are easy to make, very tasty and also it is an Indian dessert, so my colleagues who have not tasted a jamun can enjoy it.




Finally I settled on making Gulab jamuns. For those who are wondering what it is, gulab jamun is a popular Indian dessert. It is made with dough of milk solids and put in sugar syrup flavored with cardamom and rose water.


You can make the gulab jamun recipe from scratch or you can make use of ready made packs available. In India, gulab jamuns are made mostly with ready made mix, the most popular brands are MTR and Gits. Using a ready made mix is not something to be ashamed of, it’s easy to use and when you have less time you can opt for this way.


After having made my decision to prepare gulab jamuns for the Halloween potluck lunch, I thought it would be a good idea to test the Gits gulab jamun mix, this weekend.




Gulab Jamun

Gits Gulab jamun mix- 1 pack or Mixture of 1/2 cup all purpose flour and 1 cup Milk Powder and 1/2 tsp baking soda

Milk- ¼ cup

Sugar-2 cups

Water – 1 ½ cup

Vegetable oil-2 cups

Cardomom powder-1/2 tsp

Rose water-1 tsp


1. In a bowl add the gulab jamun mix and just enough milk to form a hard dough.

2. Make small balls using the dough. Make sure that there are no cracks in the balls. Apply ghee on your hands and roll the ball. If you find cracks even after that, then take drops of milk in your palm and then roll the dough ball in it.That should do the trick.

3. In a deep frying pan heat oil. Fry the dough balls until they are brown on all sides. To make sure all sides are brown , hold the handle of the pan and give a nudge, so that the balls roll over.

4. Once the balls are browned over on all sides, take the fried balls and transfer them to the warm sugar syrup(see below)

Sugar syrup
In a pan, add the sugar and water and let it boil for 5 to 10 min. Let it boil until the sugar dissolves in water.Make sure the syrup doesnt caramelize.Add cardomom powder and rose water to the syrup for a nice flavour.


Makes 20 gulab jamuns; served warm after 45 min.