Badusha

Sal Mubarak!
Diwali is here and it’s difficult to resist the temptation of eating (and making, in my case) all those snacks and sweets. I generally don’t prepare a Diwali menu well ahead of time. Just a day before the Diwali, I go through my recipe collection and a few cookbooks and pick a few things to make. This year, I had decided on Boondi Laddus and that’s when my sister Rajashri called. She raved about this Badusha recipe she had learned as a teenager from a cooking class in Bhavnagar! Ah the memories… I need to write another blog to talk about the culinary prowess of my sister but for now, suffice it to say that she is a wizard in the kitchen. I wrote down the recipe right then and there and made Badusha today. They looked great and tasted great. Boondi Laddus will have to wait for their moment, which I think will come soon..

1.5 cups maida/plain flour and a pinch of cooking soda
OR
1 cup plain flour and ½ cup self-raising flour
½ cup yoghurt (preferably sweet, not sour)
1/3rd cup ghee
3-4 cups vegetable oil for frying
½ tea spoon powdered cardamoms/elaichi
2 cups sugar
1 cup water

1. Mix flour, powdered cardamom and soda. Add ghee to the flour and mix well.
2. Add yoghurt and mix everything together to make a stiff dough. You shouldn’t need any water. If you do, just add enough to make the dough. Also, once the dough is made, don’t knead it too much.
3. Cover the dough and put aside for about ½ hour.
4. When ready to make badusha, heat oil in a frying pan/kadhai.
5. Make 3-inch thick puris and make a slight depression in the center of the puris using your thumb. (see the picture.) This is to stop the badusha from turning into a ball when frying.
6. When the oil is medium-hot, fry badusha on low heat until golden brown. This will take approx. 10-12 minutes per batch.
7. Before you fry the last batch of badusha, heat sugar and water in a pot until you have almost a 2-string consistency syrup. (about 10 minutes) To test, you can pour a couple of drops of the syrup in a spoon and feel the syrup with your thumb and forefinger. If it almost forms two strings, the syrup is ready. Take the syrup off the stove.
8. Fry the last batch of badusha.
9. Immerse each badusha in the syrup for about a minute, take it out and arrange it on a platter. If there is any syrup left over, you can fill a spoon with the syrup and spread it on the badusha. Badusha will have a shiny glaze after an hour or so.
Note: It’s important to make sure that both the syrup and badusha are fairly warm in step 9. If you wait too long, the syrup will thicken and form crystals. And if badusha are not warm, they won’t absorb sugar properly.