Moong Daal Payasam / Kheer and Bloggers' Buzz Photography session

The first session of BBPC was a hit. With 6 of us, trying our way to click better pictures and Nisha leading us in her kindest ways. As a mentor, she shared with us, her tricks and tips of food photography through a  very informative tutorial.We took a lot of pictures, literally ransacking every single prop Nisha had at our own convenience and scattering  them all over her place. It was so much fun using such amazing and beautiful props and of course the food was an absolute delight to binge over. Suchi brought this super tasty Peanut butter caramel chocolate cake ( I know! so many goodies in just one ) and all of us stuffed ourselves till a point where we could just throw it  up all.
 
Coming to the photography thing, we did a lot of experimenting with the light where Nisha taught us how to use side lighting and back lighting to get the desired result. The most important thing which I then realized was how to diffuse the light for our benefit, never thought of it really... And now, we have worked upon an assignment for the members of Bloggers Buzz Photography Club, including ourselves. Here is a collage of some of the pictures I took that day, to view more visit our Facebook Page for Bloggers' Buzz. This month our judge will be Kankana Saxena from Playful Cooking. The smiling lady who clicks pictures we all drool upon. The results will be out in September, so stay tuned fellas. :)  

Coming to this recipe of today, Kheer or Payasam is an integral item on the Indian menu cards specially during the festivals. The term Kheer (used in North India) is derived from Sanskrit words Ksheeram (which means milk). Other terms like Payasa or Payasam (used in South India) or payesh (used in Bengal region) are derived from the Sanskrit word Payas which also means "milk". Obviously milk is the basic ingredient of this dish, and other ingredients vary on the basis of region and culture, some important ones being rice, ghee, sugar, jaggery, Khoya, vermicelli etc. Some people also add a little bit of Heavy Cream to give it more richness in taste. It is often garnished using almonds, cashews, raisins and pistachios.

In a South Indian meal, payasam or payasa (Kannada) is served first at any formal or auspicious occasions. Payasam is also served after rasam rice, while rice with buttermilk forms the last item of the meal. Payasam also forms an integral part of the Kerala feast (sadya), where it is served and relished from the flat banana leaf instead of cups. In Malayalee or Kerala cuisine, there are several different kinds of payasam that can be prepared from a wide variety of fruits and starch bases, an example being chakkapradhaman made of jackfruit pulp, adapradhaman made of flat ground rice. 


*The source of all this information is Wiki and my friends who helped me out with the such complicated names and rituals :) 

This Moong daal Payasam is one such healthy dessert, which I can eat anytime. I have prepared it before with different combinations of dal and rice. They may all have different names, but the basic recipe remains the same. For those who haven't tried any South Indian payasam made of dal yet, this is a very good dish to start with. Easy to make and deliciously rich in taste.

What you need?

• 1 cup Split green gram dal or Yellow moong dal
• ¼ cup parboiled rice
• 1 cup Jaggery powder – I always use powder, see notes on how to break the Jaggery into pieces
• ¼ cup Cashew nuts
• ¼ tsp Cardamom pods
• 1 cup Grated coconut
• 1 cup sugar
• 1 cup whole Milk
• 2 tbsp Ghee
• 3-4 saffron strands
• 1 tsp rose essence – optional

How to make?

• Wash lentils and rice well replacing water at least 4-5 times, soak for 30 minutes, drain and keep aside.
• Grind coconut with cardamom, just pulse it once and keep aside.

• Pour in drained rice and dal in a pressure cooker along with 4 cups of water and cook till 3 whistles. If you are using a deep pan, soak dal for 2-3 hours and then cook with rice for 40-45 minutes keeping flame on medium and then simmer for about 20 minutes.
• Open the cooker once the pressure ease off, and mash the dal well with either potato masher or wooden spatula.  
• Add in milk, sugar and jaggery and simmer for next 15-20 minutes until dal thickens. You may add more water to adjust the consistency as per your desire at this point.
• Add in grated coconut mixture, saffron and rose essence and stir well, cook for another minute and turn off the flame.
• In another pan, heat ghee and fry cashews till light brown, and pour it over payasam. Keep some aside for garnish
• Serve hot.

My Notes

• If you are using jiggery pieces, and struggling to break it- Place inside a paper and crush it into smaller pieces using a meat tenderizer or hammer. Then put in a blender or mixer grinder and grind jaggery into fine powder; set aside.  – method adopted from Divya
• I have used both sugar and jiggery in this Payasam since I don’t  quite like the taste of only jiggery. You may omit either of them, as per your taste. I would still recommend adding some jiggery since it brings the desired texture to the dish
• It is very filling dessert, so I would not recommend it having on a full stomach.
• I have used split green gram to prepare it, but yellow moong dal can also be used using the same recipe. Just reduce the soaking time to half an hour in that case
• You may omit the use of rice completely too

Thanks to Divya Pramil of SNC for giving this recipe for this month's challenge. To know more about the other members, click here. 

Linked to the events - 
South Indian cooking started by Anu's healthy kitchen and hosted by Nivedhanams.