For this week I have been paired with Mugdha of Cooking Fundas. She has a lovely blog with many traditional Orissa recipes. I had a wonderful time browsing through her space and finally zeroed in on Khira also known as Chenna Payesh or Paneer Kheer.. Khira is an Orissa Special and is offered as Mahaprasad to the Lord Jagannath of Puri. My pictures don’t even speak half of how it tasted. I am definitely going to make this again very soon (Just waiting for the earliest occasion) and will definitely update this post with some better pics. I have halved the quantity and changed the recipe a wee bit just to reduce the time consumed, but otherwise made it in pretty much the same way. You can find the original recipe here.
What you’ll need
1. Milk – 1 liter (about 4 cups)
2. Paneer crumbled – 1 cup
3. Cornflour – 4 tsp
4. Sugar – 6 tbsp
5. Elaichi Powder – ¼ tsp
6. Cashewnuts and Raisins – a few
7. Ghee – 2 tsps
Method
Dissolve the cornflour in about ¼ cup of milk. Bring the remaining milk to boil in a heavy bottomed vessel. When the milk starts boiling, add the cornflour dissolved in milk and stir continuously for about 3 to 4 minutes. You’ll see the milk thickening slightly and getting a nice creamy texture. At this stage add the crumbled paneer and mix well without any big paneer lumps. Next add in the sugar and stir well. Simmer for 5 to 10 minutes.
In a small frying pan, heat ghee and fry the Cashews and nuts. Add these to the kheer. Also sprinkle the elaichi powder and mix well.
Yummy Khira is ready. Serve warm or chilled.
Note:
1. The original recipe called for reducing the milk to half. The texture would have been definitely better but since I was pressed for time I used the shortcut of adding cornflour.
2. The paneer should be crumbled very well, you could also pulse it in the mixie for just about 30 seconds so that the paneer blends well in the kheer.
Check out what's cooking at my fellow blog hoppers spaces.
Linking this to Indian Mithai Mela happening at Kalyani's space.
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