Rasmalai Recipe / Homemade RasMalai Recipe

Wishing all my readers, blogger friends and everyone a Happy, Joyful and Fun filled Diwali with this Elegant and Delicious Bengali Dessert, Rasmalai. Rasmalai is a rich dessert consist of soft and spongy paneer/chenna dunked in rich saffron flavored Rabdi/Milk syrup. Rasmalai is my most favorite dessert, I was introduced to this dessert by my neighbor friend on a special occasion, from that time I started loving this dessert. In salem(my hometown), Bharathy Sweets were the first sweets shop who sold good and delicious Rasmalai. From my home it was 18-20 km but I visit the shop at least once in a month mainly to buy Rasmalai.

After moving to US,first time I saw the Instant Mix to make Rasmalai and I buy those packets often and used to make it Instantly. Then after watching Paneer making video at youtube I started making my own Rasmalai with fresh homemade paneer. You can use Rasgullas to make this Rasmalai but I like the disc shaped Rasmalai, to me shape matters a lot ;) So prepared disc shaped chenna/paneer for Rasmalai. You can make whichever shape you like.

Rasmalai Recipe

Prep Time : 30 minutes | Cook Time : 15 minutes

Makes 12 disc shaped Rasmalai

Recipe Category : Sweets/Desserts | Recipe Cuisine : Indian

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Ingredients

1. Rasgulla OR

1. Full Fat Milk    4 cups(I used Organic wholemilk)
2. Yogurt   1/4 cup and 2 tbsp
3. Sugar   1 and 1/2 cup
4. Water  3 cups

For Radbi

1. Milk   2 cups
2. Condensed Milk    1/2 cup
3. Saffron   15-20 strands
4. Cardamom Powder   a pinch
5. Slivered Almonds   3 tbsp
6. Chopped Pistachios   3 tbsp

Method
For Rabdi

• In a small bowl add warm milk and saffron strands and keep it aside.
• Bring 2 cups of milk in a sauce pan to boil. 

• Once it starts boiling and frothy turn the heat to medium, add saffron soaked milk and stir well and let it cook for another 10 minutes till it turns thick.
• Then add condensed milk, stir well and let it boil for another 5-10 minutes, by this time the milk has thicken even more and turned creamy.

• Now add cardamom powder and chopped nuts and stir well and simmer for few more minutes and turn off the heat. That's it creamy and saffron flavored Rabdi ready.

For Chenna Discs

• In a sauce pan, add milk and bring it to boil, when it starts boiling and frothy, add 2 tbsp yogurt and stir well.
• It will start curdling, keep stirring and after a minute interval add another 2 tbsp of yogurt and keep stirring.
• Continue heating and stirring until milk completely curdles and you see the whey water separated.
• Then switch off the stove.
• Now take a cheese cloth and cover it over a large bowl, this is to collect the whey water.(don't throw it, use it to knead chapathi dough, soup, gravy)
• Immediately strain the paneer and wash the strained paneer/chenna once in running water and squeeze the excess water completely. If you want you can let it hang for 20-30 minutes. But i squeezed completely and started kneading the paneer instantly.
• Transfer the drained paneer to a wide bowl or plate, now it will look crumble like texture.

• Now start kneading it to a smooth and soft dough for 6-7 minutes. It should form a soft and smooth dough.
• Then divide the paneer into 12 small balls and flatten it to from disc.
• After that in a pressure cooker or sauce pan, add sugar and water stir well and bring it to boil.
• Once it started boiling add the chenna discs and close the pressure cooker with lid and pressure cook in medium high heat for 1 whistle.

• after one whistle, turn the heat to low and cook for another 5 minutes.
• Once the pressure cools down open the lid and and now take the cooked chenna disc out using a slotted spatula and squeeze the excess sugar syrup by pressing it with a another flat spatula and drop in to the prepared Warm Rabdi.

• Refrigerate Rasmalai for 1-2 hours and serve chilled. Add some more chopped pistachios on top while serving.

Notes:
I cooked rabdi and prepared chenna/paneer simultaneously. This way it is easy and quick to finish the dessert.
Adding condensed milk give nice creamy and richness to the rabdi, but you can also use sugar, if so cook milk for long time to get thicken.
Adjust condensed milk quantity to your taste, can add up to 3/4 cup for more sweetness the above one was mild and perfect to us.
I used Organic whole milk for both making Rabdi and Chenna/paneer.
Instead of pressure cooking, you can also cook on stove top till the chenna disc floats on top and turns soft, spongy and floats on top.