Thandai

The Season of Bloom is here 🙂

Holi heralds the beginning of spring and historically there is a religious story of good defeating evil. We feast at Holi, getting ready to celebrate as a family, and dedicating entire days to cooking.

Holi is about having lots of fun. The combination of colours and food brings back lovely wonderful, heady memories.

As children, we would chase each other in the neighbour hood smearing colours on each other’s faces and stuffing ourselves with as many sweets as possible. I remember relishing on kachoris and karanjis (crisp deep fried pastries filled with a delicate mixture of shredded coconut, dates, sultanas and nuts) as a child.

When you try these foods, you know spring is finally here. 🙂 For this Holi, I only dished out Thandai. Blame it on my super busy schedule at work. 😉 Well, at least the spirit of Holi was celebrated.

It is a super simple refreshing drink that can easily be made at home. The drink tastes exotic with saffron flavour and the spices elevate it to another level.

INGREDIENTS

Milk – 1/2 liter (2 cups)

Powdered Sugar – adjust to your taste

Saffron – 6 to 8 strands

To grind to a paste:

Almonds – 20

Poppy seeds – 1 tsp

Fennel seeds – 1 tsp

Cardamom powder – 1/4 tsp

Peppercorns – 10

METHOD

1. Soak almonds, poppy seeds, fennel seeds, cardamom powder and pepper corns in water for 30mins.
2. Peel almonds and grind it with the other ingredients to a smooth paste.
3. Soak saffron strands in warm milk and keep aside.
4. Meanwhile boil milk and let it cool down.
5. Add the paste to the milk and refrigerate to give little resting time for it to get blended well with milk up to an hour.
6. Strain the milk and discard the residue.
7. Add the remaining saffron milk and refrigerate until ready to serve.
8. Garnish with sliced pistachios and rose petals.

Serve chilled.

Do try this and do not forget to like, comment and share if you like what you see here. 🙂

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Love & Hugs,

Trupti