Ragi Laddoo for Diwali

What better reason to post after a long gap than Diwali! It’s a low-key Diwali at home this year; Baba, my father-in-law, left us recently, and the son is also studying far away. But marking Diwali with some frenzied activity in the kitchen still feels natural and so I made these quick laddoos last night after a regular day at work. I shared a few pictures in my Instagram stories which had many asking for the recipe and I thought why not “revive” the blog with a quick recipe that anyone with half an hour to spare can make.

All you need is ragi (finger millet) flour, jaggery (unrefined cane sugar), ghee, almonds, and cardamom – all healthy, minimally processed ingredients. I stocked up on the first two ingredients at the just-concluded Women of India Festival 2017 at Dilli Haat showcasing organic products manufactured by women. These laddoos are a great way to include millets in our diet. I will need to make more to share since we’ve already polished off half the lot and it’s not 24 hours since I made these!

Ragi Laddoo
Makes 18 small laddos

2 C ragi flour
1 C grated jaggery
1/2 C ghee
1/2 C chopped almonds
1/8 C edible gum, pounded sand-like grains (optional)
1/4 raisins (optional)
5-6 cardamoms, powdered

Heat a little ghee in a kadahi or a heavy bottomed pan. Add the gum bits and let them puff up and brown lightly. Remove and keep aside. Add chopped almonds to the ghee in the pan and fry till they just begin to brown – a minute or two. Remove and keep aside. In the same pan roast the ragi flour stirring continuously. The above quantity will take just 8-10 minutes. Add the grated jaggery and turn off the heat. Stir till the jaggery starts to melt in the residual heat. Add ghee and all the other ingredients. Mix to combine. When the mixture is cool enough to handle pick up small fistfulls and make into laddoos. If you find it hard to bind them add melted ghee, a little at a time, till you can bind into balls. If the mixture cools too much, warm it up on gentle heat to bring it back to laddoo-binding consistency again.

Happy Diwali to you, dear readers! 😀 Don’t go away; I plan to be back with more short-and-sweet posts!