Rasgulla

Rasgulla is a syrupy Bengali dessert and is made from ball shaped dumplings of chana/chena/paneer  (an Indian cottage cheese), cooked in light syrup made of sugar. This is done until the syrup permeates the dumplings. The dish originated in East India.

You can get a store bought ones in a flash but nothing beats the taste of making it at home using your own rasgulla recipe and that's why I am here to share my family favorite rasgulla recipe with you all.

Texture is squeezy, juicy and chewy. Tastes like heaven and my husband likes to call them white beauties

Rasgulla recipe- I kept it simple, first making the chana/paneer, second cooking the chena/paneer balls and third boiling and soaking them in sugar syrup. That's all and now you can enjoy eating the best rasgulla with your loved ones.

I have had tried rasgulla many times and after facing few failures I finally succeeded. There are few points to remember on during its preparation then you will end up with an amazing white little beauties in light sweet syrup.
Points to be noted-
1. For cooking chena take deep broad vessel and put only few balls at a time and do not over crowed because chena expands during cooking and become double in size. I have used a sauce pan with transparent lid as I love watching my rasgulla puffing😉.
2. Once you finish making/rolling chena balls, remember to cover the balls with a wet kitchen towel to keep them moist.
3. Another important point is the amount of heat and timing. Its essential to slide cheese balls only when sugar water is boiling hot/rolling boil.

Do let me know how it turned out for you.
Step by step pictures and procedure on how to make rasgulla!

Prep time: 5 minutes
cooking time: 25 minutes
waiting time: (3+5)minutes +3hours(chilling)
Cuisine: Bengal/Indian
Type: Sweet/Dessert
Yields: approx 15P

Ingredients:

Full fat milk - 1litre
Lemon juice - 50ml approx
White sugar - 1&1/2 cups (little less or more, as per your taste)
Water - 4 cups
A glass of warm water

Method:

                                                          

1.) Pour milk into a big pan and bring to boil by stirring it.
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2.) Reduce heat and slowly add the lemon juice to it and give a stir .
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3.) It should start to curdle straight away.
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4.) Remove it from the heat and leave it for 5 minutes, give the acid time to completely separate the curds and whey.
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5.) Meanwhile, line a sieve with a large piece of muslin cloth or cheese cloth or a big napkin and place it over a big pan or bowl.
6.) Carefully pour the mixture into the sieve to collect the curds in the muslin cloth.
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7.) Place it under cold running water to get rid of any left over whey.
8.) Gather the muslin cloth in your hand and squeeze out the excess liquid and leave it hang for 5 minutes, this way it removes the excess water from chena/milk fat but remember we still need moitured chena/milk fat  for making this soft and delicious sweet balls.
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9.) Untie the muslin cloth and transfer paneer/milk fat to a plate.
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10.) Crumble it with your clean hand. It should be crumbly and little moist. If it is too dry, rasgulla will turn hard and if it is too moist, they will break while cooking and will not retain their shape after cooking and you will end up with broken rasgulla.
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11.) Knead it using hand until it all comes together like dough and it starts to release some fat. Your palm will turn little greasy, its an indication that it has started to release fat. Stop kneading after that.
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12.) Now make small balls from kneaded paneer dough and make sure it has absolutely no cracks and  cover them with a wet towel. The size of balls will increase to almost to double after boiling in sugar syrup. so do not make very large balls.
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13.) Heat water and sugar together on a low medium heat until sugar dissolves completely then increase the heat to medium high and bring it to rolling boil.
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14.) When it comes to rolling boil, gently drop prepared balls to it.
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15.) Cover it with lid and cook them for 20 minutes and do not open the lid through out the cooking but you can shake the pan slowly couple of times while cooking with lid on, so that the balls will get a chance to move around.
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16.) Off the stove. Its time for checking the doneness of rasgulla, for this take a glass of warm water and slowly drop one rasgulla in it. It is done, if the rasgulla sits at the bottom of the glass silently without dancing around. It needs more cooking, if the rasgulla dancing around and floating means its not fully cooked inside and needs to be cooked for few more minutes then it will be done.
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17.) Once the rasgulla's are completely cooked, take out all the rasgullas into a bowl(without water syrup). Now strain the sugar syrup to a different bowl this way we takeout all the small paneer/milk fat particles. Finally add the rasgulla balls to the strained sugar syrup, cool it completely and cover  with lid and serve at room temperature or serve it chill by refrigerating for at least 3 hours. I prefer chilled ones. Refregerate them and consume in 4 to 5 days time.

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