Food Fundas – Diwali Faral

Troubled and worried how you would manage your Diwali this time without help? Upset that your servant left you at the last moment just before Diwali? Frantically searching for your cookery book? Well all your worries are rest assured as this article would deal with all that you needed to know about Diwali Faral. Let us have some Maharashtrians fare from India. The Diwali faral is the sweets and the other savories that we make during this festival. Diwali is a time when we get to make a lot of sweets as it is that time of the year when we celebrate the festival with a whole lot of sweets. Diwali faral is very important as it signifies our efforts towards prosperity and success in the family. Dry fruits and chocolates are very common things to give but Maharashtrian people offer and give Diwali faral to their friends and relatives. People Make Traditional Diwali sweets and namkeen like laddu, Chakli, Chivda, Shankarpale, Karanji and many more. Given below is the recipe for one such important Diwali delicacy.

Chakli

Chakli is the most common Diwali faral in Maharashtra. Let us have an idea how this is made. First of all, you need to know h0w to make the flour.

Ingredients would be:-

• Half a cup of urad dal
• Half a cup of moong dal
• One and a half cup of Chana dal
• Two cups of Rice
• One fourth cup of Sabudana
• Handful of dhania or coriander seeds
• 50 grams of jeera or cumin seeds

Clean all the dals separately. Wash rice and keep it on a sieve. Spread this wet rice on a cloth and then let it dry. Don’t keep it under sunlight. Roast each dal separately. Keep the heat medium. The dals would turn golden in colour. Then dry roast the rice that has been spread out. Dry roast the sago also. Let it turn brown. Roast the cumin seed and also the dhania or coriander seeds. Cool the roasted items. Mix everything and make it a fine powder. This is the way to make chakli flour.

How to make Chakli :-

Ingredients for making chakli would be:-

• A cup of this Chakli flour
• A cup of water
• A small teaspoon of hing or Asafoetida powder
• Two teaspoons of ajwain or carom seeds
• A tablespoon of Red chilli powder
• A tablespoon of oil
• Salt to taste
• Oil for frying

Take a cup of water in a thick bottomed vessel. Then put asafetida powder, carom sees, red chilli powder, sesame seeds, salt and oil. Stir it well. Boil the water.

When the water boils add the chakli flour and stir fast. Reduce the heat and let the vessel be covered for some 10 minutes.

Then put the dough on a plate. Add a little warm water and knead the dough to make it soft.

Now take the Chakli press and then put the dough in it after greasing the press. Put a little dough and press it such that the dough falls like a chakli on the oil which you have kept in the pan for frying.

Drain the chakli and drain it on a tissue paper.

Remember to keep the chakli in an airtight container.

Chivda

Then of course you can have the Chivda which is very popular across Maharashtra.

For this we need the following:-

• Take eight cups of flattened rice or chivda
• Two cups of puffed rice or murmura
• One cup of peanuts
• Around 10 cashew nuts or kaju
• Few curry leaves
• 10 or 12 green chillies. Chop them finely
• Half a cup of oil
• Half a teaspoon of asafoetida
• A teaspoon of haldi or turmeric powder
• Half a teaspoon mustard seeds
• Half a teaspoon of cumin seeds
• Salt and sugar

How to make Chivda :-

Take a pan and dry roast the poha which you could have been previously kept in the sun. Roast the puffed rice also. Keep stirring for some time. Heat the oil and fry the peanuts and the cashew nuts. Drain both on a tissue paper.

Take the mustard seeds and put them in hot oil. Let the mustard seeds splutter and then add the cumin seeds or jeera and also the asafoetida powder or hing. Add the turmeric powder, curry leaves and the chillies. Stir and add the nuts, and the rest of the poha and the puffed rice. Mix well. Add salt and sugar and again mix. Keep the pan covered half for some time.

You can also add raisins, coconut slices, garlic flakes, and amchoor powder depending on your taste.

Shankarpale

Shankarpale is another Diwali faral which is very popular.

Ingredients for this are:-

• A quarter cup milk
• A quarter cup pure ghee
• A quarter cup sugar
• One and a half cups maida (flour)
• Oil for frying

How to make Shankarpale :-

Take milk in a saucepan and also add the sugar and ghee. Heat the mixture till the sugar completely melts. Then let it cool.

Then add Maida or flour to the mixture and make it dough. Keep this dough covered for around 20 minutes. Don’t add all the Maida that you have. Again knead the dough after 20 minutes and divide it into small balls. Sprinkle Maida on a board and roll out the small dough and make it a thin tortilla. Cut the whole into diamond shapes and deep fry the pieces.

Your Shankarpale is ready.

Diwali faral includes other sweets like chirote, karanji, besan ladoo, rava ladoo, mysorepak, barfi, chivda. All over India people make sweets and savories and like to celebrate it with a lot of warmth and love. People also make shankarpale, kadboli etc.