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Celebrating Christmas Eve with Sweet Pongal

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Here’s wishing you all a very Happy and Cheerful Christmas & Happy Holidays! Celebrating the Lord’s birthday with this sweet dish as an offering to HIM!


Sweet pongal is a sweet and pudding-like dish that is traditionally prepared in South India for the harvest festival of Makar Sankranti festival celebrated on January 14th.In the rural villages people gather in front of their homes and cook the ’sweet pongal’ in earthen clay pots.The courtyards are decorated with long shalks of sugarcane and under it this sweet dish is prepared.

This sweet is also prepared as ‘naivedyam’ or ‘prasadam’ as an offering to God during various festivals of India.


Ingredients:

1 cup raw rice
1/4 cup moong dhal (green gram lentil)
1 1/4 cup grated or powdered jaggery
5-6 cardamoms (powdered)
10-12 cashewnuts
8-10 raisins
2 tbsp ghee

Dry roast whole green gram dal till light brown in colour.Remove from fire.
Wash rice.Pressure cook the rice and dal till it becomes very soft and mushy.Alternately you can cook the rice and green gram dal with 3 1/4 cups of water in the microwave and set aside.
Heat jaggery in half cup of water till it dissolves completely.
Add the cooked rice and dal to the jaggery and cook on low flame for few minutes.Turn off heat.
Heat ghee and add the cashewnuts and raisins and fry till brown and add these along with the ghee to the sweet pongal.Now add the cardamom powder and mix well.
It can be served hot or cold.




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By sailu • Dec 24th, 2005 • Category: All Recipes, Dals & Legumes, Desserts, Indian Sweets, South Indian Recipes

17 Responses »

  1. Paz on December 25th, 2005 at 1:13 pm:

    Beautiful Christmas tree! Merry Christmas to you and a Happy New Year! This dish looks very interesting. What is jaggery? I’ll have to look that up.

    Best,
    Paz

  2. sailu on December 25th, 2005 at 5:09 pm:

    Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to you too,Paz.
    Jaggery is a “natural” sweetener made by the concentration of
    sugarcane juice WITHOUT the use of any chemicals / synthetic additives
    or preservatives.It contains an enormous wealth of minerals / protein
    / vitamins.Its a whole sugar , traditional, unrefined and is one of
    the most wholesome and healthy sugars in the world. Its available in most indian grocery stores and its also called ‘gur’or panela.

  3. Kalyn on December 26th, 2005 at 7:04 am:

    See, I was not the only one who did not know what jaggery was!! Indira was kind enough to explain that one to me. I am so enjoying learning more about new foods from you. I hope you will have a great new year in 2006.

  4. arun tatikonda on December 26th, 2005 at 12:53 pm:

    hi sailu, happy holidays, good blog on our andhra and indian recipes.good work..

  5. Anonymous on December 26th, 2005 at 12:56 pm:

    good blog on food

  6. sailu on December 26th, 2005 at 1:20 pm:

    Kalyn,wishing you and your family a wonderful X’mas and a Very Happy New Year!

    Arun,thanks for your kind words and wish you and your family a wonderful New Year!

    Thanks,Anonymous.

  7. Tina Jennifer D'Silva on December 26th, 2005 at 5:09 pm:

    Hey Sailu, Compliments of the Season & wishing you a very happy new years too… Your blog is really great & I’ve tried out a few recipes which turned out awesome. Infact, I have also told my friends abt your blog & they check it daily. Hope to see you with more & more of your yummy recipes in 2006…

  8. paz on December 26th, 2005 at 7:30 pm:

    Thanks for the explanation, Sailu. It’s always good to learn something new.

    Best,
    Paz

  9. prasad on December 27th, 2005 at 4:46 am:

    Hello Sailu, Happy holidays..& Happy Christmas..

  10. sailu on December 27th, 2005 at 8:18 am:

    Thanks Tina and wishing you and your family a wonderful new year!

    Your most welcome,Paz.

    Wishing you and family a wonderful New Year,Prasad.

  11. Melissa CookingDiva on December 27th, 2005 at 9:48 pm:

    Sailu! Happy New Year :) This is a delicious dessert. I like it very much, will have to try your recipe now! Hugs,

  12. CJ's Food & Discovery on December 29th, 2005 at 5:48 am:

    Sailu,

    Belated Merry Christmas..I’m sure you had a wonderful time with your family! I link you if its okay!

  13. sailu on December 29th, 2005 at 9:10 am:

    Melissa,do try it and wish you a wonderful NEW YEAR!

    Cj,thanks for dropping by and a belated Merry X’mas to you too.Here’s wishing you a wonderful NEW YEAR!

  14. rums on December 29th, 2005 at 2:52 pm:

    hey sailu! come back soon, i’m missing looking and reading about all the nice stuff you cook :)

  15. Jag on December 29th, 2005 at 7:55 pm:

    Happy New Year to you Sailu!

  16. Lera on December 30th, 2005 at 12:24 pm:

    Sailu, thanks for the greetings,hope you too are enjoying the holiday season…

    Wishing you the Best for 2006 that life can give you “May each day of the coming year be vibrant bringing along many reasons for celebrations”

  17. chanit on December 31st, 2005 at 2:03 pm:

    Happy New Year !

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