Can you imagine celebrating Diwali without the soft Gulab Jamuns ?

Gulab jamun is a milk-solids -based dessert, similar to a dumpling. . It is made mainly from milk solids, traditionally from freshly curdled milk. In India, milk solids are prepared by heating milk over a low flame for a long time until most of the water content has evaporated. These milks solids are kneaded into a dough, sometimes with a pinch of flour, and then shaped into small balls and deep fried at a low temperature . The balls are then soaked in a light sugar syrup flavored with green cardamom and rosewater.

Gulab Jamun is among India's most popular desserts! This delicious dessert consists of dumplings traditionally made of thickened or reduced milk, soaked in rose flavored sugar syrup. Gulab means rose (for the rose flavored syrup) and Jamun which is a kind of deep purple colored Indian berry (the cooked dumplings are dark brown in colour). Serve Gulab Jamun warm or at room temprature; by itself or topped with ice cream!

There may be a veritable spread of the most yummiest sweets and savories being laid out for the festivities and the gorging is incomplete without some succulent sweet melt in the mouth Gulab Jamuns.

Jostling for the pride of place on the festive platter , this sweet can be prepared in a jiffy and in a moments notice thanks to the enormous no of branded ready to make mixes which gives amazing results in no time and for first timers and young people , this is no doubt a boon for whipping up some yummy jamuns .

But there is something to be said about preparing this bowl of yummies from scratch and there isnt any long procedure involved either. The ingredients will definitely be available as this is made using skimmed milk powder.

A pack of skimmed milk powder sitting idle drew my attention and I had to find out whether I could replace the calorie laden khoa normally used in making gulab jamuns, with skimmed milk powder.

Happily not only did I get the most amazingly succulent jamuns , they tasted just as good too. Great colour on the exterior, crack free and smooth spongy inside totally absorbing the syrup.

Ingredients:

1/2 cup All purpose powder + 2 tbsp , just in case you need it to make a smooth non sticky dough.

1 cup skimmed milk powder.

1 tbsp butter or melted ghee

small pinch of baking soda

2 cups sugar

1 1/2 cups water

Saffron strands.

Cardamom powder or rose essence.

Slivers of Pistachio for garnish.

Method

Mix flour, skimmed milk powder baking soda, ghee and rub well till the mixture appears like fine crumbs.

Make a very soft dough with very little water , just add tablespoons of water at a time and just enough to make a smooth dough. Cover and let it side for 10 minutes

Prepare the sugar syrup by boiling the sugar and water and first remove the impurities which will float on the top with a ladle.

Add the saffron strands, rose essence if adding it or cardamom powder and make the syrup to a lightly sticky one.

Keep the prepared sugar syrup aside and proceed to make the gulab jamuns.

Take the dough out and if it seems to have hardened a bit, don't panic, just add few drops of water or milk to soften the dough and knead softly till it becomes a smooth dough once again.

Grease your hands well if the dough appears to be sticky to handle. Make small balls of the dough and not too tight or firm.

Roll the small balls gently avoiding cracks. Before making the small balls , grease your palm and roll a soft ball.

Keep the oil on a moderate heat and slide the prepared jamuns in the oil carefully and fry them keeping the flame on a low when the oil appears to be heated up to prevent darkening of the jamuns too soon.

Drain the fried jamuns on a paper towel and drop into the prepared syrup to absorb the sweetness.

Garnish with pistachio slivers.

Even though these jamuns were made using skimmed milk powder, I couldn't see any difference in the taste or aroma.