Learn how to make nel pori urundai, a must for karthigai deepam, south Indian festival. With step by step pictures and full video

Ingredients

Nel pori – 4 cups, levelled (approx.)
Jaggery, powdered – 1/2 cup, heaped
Dry ginger powder (optional) – 2 pinches
Dry coconut bits (optional) – 4 tbsp
Roasted Sesame seeds (optional) – 1 tbsp
Ealchi – 1 powdered
Ghee – 2 tsp

Method :

1. 1. First clean the nel pori well to take out the skin, there will be lots of nel, so pick throw away those. Measure the pori, roast slightly to heat it up and keep aside ready.
   2. Fry koppara coconut bits (dry coconut) in ghee and keep aside. Roast sesame seeds too and keep aside. Powder elachi, jaggery.
   3. Heat 1/4 cup water with the powdered jaggery. Continue heating until the jaggery dissolves. Powder jaggery well to make this easy. Filter it to remove any impurities. Add elachi powder, sukku powder, coconut bits, sesame seeds at this stage if adding. I dint add anything as Vj doesn’t like anything in this.

1. 1. Continue heating until you reach soft ball consistency. Do not keep stirring too much.  Just keep checking the padham. That is if you pour little syrup in water and gather with hands, you should be able to form a non sticky soft ball (uruttu padham). Switch off the flame.

1. 1. Add the puffed rice little by little as you keep stirring well. I added as such together, but its always better to add little by little with stirring and stop when you cant see any syrup at the bottom of the pan. Act quickly.

1. 1. Grease hands well with ghee or sesame oil. Make balls out of this, press strongly so that it holds its shape.

Notes

• • Choose dark coloured jaggery for this, white ones may not yield good results.
  • At last, the pori will stick to the pan, just heat it up a bit to loosen it and make use of it until the last pori.
  • Make sure you reach soft ball consistency, otherwise balls wont hold its shape.  Do the syrup in medium flame.
  • Follow the same method for aval pori – you can make your own aval pori by roasting aval, thick variety until it pops.
  • Do not add more than required otherwise wont hold shape the next day. The above measurement is only approx, so add and mix if needed only add everything.