For Indians, September-October-November are festive months. Major festivals like Ganesh Chaturthi, Navratri and Deepavali are back to back these months. Shopping, Food, Fun and Worshipping God adds magic to our lives during this period every year.

Shopping and Fun reminds me of Zak Salaam India Expo where I will be speaking about the latest trends in Motherhood in the Parent Panel Discussion. If you are in Singapore, do join on 20th October at 6:00 PM at Singapore Expo Hall 6B.

Coming back to the topic, what’s festivals without food? Remembering my Grandma’s elaborate cooking for festivals still makes me drool. My mom also cooks yummylicious and special food during festivals.

For me, I like to cook and prefer to feed home cooked food to my family as much as I can. Of course, I can’t cook too elaborate meals and try to keep the ritual of cooking simple, quick and relaxing.

Here is my recipe to make Bottle Gourd Sweet AKA Dudhi Halwa that is very famous and tastes heavenly.

Seriously straightforward and it should be done under 30 minutes.

Ingredients:

One young bottle gourd

Milk powder

Condensed milk

Dry fruits powder

Ghee or Clarified butter

Milk

Steps:

1. Peel and grate bottle gourd. Remove seeds.

Tip: don’t keep it grated too long else it will turn watery and the color becomes rusty. I prefer to use young bottle gourd (thin and green color) because it’s fast to cook.

2. Remove water if any from the bottle gourd

3. Add 3-4 tablespoons of ghee to the pan. Heat up a bit and add grated bottle gourd to it.

4. Keep trying for 5-7 mins. This will remove the rawness of the bottle gourd. You can start getting fragrance and that’s the time for the next step.

5. Add 3-4 tablespoons of condensed milk (or more if you want sweeter taste or less if you want to keep it low sugar). I didn’t add white sugar at all.

https://flic.kr/p/2aB8SQH

6. Add 6-8 tablespoons of Milk powder. Traditionally, they use Khoa or mawa but I didn’t have it so I decided to use milk powder. It acted as a great replacement and gave me a superb taste.

7. Mix well. I added dryfruit and spices powder at this time.

8. Add one cup of milk or more. I wanted soft and smooth consistency so added a bit more.

9. Keep mixing and bring the mixture to the boil.

10. Keep boiling and mixing on a low flame until desired consistency is achieved.

https://flic.kr/p/NeCHcZ

Serving suggestions:

Your bottle gourd sweet can be served in silver bowls or glass or steal bowls. You can eat it during lunch or after lunch.

I served it slight differently in ice cream glasses topped with pieces of walnuts.

How do you like my Dudhi Halwa Recipe? Do you do it differently? Pls share your recipe with me too.

Love our blog which is among TOP 15 Singapore Family and Parenting blogs and Top 30 Lifestyle blogs?…Check our portfolio here. Drop a line on [email protected] to collaborate with us for your products and services or Click here to get in touch with us.