Gajar (Carrot) ka Halwa

This is one of the most popular sweets and also one of the first sweets any Indian would try their hand at, probably second only to Gulab Jamun, in both aspects.
I found these really tempting juicy red carrots in Yelahanka Farmers' market the other day and immediately decided to make halwa for no particular occasion. I could not see any better reason for those red carrots to be born in this world than to be part of my halwa. Although carrot halwa can be made with both red and orange carrots, red carrots are sweeter and give a deeper colour to the halwa, enhancing its taste and visual appeal.
The recipe is a classic one with no improvisation. One basic thumb rule that I apply in making most sweets is "Do not improvise or experiment. It could be disastrous". This is exactly the opposite of the philosophy I follow for my other dishes, where I always give a signature twist to the existing recipe, use my intuition a lot and remix multiple recipes from the net and create one that suits me best. But probably sweet dishes were meant to be made akkakka... akkakka means "copy paste". Or WYGMIWYM ( What your grandmom made is what you make). Of course, I safely make minor variations like adjusting the amount of sugar/ghee depending on my momentary health-consciousness-index, but I havent ventured farther than that.....yet.

Ingredients:

1. Carrots - 1 kg
2. Milk - 1 litre
3. Sugar - 200- 300 grams ( depends on how sweet you like the halwa to be)
4. Ghee - 1 tbsp or even less if you like it less fatty.
5. Cardamom - 3 pods ( powdered)
6. Raisins - 2 tsp
7. Cashews ( broken in half ) - 2 tsp.



pic 1



pic 2



pic 3



pic 4



pic 5



pic 6

 
Procedure:

1. Grate the carrots ( pic 1)
2. In a large (preferably non-stick) pan, add the grated carrots and milk and boil on medium flame. (pic 2)
3. Keep stirring occasionally, making sure the milk does not boil over and the mixture does not stick to the pan.The carrots should get cooked in the milk and the remaining milk should condense/evaporate.  This would take around 45 minutes to an hour. After this stage the mixture would look lighter in colour. (pic 3)
4. Now, when there is no liquid milk remaining in the mixture, add sugar and cardamom powder and stir continuously. As soon as we add sugar and stir, the mixture will become more liquid and also darken in colour. ( pic 4). Keep stirring until the liquid evaporates. (pic 5)
5. In another small pan, heat the ghee and roast the cashews in it till they turn light golden. Add only the cashews to the mixture and in the remaining ghee, mix in the raisins. There is no need to heat/fry the raisins. The raisins will swell up in the hot ghee even without being on flame. Add the raisins and the ghee to the mixture and stir in well till the ghee is absorbed. (pic 6)
6. Switch off the flame.
7. Serve as dessert. It can be served hot or cold. Best served with ice-cream.