CooknDine....: Millets Sweet Pongal

I got addicted to millets and started replacing millets for white rice.Infact these millets taste too good and tastier than the normal polished white rice...I had already posted few recipes made of millets like Kodomillet rice,Millets pongal,Millets Dosa, Kodomillet masala paniyaram etc.

I had already posted the sankaraipongal,the rice version..

For the millets version of the sweet jaggery pongal please click READ MORE below:

INGREDIENTS:

1 Cup of Kodomillet/Quinoa/VaraguArisi/Varagu
3 Cups of water
1/2 Cup of Moong Dhal/Pasi paruppu
1 to 1.5 Cups of Grated Jaggery/Palm jaggery
Fried cashewnuts and raisins to garnish
1/2 Tsp of cardamom powder
3 Tbsp of ghee
A pinch of salt

THIS IS HOW I MADE IT...

Add a tsp of ghee to a pan.
Fry the cashewnuts.
Take them off the pan and keep it aside.
In the same pan add raisins and fry it.Keep them aside.
Care should be taken while frying not to burn the cashews and raisins.

Clean the millets.
In a dry pan roast the moong dhal for fewer minutes.Don't change the colour of it.
Add the slightly roasted dal to the millets.

Add 3 cups of water and soak the millets and dhal together for 15-30 minutes.
Pressure cook it for 3-4 whistles so that it gets cooked well.

After cooking them just mash them little with a spatula.

Take another pan.Add grated jaggery to it and add about 1/4 cup or less of water.let the jaggery get dissolved in water completely.
Strain the jaggery solution to remove the dirts and impurities.

Again heat the jaggery water.
To it add the cooked millets and dhal mixture.
Mix it well and keep the flame in low.
Add the remaining ghee and mix it well.

Add the fried cashews and raisins.
Add cardamom powder and mix well.

When the mixture turns semisolid switch off the flame.The pongal will get thicker on cooling.So take it off from the flame when the mixture is little semi solid in consistency

Serve it hot with a tsp of ghee on it..

HANDY TIPS:

Instead of the normal jaggery u can use palm jaggery or candy sugar too..
If u want it to be little watery ,u can add 1/2 a cup of water more thereby reducing the amount of ghee.
The dish turns little thick after some time.So when u switch off the flame see to it that the pongal is little semisolid in consistency.
Varagu arisi can be substituted with Quinoa/Samai too.