Fada Lapsi – Sweet Daliya
Fada Lapsi, a perfect festive sweet dish prepared by mostly Gujarati’s during festive season, for housewarming or for any religious occasion. It’s made from cracked wheat. Ghee, sugar or Jaggery, and like every other Indian dish flavored with cardamom.
It’s great sweet dish but it works for a really good breakfast too. We make it every year around Dhanteras. It’s my mom’s recipe. The first time I made it for our housewarming party also to offered it to God for Pooja, I had so many people ask for the recipe later on.
I feel the perfect fada lapsi is the one where fada (cracked wheat) is cooked well and grains are separated. I know people can have personal preference. But I have always loved it when the grains are look separated.
We consider lapsi to be be cooked on auspicious occasions. And, always offered to God first and then we feast on it. Lapsi is also prepared in lot of Indian families other than Gujaratis.
Fada Lapsi is also called Daliya in Hindi. There is another similar dish, that we call Kansaar.
The main ingredient for Lapsi is cracked wheat. I prefer to use coarse variety. But if you prefer finer variety, please use it. There are other savory dishes that we make from cracked wheat too.
There are very few ingredients and its one of the quickest recipes for a big crowd specially if you use pressure cooker. If you use regular pot, then it will take some time.
The ingredients you need – Cracked wheat, ghee, sugar or jaggery and cardamom. Some people also add cinnamon stick and cloves.
Nuts are optional. I love adding saunf (fennel) and coconut chips. Make sure to toast nuts and coconut in ghee.
Fada Lapsi – Sweet Daliya
Ingredients
- 1 cup Fada/Lapsi grains cracked wheat, coarse variety
- 3/4 cup sugar or jaggery or brown sugar
- ¼ cup ghee
- ¼ cup almond meal optional
- Cardamom powder
- Dry fruits -almonds /cashews/sultanas, dry coconut chips, fennel seeds optional
- Saffron optional
Instructions
- Take about 2 tbsp of ghee in a pressure cooker on medium heat. Roast nuts and coconut chips in it. Once they are toasty enough remove them in a small bowl and leave it aside. Do not take out the ghee. We will use it to cook lapsi.
- In the same cooker/pot, if needed take a tbsp of ghee; add your fada/cracked wheat. Toast it until they turn a little bit brown in color. Do not leave it unattended. Keep stirring them so that they do not stick to the pot, and they should not burn.
- Once you see they are toasted well enough, add in 3 cups of water. Stir it well.
- Close the lid of the cooker/pot. Let it cook on medium flame until it whistles for about 5 times. Turn off the stove. Keep it covered and let it cool down.
- Once its slightly cool, open the lid of the cooker and turn on the heat on the stove. Add in sugar or jaggery at this point. Mix it well. The sugar will release water so keep stirring until you see all the water has evaporated from sugar and sugar has melted. You can also add extra ghee if you would like. At this point you can also add in almond meal and the roasted nuts.
- Once the grains look separated and nicely mixed well with the sugar, turn off the heat. Add cardamom powder and mix in well. You can also add saffron dissolved in warm milk if you like, but it’s totally optional.
Notes
- You can use any size of the fada/grains. I chose the bigger/coarse granules. If you choose smaller ones, then the water and cooking time might differ slightly.
- You can do the whole process in a pot, but pressure cooker method is easier and quicker. Keep checking the grains do not stick in the pot method. Add more water if water evaporates and the cracked wheat is not cooked.
- The ratio of water is 1:3. I cup of fada/grains to 3 cups of water. So, you can easily halve the recipe or double the recipe.
- You can also use alternative sugar- brown sugar, coconut sugar, Jaggery, palm sugar, muscovado sugar etc.
- I used white sugar+ couple of spoons of coconut sugar+ a small piece of Jaggery.