Mom’s Besan Ladoo

Diwali brings out the bawarchi in me. I may not be an expert at every item on a faral platter, but I love the joy of making them. And besan ladoo, the queen of the Mumbai platter in my book, always deserves her place.

These are Mom’s ladoos. Besan, ghee, powdered sugar and that familiar nutty aroma that tells you the roasting is finally getting somewhere. Simple ingredients, but they ask you to stay by the pan for a while. For me, that is part of Diwali beginning.

Besan ladoos are also tied to the beginning of my recipe-writing journey. In 2011, when I had briefly moved to Queen Anne in Seattle, I started a little Blogspot blog called Shades of Yellow. It was Diwali, and besan ladoos with rava and bura sugar were part of that first chapter. I liked the extra crunch, and years later, that memory found its way back into my kitchen.

For the first Diwali in our new Edmonton home in 2022, I made that besan-rava version again. I watched the fall leaves outside while stirring the besan and ghee, thinking about that first blog post. Seattle, Mumbai, Edmonton. Blogspot, WordPress, Instagram. So much had changed around the recipe, while the act of making it still felt familiar.

There have been little variations along the way. A friend’s mom taught me to make bura sugar, or tagaar, and I fell for its grainy crunch. Other years, I return to powdered sugar, just as Mom used for so many Diwalis. In 2023, a few dry-roasted almond slivers brought the crunch instead.

That is what I love about keeping these recipes. They hold more than a list of ingredients. They hold the homes we have cooked in, the people we learnt from, and the different versions of ourselves who stood stirring the same pan.

Mom’s Besan Ladoo

Ingredients

Ingredients

• 2 cups besan (gram flour)
• ½ cup ghee, plus up to ¼ cup more only if needed
• 1 cup powdered sugar, or 1 cup prepared bura sugar/tagaar for a grainier texture
• Ground cardamom, to taste
• Almond slivers or finely chopped cashews, optional
• Raisins, optional, for topping

Instructions

Method

• Roast the nuts. If using almonds or cashews, dry-roast them gently until fragrant and lightly golden. Set aside.
• Begin the besan. Melt ½ cup ghee in a heavy pan over low to medium-low heat. Add the besan and stir thoroughly, breaking up any lumps.
• Give it time. Keep stirring and scraping the base so the besan roasts evenly. It will gradually deepen to a golden colour, smell nutty and loosen in the pan. My batch takes around 30 minutes. Follow those cues rather than the clock, and lower the heat if it colours too quickly. Do not add extra ghee simply because the mixture looks thick at the start.
• Add nuts and cool. Stir in the roasted nuts, then transfer to a bowl so the hot pan does not continue cooking the flour. Let it become lukewarm, with no strong heat left in it.
• Mix in the sweetness. Add the powdered sugar or prepared bura sugar and cardamom. Mix very well, making sure there are no pockets of sugar. Adding sugar to hot besan can melt it and make shaping difficult.
• Check the texture. If the mixture feels too soft to shape, let it cool a little longer. If it is cool enough but still crumbles when pressed, work in a teaspoon of melted ghee at a time, staying within the extra ¼ cup allowance. Use only what is needed.
• Roll the ladoos. Divide into portions of your preferred size. Press each portion together, then roll between your palms. Add a raisin on top if you like, pressing it in gently. Let the ladoos firm up before packing.

Notes

The main quantities are from my own 2023 recipe: 2 cups besan, 1 cup sugar and ½–¾ cup ghee. Nuts and raisins are optional additions; no serving count is specified.

For the texture I loved in my 2021 reel, use prepared bura sugar instead of powdered sugar. This is crystallised sugar with a fine, grainy texture; it is not brown sugar. Measure 1 cup of the finished bura sugar for this batch.

My homemade method uses 4 parts granulated sugar to 1 part water. Start with 1 cup sugar and ¼ cup water in a heavy pan. Heat gently until the sugar dissolves, then increase the heat and stir as the syrup thickens and starts turning grainy. Once it crystallises, turn off the heat and continue stirring as it cools so it does not set into one hard lump. Cool completely and sieve out hard clumps before measuring it for the ladoos. The finished yield can vary; do not assume the starting cup of sugar produces exactly one cup of bura.

The 2022 photograph and story refer to besan-rava ladoos, made as an ode to my first blog post in Seattle. The measured recipe here is the besan-only version from my 2023 reel. I have kept the rava version in the story rather than guess its proportions and call it the same recipe.

Course: Dessert

Cuisine: Indian

For more Diwali favourites, try Karanji / Nevri and Mom’s Poha Chivda.