Kala Jamun

Kala jamun is a delicious North Indian sweet dish widely used on the special
occasion, like festival or entertaining the guests. Kala jamuns are dark black
in color and beautiful to look at. Kala means black in Hindi and jamun is an
Indian fruit which is dark purple color. This sweet name kala-jamun is supposedly named after them.

Kala jamun are another version of gulabjamun. They are prepared same way as gulab jamun, but they are larger and darker in color then gulab jamuns and their presentation is decorative. Kala jamun balls are either made round or cylindrical in shape and they are fried till they turn dark black. After soaking in the syrup they are cut in half and decorated with khoya (thicken milk) and nuts. They look very attractive. Any one will be tempted to eat them.

Kala Jamuns are prepared same way as gulab jamuns (See Gulab jamuns)

Ingredients

2 Cup dry powder milk (Nonfat dry powder milk)
¾ Cup all-purpose flour (Gulten free all-purpose flour if you have guten allergy)
½    Teaspoon baking powder
2 Teaspoon sugar
2     Tablespoon yogurt
2     Tablespoon melted butter
1½  Cup heavy whipping cream or as needed to make the dough
Vegetable oil for frying Gulab Jamaun's     Makes about 30 Kala Jamaun's

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Dry Milk Powder

All-Purpose Flour (Maida)

Heavy cream

Yogurt

Melted Butter

Sugar

Baking powder

Oil

Ingredients for garnishing:

1   16 oz container ricotta cheese (full or part skim- substitute for khoya)
¼   Cup thin sliced almonds
¼ Sliced pistachio
¼   Cup of sugar or to your taste.

Ricotta cheese

Almonds- Sliced

Pistachio - Sliced

Ingredients for sugar syrup:

3 To 3½ Cups of sugar or to your taste
5 Cups of water
2 Teaspoons of Lemon juice
1 Teaspoon cardamoms seeds
Few leaves of saffron

Sugar

Lemon juice

Cardamoms seeds

Saffron strings

Directions for making the syrup:

1. Choose a wide pan to make syrup, so that all the Kala jamauns get enough
space to soak well in the syrup.

2. Place the pan on the stove and add water.

3. Add sugar & mix it well. Boil on medium heat until sugar dissolve completely.

In a pan add water

Mix Sugar well with water

Add sugar

Let the sugar water boil

4. While the Water is boiling in the Mortar and pestle add Cardamoms seeds
and saffron and crush.

Crush Cardamoms seeds and Saffron

Crushed Cardamoms & Saffron

5. Add crushed cardamoms and saffron in syrup and keep string periodically.

6. Add lemon juice in the syrup that will keep the sugar liquid prevent form
crystallizing

7. Boil the water for ½ hour to 45 minutes or until the syrup become little thick.
It will be still runny and only slightly sticky (no thread consistency).

8. Syrup should be made earlier and kept warm.

Add crushed Cardamoms & Saffron

Add lemon juice

Syrup is ready

Directions for making the Khoya: (cheese for decoration)

Khoya is also known as Mawa. It is difficult to find khoya outside of India but you can substitute it by using powdered milk mixed with heavy cream or ricotta cheese. Khoya is lower in moisture then ricotta cheese that is the reason we need to dry the water from the ricotta and make it like khoya.

1. Transfer the ricotta cheese from container to a bowl.

2. With a hand mixer whip the Cheese for 4 to 5 minutes or until Cheese becomes
smooth and fluffy. (You can prepare without wiping the ricotta cheese, but
whipping make the cheese smooth.)

Ricotta cheese

Whip Ricotta cheese

3.  In a non-stick pan and add ricotta cheese, and cook on medium heat, keep
      stirring periodically.

4.   Once the ricotta cheese melt and start splattering, turn the heat to low.

Whipped Ricotta cheese

Transfer whipped cheese in a pan

5. Frequently keep stirring and scraping the sides of the pan and keep mashing
the lumps.

Stir cheese frequently

Stir and scrape the cheese from sides

6. In about 20 to 30 minutes all the water will dry up, add crushed cardamoms
and sugar, mix and frequently keep stirring because khoa burn very quickly.

Cheese turn to light cream color

Add sugar & crushed cardamom seeds

All the moisture is evaporated

Cheese become like Khoya

Directions for making the dough for Kala Jamun:

1. In a bowl add powdered milk.

2. Add All-purpose flour.

Powder Milk

Add All-purpose flour

3. Add baking powder and mix.

4. Add sugar and mix.

5. Add yogurt and mix.

6. Add melted butter.

Add baking powder

Add yogurt

Add sugar and mix

Add melted butter

7. Mix all the ingredients well with powder milk and flour.

Mix all the ingredient well

All the ingredients mixed well

8. Add whipping cream little at a time and bind the mixture with your fingers
      to form loose and sticky dough.

9. Do not apply to much pressure, just gently mix and put the dough together.
   Scrape your fingers with a knife or the edges of the plate.

10.   Cover the dough with a damp cloth and let it rest for 10 minutes.

Add cream in milk powder & flour mix

Gooey sticky Dough

Mix cream with Milk powder mix

Cover the dough with damp towel

11. As the dough sits it becomes little dry because the moisture is absorbed by the
dry milk and flour.

12. If you have leftover whipping cream then add that or add little milk and mix.
Do not knead just use your fingers to mix. If the dough is sticking then grease
your hand and make it soft and smooth. At this point dough is not sticky.

Mix and make the dough soft

Kala jamaun dough

13. Wash your hands and take a portion of the dough and knead and roll over the
rolling board to make it smooth.

14.   Now take a portion of the dough and make a 1½ “ ball by gently rolling each
       portion between your palms in to a smooth ball or over the rolling board roll
       them in circular motion and make smooth and round balls. The balls should
   not have any cracks otherwise the surface of balls will not come out smooth.
(Number of balls depends on the size of balls you want to make.)

Roll the dough

Take some dough in your hand

Rolled dough balls

15. Place the balls on a plate and cover with a damp yet dry kitchen towel.

Cover the balls with a damp towel

Balls are covered with damp towel

Directions for frying and making the Kala Jamun:

1. Add enough oil in the pan so that it covers whole ball of Kala jamaun. First heat oil until it is medium-hot. Once oil become hot lower the heat to a
medium- low or low and wait for a minute. Then gently place a single dough
ball in the oil to test.

If it sizzles and comes up too quickly, the oil is overheated. It will result in hard Kala jamuns that will remain uncooked from within.
If it stays at the bottom of the pan for more than a minute, the oil is not hot enough.
If it stays down for a few seconds, then sizzles and comes up slowly, it is the right temperature. The oil is ready to be used for frying.
If the dough does not disintegrate while frying, it is perfect, and you can proceed with frying the jamuns.

   Frying Kala jamuns is one of the most important part of making jamuns.
   You have to fry jamuns on low heat and constantly keep flickering oil and
rotating Kala jamaun balls in the oil for even cooking and coloring
   till it gets golden in cooler. This way the jamuns puff and gets cooked from
   inside out. if you fry Kala jamuns on high heat there are chances it might
   get brown on outside and inside will be undercooked.

In a pan add oil and heat

Drop little dough in the oil

2. Gently slip in the balls into the hot oil from the side of the pan, one by one.
Do not fry too many Kala jamun at a time as the Kala jamuns will expand
to about double their original volume.

Gently drop kala jamun balls in hot oil

3. At first balls will sink to the bottom of the oil, do not try to move them,
    Instead, gently shake the pan to keep the balls from browning on just one side.
   In about 5 minutes, the balls will puff up and rise to the surface and begin to
float. Now with a slotted spoon, constantly keep flickering oil and rotating
   them in the oil for even cooking and coloring. It takes about 15 to 20 minutes
   to fry the balls.

Hold the handle of pan and shake

4. If you think you need to separate the balls then take a spoon and hold it upside
down and with the bottom of the spoon or anything thin gently move them.

Very gently move the balls

5. As Kala jamaun expend and float oil gets cloudy.

Oil start getting clouding

6. Oil start clearing and balls began to float and get brown. Keep roatating the
balls in oil with spoon.

Kala jamaun balls began to brown

7. Now increase the heat a little. Keep rotating the balls in oil with spoon.

Kala jamun balls become light brown

Kala Jamaun's start becoming brown

Continue to keep turning Kala Jamuns around

8. Once the balls are fried and evenly brown then increase the heat a little,
because they are cooked from inside and you want to give them dark color.

Kala Jamun's are fried

9. Once Jamuns become dark color with the spatula lift them from the hot oil
and shake the oil out, and place them on a plate over paper towel, so that all
the extra oil absorbed by the towel.

Take the kala jamuns out from hot oil

Place the fried Kala Jamaun's on paper towel

10. Do add kala jamuns in the syrup immediately after frying. let them cool
dawn and then add.

12. Now oil is hot turn the heat down. Once oil cool dawn drop the other batch of
   kala jamuns that will ensure that jamun do not fry quickly. Repeat this until
   all the balls are fried.

13. Once all the balls are fried add them in the syrup and place the pan on the
stove on low heat and give a boil and turn the heat off.

Now the sugar syrup may get cold. So just warm it up and then add Gulab jamun
in the syrup. Jamun will float in the syrup. If they sink in the bottom meaning
they are not fried properly, they are heavy and dense or they are raw from
   inside. Let it sit for 3-4 hours, during this time they will soak up some syrup
and will get slightly bigger in size. They soak well if you leave them over night.

14. In few hours balls will soak the syrup. For the best result leave the jamuns
balls in the syrup overnight.

15. Soaked kala jamun in syrup become little darker in color.

Add fried Kala Jamaun's in the syrup

Soaked in syrup Kala jamuns

16. When balls are soaked, then with a knife cut each ball in half.

With a knife cut each kala jamun in half

17. With a butter knife add a layer of khoa on each halves of Kala jamun’s .

18. Decorate kala jamuns with the sliced pistachio and almonds.

Add layer of khoa

Decorate with slice of pistachio and almonds

19. You can also serve kala jamun warm as Gulab jamun.

Kala Jamuns

Tips:

1. Instead of khoya you can decorate kala jamun with whipping cream.

Kala jamauns

Please take the time to let me know what you think about my recipe. Your comments would be helpful to me to improve the recipe.

Thank you

Geeta Seth

Other recipes:

Gulab jamun                                          Coconut burfi

Rasgulla                                                 Carrot halwa

Rasmalai                                               Kheer (Rice pudding)

Cashew burfi (Kaju katli)                    Soozi ka halwa (Cream of wheat halwa)