Pazham Pradhaman - Vishu Special

Nendram pazham is one of my fav variety of banana. My mil buys that almost twice a week. My MIL born and brought up in Palakkad, so there will always a kerala touch in our menu. This is a perfect payasam for vishu.

Ingredients:

·         Nendram banana – 4 – ground into smooth paste

·         Jaggery – as much as the quantity of banana paste

·         Water – 2 cups

·         Semi thick Coconut milk – 1 cup

·         Ghee – 2 tbsp

·         Cashews – around 10 roughly chopped.
·         Cardamon powder - 1/4 tsp

Preparation:

Extract thick milk from half a coconut. You can also use store bought coconut milk, Or dilute store bought coconut milk with about 1 cup of water.

Roughly chop cashews and fry them in ghee till golden brown.

Cut nendram pazham into slices and grind it into smooth paste. Keep it aside

Method:

Measure same amount of jaggery as the banana paste.  1:1 ratio. You can also reduce a lil if you prefer a less sweeter version.

Heat a thick bottom vessel, add jaggery and a cup of water and let the jaggery melt completely in the water. There is no need to attain any string consistency, just melting should be fine. Switch off the stove and strain the impurities from the jaggery syrup if any.

Now in another vessel, add the banana paste and a cup of water and heat until the banana gets cooked well and attain a shiny consistency. For about 5 mins.

Add the jaggery syrup into the banana paste and let it cook for about 10 mins with occasional stirring till it starts boiling. 

Switch off the stove, add the coconut milk.

Add fried cashews.

Add cardamon powder. Mix well.

Payasam ready.

Serve it either hot or cold. 

Pazham Nurukku

This dish takes me back few decades where my paru patty (Grandma) used to pamper me with this wonderful yet simple dish. Pazham Nurukku. Kerela Special.

This is such a kids friendly delight. Nendram pazham is such healthy variety of plantain. For kids, it is usually given steamed and mashed with lil sugar and Ghee added. My grandma use to steam it with Jaggery and add ghee as final touch. The house smells with the aroma of the banana with jaggery. Cardamom added will make the aroma reach the streets.

This weekend I made this along with my daughter. She was patiently watching me and when I gave her to eat it, she licked the plate clean. The jaggery sauce flavoured with cardamom and plantain will do all the magic.

Note: The plantain should not be overripe or neither too firm. Overripe bananas will get smashed while steaming. Very firm ones will harden when u steam it. So it should be in between stage.

Ingredients:

·         Nendram Banana – 3

·         Jaggery – 3 tbsp  (Pagu variety)

·         Cardamom powder – ¼ tsp

·         Ghee – 1 tsp

·         Water – 1 cup 

Method:

Peel and cut the bananas into 3 pieces like shown below.

Add jaggery and water in a kadai. Once Jaggery is melted, filter it to remove any impurities.

Transfer the filtered jaggery syrup to same kadai ; add the cut bananas and cardamom powder. I dint have cardamom powder, so I slit the pods and added them.

Cover the kadai with the lid and steam it for 10 mins with constant checking it between. Time varies based on how ripe they are. Cook till they are glossy and soft. Make sure the bananas wont stick in the kadai.

If it is over ripened bananas then u can reduce the time to 5 mins, as they will be cooked very soon.

As a final touch add a tea spoon of ghee to it and slightly mix it.

 

Serve it hot. While giving for small kids, smash the bananas and feed it.